Business Transformation Agency Presents at Northern Virginia Technology Council's Business to Government Event
Communications Division
Business Transformation Agency
November 4, 2008
Arlington, Va. – The Defense Business Transformation Agency's (BTA's) Enterprise Integration (EI) Director Prashant Gaur and BTA Enterprise Planning and Investment (EP&I) Director Paul Ketrick gave a presentation titled "Business Transformation Through Business Systems in the Department of Defense (DoD) - achieving financial, acquisition and logistics visibility across the DoD enterprise" at the Northern Virginia Technology Council's business to government event in McLean, Va. on October 3.
EI Director
Prashant Gaur
EI's Director Prashant Gaur gave an overview of BTA and updated attendees on DoD's business systems and enterprise integration initiatives. He also defined end-to-end business processes, explained the implementation of Enterprise Transition Planning (ERP) and provided examples from the Enterprise Transition Plan (ETP). Gaur underscored industry and small business collaboration to provide support in improving DoD's bottom line.
"It is imperative to have strong continuity of DoD operations," said Gaur. "Tiered accountability and flexibility, integration of financial, logistics and human resource communities' roles are important to advance defense business transformation. The synthesis of acquisition, information technology and functional roles are also key factors for advancing change."
Ketrick gave an overview of the EP&I directorate and its responsibilities, which include the production and maintenance of the Business Enterprise Architecture (BEA) and the ETP. The directorate also supports the Investment Review Boards with the certification process, which optimize investments and ensures statutory compliance. In addition, EP&I developed the Business Capability Lifecycle (BCL) and Enterprise Risk Assessment Methodology (ERAM) frameworks and are actively institutionalizing them in DoD.
EP&I Director
Paul Ketrick
BTA is working collaboratively with other federal agencies, industry partners and Principal Staff Assistants on standardizing policies, data and processes across domains.
"DoD, the world's largest organization, has a critical mission," said Gaur. "As the nature of modern warfare changes, DoD is investing in transforming its business across the Navy, Army, Marine Corps and the Air Force through ERPs, Service Oriented Architecture, BEA and enterprise data standards. DoD is also taking initiatives at senior levels to integrate processes across financial, acquisition and other domains, and across the services from a process and governance perspective."
Gaur reviewed critical factors for implementing ERPs such as governance, business case and business focus, domain integration, people, contracting strategy, solution architecture, master data management and testing. He also defined the benefits of end-to-end business processes and reviewed key elements for achieving transformation in DoD: strategy, culture, information technology and process.
"The strategy and technology usually develop first," said Gaur. "We need to bring a shift in culture, process alignment, and information visibility and reliability up front to account for interoperability across enterprise initiatives. End-to-end business processes help us cut across silos and bring about business transformation. DoD needs to be efficient and agile in the way it moves resources, people and equipment to meet the needs of the warfighter. End-to-end processes help to obtain financial visibility and provide the foundation for accuracy and transparency."