The Defense Department’s first enterprisewide data strategy, released in October, is succinct, coming in at less than 20 pages. But many defense observers say the strategy plants a clear and necessary stake in the ground declaring the importance of good data management at the Pentagon.
The road to realizing the vision isn’t free of challenges, though, and details regarding how the strategy will be are just starting to emerge. Still, experts suggest DOD stay the course.
Tara Murphy Dougherty, chief executive officer of Govini, a decision science firm supporting the Pentagon and the defense industry, told Nextgov in a recent conversation the foundation of the strategy is “quite sound.”
“I really would call upon the incoming Biden administration to adopt the data strategy and run with it,” Dougherty said.
“So much of what is in it is right and spot on from a needs perspective, they're better served by defining the ‘how’ than going back and re-litigating any of the first principles, which all data professionals would tell you are quite sound,” she added.
How the Strategy Came to Be
The Pentagon’s first enterprisewide data strategy breaks from previous departmental guidance on data by changing the focus to center warfighters and senior leaders who need to make better decisions, Chief Data Officer David Spirk said at a National Defense Industrial Association event in October.
The DOD Net-Centric Data Strategy, signed in 2003, prescribed an “outside in” view of the data landscape, according to Spirk, but this new strategy means data requirements will now flow from decision-make ..
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