The Navy’s newest innovation office, NavalX, was stood up seven months ago to act as an innovation incubator. But, unlike other innovation outfits in the military, NavalX is focused on transforming the workforce, not the technology.
“NavalX is quite a bit different from those other organizations,” NavalX Director Capt. Frank Futcher said Tuesday during a spotlight talk at the Nextgov Modernization Roadmap event. “We’re not scouting technology. … Our focus is much more on the workforce and how we can deliver mechanisms and tools to that workforce to make them more agile.”
Futcher cited other military innovation offices such as SOFWERX (which brings together military, industry and academia to work on hard problems for Special Operations Command), AFWERX (a similar program run by the Air Force) and the Defense Innovation Unit, which works with industry to bring new technologies to the military.
“We live in an environment today that is very complex, filled with uncertainty,” he said. “There’s a lot of talk about change. Our goal is: How do we adapt to that change? NavalX is trying to essentially find a lot of tools and methods that allows our workforce to be more agile, move a little bit faster and adapt to those changes in environment.”
Last month, the office began to expand out of its headquarters in Alexandria, Virginia to five additional locations: Seattle, San Diego, Orlando, Newport, Rhode Island, and Gary, Indiana.
As the new office and outposts get rolling, its leaders want to make sure everyone is aware of one trait: agility.
Even the office’s web presence belies its intent. The website is under the secretary of the Navy’s domain, under a page titled “agility”— navalx innovation office really wants agile
