New program to allow defense companies access to classified information

Transcript

[Music] welcome back the pentagon has a new program designed to give defense companies more access to classified information the sap contractor portfolio program aims to increase productivity and cost efficiency deborah lee james is the 23rd secretary of the air force madam secretary welcome back it's great to see you again what do we know about this program it's been a pilot for a period of time apparently the pilot was successful it's now an official program at dod that ellen lord has rolled out what do we know about it ma'am well first of all happy new year it's great to see you again francis and this is a very interesting program in my opinion so we don't know a whole lot but what we do know is that this is part i would say of a drive across the government certainly a drive across dod to see whether or not we can declassify certain information or if not fully declassify at least open up the apertures because what we find is in the classified world and in this case we're talking about the most highly classified programs in the classified world in general programs tend to be expensive there tends not to be a lot of competition because not that many people know about it and also um it tends to be that it's hard to insert new technologies into the game because things are so uh highly walled off one contractor to another so this is an effort to open up the aperture and it'll be interesting to see how it all unfolds how will this information help the companies do what the department wants them to achieve air force magazine writes it this way hoping more insight will make contractors more efficient and cost conscious how could the information that this program will allow them to access to see more or see earlier or whatever be able to achieve those goals well certainly in theory and i think for the most part in practice as well whenever you have greater transparency whenever an industry partner has broader knowledge of the totality of a program how the piece parts fit together when they have insight into the future the strategy the go forward all of these things ought to be able to allow them to gin up new proposals bring other capabilities to the table that might be useful to the government and over time that should also drive down costs and allow them to optimize the efficiency of what needs to be a very highly uh cleared workforce which of course is at a premium here in washington and across the uh across the country we don't know the companies that are involved in this madam secretary this uh this piece says the memo didn't say for a memo from ellen lord's office didn't say how many or which companies are part of the program but noted corporations must be on contract for at least 15 special access programs to participate understanding that you're not on the inside now that you're an outside observer but with experience on the inside what's your sense of what that level of participation in special access programs means to the ability uh for these companies to participate in this program well first of all i think this is going to be very helpful for those country companies who have you know broad experience with the special access program of course if you have 15 different contracts with saps at the moment that means you're highly experienced and you in the minds of the government you are a trusted partner you've done well with those programs you've protected the classified information etc so if you're in the club i think you're in like flynn as they as they sometimes say if you're not in that club if i were an industry partner not in that club i would be wonder wondering well gee what's what's magic about 15 and why isn't it 20 and how about i have 12 how come 12 isn't good enough i would have all of these extra questions that that i would be asking so again since we have so little information and most importantly we don't have metrics to be able to judge whether or not two or three years from now we do get more technology insertions or we do drive down costs whether the goals of the program are met we'll we will as members of the public we won't know this unless dod uh shares that information ultimately with us and it's it when you draw that distinction why is 15 the right number why not 12 why not 20 etc it makes me think of a the right word is club that you use madam secretary because i guess if you're in you know why you're in and if you're not in if you don't know why you're not in that indicates that you're not going to make it any time soon it sounds like well it sounds like it was a judgment call and of course government industry all walks of life are filled with judgment calls they had to to draw the line at some point and they made the decision that 15 would be the line my guess is because it is a drive to um it to increase efficiency pull down the cost bring more technology insertion to the table that congress and by the way there are only a handful in congress members and staff who are allowed to oversee and and to have knowledge of these programs because again these are highly classified programs my sense is they'll probably give this some runway and but they will be asking about some of the things we've talked about here the metrics how are we going to demonstrate that this works what's the impact of small business for example how many small businesses are allowed in is small business being shut out these are key questions that you and i can't answer but i guarantee you that congress will be will be asking what will you watch moving forward madam secretary what are the markers here that will make a difference to the way this evolves well in general over the next several weeks i'll be watching across the the federal government and especially at the department of defense what other initiatives roll out because we are clearly in the final weeks of an administration and when you know my administration included all administrations there's a race to the finish line to try to push over the finish line programs that are near completion or that you want to have as part of a legacy good ideas that you want to leave for the future so i would expect we'll see more things rolling out over the next several weeks specifically to this program as i said i think it's going to take several years and it will largely depend on what dod decides to reveal to the public will they eventually reveal the names of the companies i mean there's pros and cons to that will congress ask these questions and issue complaints um that it should be opened up wider for example these are and what will the metrics be to measure success so these are the things i would be watching for the long term specific to this program madam secretary thanks very much for joining me it's great to have you back thank you francis