DoD Honors Value Engineering Achievement Award Recipients

WASHINGTON -- More than 30 individuals, teams and organizations were honored with the Fiscal Year 2017 Value Engineering Achievement Award in a ceremony in the Pentagon Auditorium today.

“With formal [Defense Department] programs for value engineering dating back to 1954 in the Navy’s Bureau of Ships, value engineering has played an integral and enduring role in accomplishing the DoD mission to provide a lethal joint force, to defend the security of our nation, and sustain American influence abroad,” said Kristen Baldwin, acting deputy assistant secretary of defense for systems engineering, keynote speaker for the event.

National Defense Strategy

In the summary of the 2018 National Defense Strategy, Defense Secretary James N. Mattis identifies his top priorities to generate and sustain the U.S. military advantage, she said, which are: building a more lethal force, strengthening alliances and attracting new partnerships, and bringing business reforms to DoD.

In the area of DoD reform, Baldwin told the award recipients their personal and team initiatives in using value engineering have “kept pace with the direction to change our mindset, to change our culture and our management systems in the department, and to modernize our systems and capabilities, and create efficiencies while doing so. Your assured steps provide necessary functions to our forces while achieving those cost savings.”

Better Reliability, Quality, Safety

Value engineering efforts, she added, deliver improved reliability, quality and safety to augment the DoD objective to continuously deliver performance with affordability and speed. The awardees’ efforts also align with DoD’s warfighting and national security missions, Baldwin said.

As part of the DoD Honorary Awards Program, the DoD Value Engineering Achievement Award honors civilian and military organizations, teams, individuals, and programs/projects for demonstrating exemplary value engineering accomplishments. The winners are:

Army

-- Program/Project: Project manager, Combat Ammunition Systems.

-- Individual: Chester Marc Dalangin, program manager, Crew Served Weapons.

-- Team: Watervliet Arsenal.

-- Organization: U.S. Army Aviation and Missile Command.

-- Special: Apache Helicopter Project Manager’s Office, Apache Production and Fielding Product Office.

-- Special: Project manager, Armored Fighting Vehicles.

-- Special: U.S. Army Armament Research, Development and Engineering Center.

Navy

-- Program/Project: Single Coat Paint Systems.

-- Individual: Charles Radvansky, Industrial and In-Service Systems engineer.

-- Team: Cumbersome Work Practices Resolution Team.

-- Organization: Naval Systems Engineering Directorate, NAVSEA 05.

-- Special: Phased Array Ultrasound Technology/Time of Flight Diffraction Program.

-- Special: Virginia Class Submarine Battery Replacement Team.

-- Special: Pressure Rescue Module Battery Improvement Team.

Air Force

-- Program/Project: Air Intercept Missile-120 Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile.

-- Individual: Tracy L. Patrick, chief, Combat Systems Branch.

-- Team: Air Force Materiel Command Federal Acquisition Regulation 16.5 High Performance Team.

-- Organization: Air Force Category Management Program Support Office.

-- Special: Michael W. Sahlu, lead engineer, Detachment 3.

-- Special: Col. William Patrick, system program manager, B-2 Division.

-- Special: Col. Christopher B. Athearn, senior materiel leader, Long Range Systems Division.

Defense Logistics Agency

-- Program/Project: DLA Aviation, Aviation Engineering Flaps Project.

-- Individual: Donald O’Flaherty, equipment specialist, DLA Land and Maritime, Value Management and Engineering Division.

-- Team: DLA Aviation, Source Approval Request Team.

-- Organization: DLA Aviation, Engineering and Technology Division.

-- Special: DLA Land and Maritime, Reverse and Sustaining Engineering.

Defense Threat Reduction Agency

-- Special: DTRA Ground-Based Prompt Diagnostics Test Team.

Missile Defense Agency

-- Program/Project: Terminal High Altitude Area Defense Ground Components Product Office.

-- Individual: Mark Murphy, systems engineer, Ground Components Product Office.

--Team: Terminal High Altitude Area Defense Systems Engineering Directorate Value Engineering Team.

-- Organization: Terminal High Altitude Area Defense Project Office

-- Special: Terminal High Altitude Area Defense Logistics Support Value Engineering Team

-- Special Terminal High Altitude Area Defense Missile Production Value Engineering Team.