For defense programs, a new standard for manufacturing management requirements.

• Author: Karr, David
• Position: Homeland Security News: ANALYSIS

* SAE International--a global association of 137,000 industrial engineers and technical experts--recently published a commercial standard governing the implementation of best practices for the management of manufacturing operations.

Called AS6500, this manufacturing management program in many ways replaces the MIL-STD-1528A that was canceled as part of the Defense Department's acquisition reform initiative in the mid-1990s. Until then, the department used the military standard in contracts to specify requirements, such as manufacturing feasibility assessments, producibility analyses, supplier management and production readiness reviews.

In the absence of MIL-STD-1528A, defense contracts were generally silent on manufacturing requirements. The department lost its ability to require a standardized approach to ensuring manufacturing processes were ready for development and production. Companies implemented a wide range of systems with an equally wide range of effectiveness. Subsequently, the Government Accountability Office identified the lack of manufacturing maturity on many programs as a root cause that led to cost overruns, schedule delays and quality problems.

Compared with the commercial industry, the Defense Department has been willing to accept more risk when it comes to a lack of manufacturing maturity when programs enter into the production phase. Commercial companies demonstrate that their manufacturing processes are stable and capable before they commit to a production decision. That has not always been the case with defense programs, and it is a situation that the Defense Department and industry are hoping to turn around with the publication of AS6500.

Senior industry leaders have told their government counterparts that when budgets are tight, they sacrifice manufacturing activities that are perceived to add cost in the near term because there are no specific customer requirements to perform those tasks, even though they are beneficial. This is especially true in competitive environments when offerors are reluctant to propose additional activities that are not specifically required in the request for proposals, or RFP. One industry leader said that he had to lay off all of his producibility engineers in the 1990s because of the perceived added cost. Manufacturing managers have the difficult job of justifying initiatives that will have long-term benefits, but will increase costs in the short term. By including AS6500 in RFPs...