Acquisition Disasters? Ideas For Reducing Acquisition Risk

Alfred R. Schenker is a Senior Software Systems Engineer at Carnegie Mellon University’s Software Engineering Institute, where he has worked for more 20 years. He focuses on the improvement of software acquisition and product development practices throughout the armed services, and other organizations. He has actively worked in software process, architecture, model-based systems engineering, and metrics. Before joining the SEI, Mr. Schenker spent more than 20 years in industry as an active contributor in all phases of product development. Mr. Schenker is also an inventor, and has obtained patents for a pressure switch (used in automotive airbag applications), and for a manufacturing process to seal gas inside a vessel.

Linda Parker Gates leads the Software Acquisition Pathways Initiative in the SEI's Software Solutions Division. She specializes in strategic planning, change management, technology transition, and performance excellence, supporting numerous government organizations in developing and adopting improvement strategies. She is the author of a multi-part SEI blog series on agile strategic planning, and the SEI technical report Strategic Planning with Critical Success Factors and Future Scenarios: An Integrated Strategic Planning Framework. Ms. Gates is a member of the Association for Strategic Planning and a co-chair of the ASP Global Conference 2022. She has also served as the co-chair of the Government Community of Practice. Ms. Gates has served as a senior examiner for the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award, in addition to serving as an examiner and a judge on multiple other quality award programs.