Hitting 4 “Corners” of the U.S.

It’s the middle of summer in the U.S., which for many people means vacation time! Last week we were certainly on the road…but not just for fun. Our team hit four different locations on the East Coast last week…here’s a glance at what we did (and why!).

Keenan and Stu in the Big Apple

As some of you may know, we’re currently working on a project with the U.S. Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence, a.k.a. OUSD(I). It’s focused on identifying barriers, constraints, and gaps that frustrate fast and effective information sharing in multinational environments, and will culminate in several policy papers with recommendations to mitigate those issues.

The project has included an extensive survey, a day-long workshop in D.C., and many small group discussions. For this part of the project, Keenan (GSF VP) and Stu (GSF President and CEO) went to New York City to visit with several organizations to see how they operate and gather lessons learned.

Both have extensive experience with military operations and commands, but they were asked to visit some non-military organizations to see how other teams function.

The first stop was the Lower Manhattan Security Coordination Center (LMSCC) in–you guessed it–Lower Manhattan. It’s the home of the Lower Manhattan Security Initiative (LMSI), which is an NYPD initiative overseen by the Counterterrorism Bureau.

After a tour and overview of that facility, they were escorted on foot the NYPD Headquarters at 1 Police Plaza, where they had the chance to talk to some of their intel and security staff and get more lessons learned. 

The last official stop of the trip was the JP Morgan Chase Fusions Cell. Who better to talk to about intel and security than people who are responsible for protecting money? 

Stu and Keenan got a lot out of this trip–from people who were “switched on” (huge compliment from Stu) or things they learned that didn’t work. More to follow on this project.

MKP at the PALT

With other folks out of town, Meaghan (GSF COO, better known as MKP) had PALT duty!

For anyone who doesn’t know the PALT stands for Procurement Administrative Lead Time, and it is defined as the amount of time from the date on which a solicitation for a contract or task order is issued to the date of an initial award of the contract or task order. 

Basically, it’s an opportunity for defense industry to hear from Government Acquisition representatives about the status of available contract opportunities. 

Orlando is the home of two recurring PALTs that we like to attend–one by the Army’s PEO-STRI and one by the Navy’s NAWCTSD. Every other month both occur on the same day, so we always host a PALT lunch where we invite attending partners and friends to join us for a bite at a local restaurant.

This month’s lunch was kindly sponsored by our Academic Partner–Norwich University! We are big fans of Norwich, and although they are based in Vermont they used this opportunity to head down to Florida for some meetings and to join us for lunch!

If you listen to our SOFspot podcast, you’ll catch a new episode from them this week, and if you’re a GSF Member or Partner you’ll see them highlighted in our latest Video Newsletter. #YesWeHaveANewVideoNewsletter

Steve at Warrior Expo East

It’s worth noting that our Director of Partner Relations, Steve Jones, ended the previous week by *uniting* with our Small Business Committee at a D.C. United Game. Our new GSF Small Business Committee Chair, Eric Shaw, and his employer, Axiologic Solutions, kindly hosted a meeting from their box at Audi Field.

They had a productive meeting to talk about the goals and plans for the Small Business Committee, followed by a great time at the game! 

This week, Steve decided to drive a little south of his hub in D.C. to head to Warrior Expo East in Virginia Beach. This bi-annual event (there’s also a West edition) brings “end users, program managers, and procurement specialists together with industry-leading solutions for unique networking and training opportunities in a secure environment.”

Chelsea and Rick at the Ranger Rendezvous

Meanwhile, Chelsea and Rick found themselves at Ft. Benning’s Ranger Rendezvous! The week included all types of things, from jumps to podcasts to the Ranger Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony.

However, that event deserved its own blog… so stay tuned for that to be released next week!