Jared Serbu

Army officials are working to inculcate agile principles within their own organizations, but also need a new contract vehicle to buy software from industry.

"We want to understand these patterns better to help us better identify the socioeconomic factors" said Michael Palmedo.

Potential bidders have until the end of this week to offer comments on the Army's latest draft request for proposals. 15-20 firms will win spots on the contract

The new implementation plan builds on the first-ever National Defense Industrial Strategy, published earlier this year.

A new plan offers short and long-term recommendations to streamline the 90-or-so steps it takes to onboard employees in the Office of the Secretary of Defense.

The concept of a single network from soldiers' home stations to the tactical edge isn't new, but Army leaders say cultural changes are finally making it happen.

Nontraditional hiring, pay authorities were among the factors that let DoD significantly reduce its cyber workforce shortage over the past year.

DoD will rely on existing commercial networks "to the maximum extent possible," but in some cases, will need to run its own 5G infrastructure.

It's not a silver bullet for DoD's challenges with business IT systems, but the department thinks it's overcome one big barrier involved in sharing budget data.

The department is using the new Defense Civilian Training Corps to build its acquisition workforce, with hopes to expand the program to other disciplines soon.