1. ARDEC Journey to Excellence
COL Russell Hrdy
Deputy Director

2. ARDEC FIRST FEDERAL & DOD RECIPIENT OF THE MALCOLM BALDRIGE
US Army Armament Research, Development and Engineering Center
Provide 90% of Army’s Suite of Armaments
No Single Counterpart in the World
Provide Battlefield Supremacy for Our Warfighters
FIRST FEDERAL & DOD RECIPIENT
OF THE MALCOLM BALDRIGE
NATIONAL QUALITY AWARD
Short explanation of mission, purpose, vision
Many of you in the audience have probably been members of the military or have a family member is or has been in the military
Winning & recognition is nice, but bottom line of using Baldrige is the real winners are the men and women of the Armed Forces who use the products we research, develop and engineer
Because the products are developed faster
At the highest possible quality
At the lowest cost to the taxpayer
Old expression ‘never time to do things right the first time, but always time to do them over’
Our message is simple – if we can do it, so can you
Vision – “Innovative Armaments for Today and Tomorrow”

3. First Use of Six Sigma, CMMI
2007 Malcolm Baldrige
Quality Award Recipient
ARDEC’s Performance
Excellence Journey
Knowledge
Base
Creation
Large R&D Organization
of the Year
86,95,99,00,04,06
CSA
ACOE
Award
96,99,00, 02
First Use of Six Sigma, CMMI
& ISO
Reduced Cost
Increased Quality
Faster Cycle Times
Increased Innovation
Satisfied Customers
Army
Performance
Excellence
Award
Jan. 2006
Presidential Award for
Quality Improvement
1999
System
Owners
Handbooks
NJ Quality
Achievement
Award
1998, 2004
US Army’s Greatest
Invention Awards
R&D Center of
Excellence
Award
89,90,91,96,97
Legend:
NJ Quality
Partnership
Award
1996
ARDEC “Triple Crown”
Events
Presidential Award
for
Quality
1996
Awards
Start of Formal
Benchmarking
GPRA Driven
Strategic & Business
Planning
CINC
Community of
Excellence
Awards
96&00
Vice President’s
NPR “Hammer”
Award
Evolving Excellence
Process Action Teams
and
Quality Management
Boards Established
R&D
Organization
of the Year
1986&1995
Quality
Improvement
Prototype
Award
1995
Baldrige Category
Champions
Performance Excellence for us is a journey, not a destination and we continue to be in a state of ‘being’
This busy chart shows some major events on our journey – from the start of teaming with Quality Circles in 1985, our formation of a TQM Executive Council in 1989, being an early recipient of the Vice Presidential “Hammer Award” in 1993 for making a significant contribution to reinventing gov’t through our innovation and excellence, our first use of Baldrige category champions in 1995 to being the first and only winner of the Army Performance Excellence Award in 2004….it has been a long and continuous journey, then all to way to becoming a recipient of the MBNQA.
Our Enterprise Excellence initiative has enabled us to apply the right resources at the right time to get our job done right the first time
President’s Council
for Management
Improvement
Award
1991
Middle Management
Work Groups
Power Down X
Integrated
Product Teams X
PEG V
Formal Evaluation
Of Baldrige Feedback
On Opportunities
for Improvement
& Corrective Actions
PEG IV
Quality
Circles
QIP Nomination
Middle Managers
Trained X
PEG III
System Approach
Adopted,
Natural Work Groups X PM
Teams
TQM Executive Council Formed
Vision Established
PEG II
PEG = Productivity Enhancement Group

4. Enterprise Excellence Integrates Best Practices Continuous Improvement
FY05 Adoption of Enterprise Excellence
FY03 Adoption of Balanced Scorecard
Continuous Improvement
FY03 Corp Commitment CMMI, ISO, SE
Started in Areas with Biggest Business Benefit
FY01 Corporate
Commitment to
Six Sigma
Certifications
FY01 First
CMMI
Certifications
FY01 First
ISO
This chart illustrates how Enterprise Excellence has integrated our best practices.
The Baldrige-criteria has been the foundation of our continuous improvement and is a major component of our Quality Management System (QMS) within Enterprise Excellence
Implemented in 2005, the key components of EE are shown here
Our Quality Management System ensures we do things consistently
Baldrige is the management framework of our QMS
Within this QMS we use Capability Maturity Model Integrated and ISO for controlled, repeatable, tailorable processes
A balanced scorecard aligns our strategy to actions to results
Our scorecards cascade through multiple levels of our organization and provides a clear line-of-sight to our employees on what is important
Voice of the Customer ensures we do the right thing the first time
We use Systems Engineering for a common understanding of our customers requirements
Additionally, our work is accomplished through Integrated Product Teams that have a customer as a member for almost daily opportunities to listen to the voice of the customer
A robust quarterly customer survey also provides a valuable opportunity to listen to our customers
Lastly, the wide pervasive use of Lean Six Sigma ensures we do things right
We drive both efficiency and effectiveness through out our organization
Please consider coming to our Process Management concurrent session to hear more about our LSS
I’d like to see a show of hands in this room – who has received a Black Belt, Green Belt or has taken (or is currently taking) Green Belt, Black Belt or Executive Black Belt training? <wait for examiners to look around and see the show of hands>
FY00 Six Sigma, CMMI, ISO Starts
FY95 Baldrige Management Framework

5. Level 2 ARDEC Competency Directors / Office Chiefs
Cascade of Strategies
Vision / Mission
Strategy Definition
Level 1 ARDEC Centers
Level 0 ARDEC Corporate
Level 2 ARDEC Competency Directors / Office Chiefs
Lean Six Sigma Projects Linked to Strategy
At ARDEC, we lead by example and are dedicated to continuous improvement
Remember I mentioned how a balanced scorecard aligns our strategy to actions to results
Our scorecards cascade through multiple levels of our organization and provides a clear line-of-sight to our employees on what is important – this is a visual depiction of what I was speaking about
Strategy Execution
Individual Employees
Workforce has a Clear Line-of-Sight of What is Important

6. ARDEC Human Capital Management (HCM)
Human Capital “Pillars”
Strategy: Workforce Strategic Alignment
Leadership: Succession Planning for Leaders
Diversity: Demographic & Talent Diversity
Culture: Embody a Learning Organization
Talent: Recruit, Train, Develop & Educate
Performance: Enterprise-wide Management
Strategic
HCM
Mentoring and
Rotational
Assignments
Personnel
Evaluation
Recruitment
Practices
Succession
Planning
and Metrics
Multi-Path
Career
Progression
Leadership
Development

7. Applied Talent Management
Objectives of the HCMO
The integration of LSS Projects
The ARDEC HCC Charter
The Impact of the 10 year hiring freeze
Exit Interviews
Measurements of the HCMO
Plan
Strengthening Talent Pipelines
Proactive Recruiting, Talent Acquisition
Marketing ARDEC
Evaluate
Acquire
ARDEC’s Human Capital Goals
1.Align and integrate workforce
2. Decentralized execution
3. Data driven workforce analysis
4. Organizational learning
5. Human Capital Strategic Plan
Retain
Internal Flow of Talent
Engage
Improved Mentoring
Programs
Knowledge Sharing and Management
Lead
Develop
This slide aims to demonstrate the actual magnitude of the problem.
Plan- Cost per Day – $7000 a day for operating without a key player (Sullivan)
Acquire- Cost of Poor Hire – $300K impact (Sullivan)
Engage- 84% of highly engaged employees believe they can impact quality and reduce costs vs. only 31% of disengaged employees.
Develop months for a manager to become productive in a new job (Watkins).
Deploy- Only about 20% of employees are assigned to do what they do best at work (Buckingham)
Lead- Top 10% of leadership accounts for almost 2x profit over the middle 80% (Zenger & Folkman – The Extraordinary Leader).
On average, a manager’s actions impact 12.4 people in a company (Watkins)
Retain- Loss of talented engineer or leader ranges from 250k -500k
Cisco loses $250K for each talented engineer it loses. Bristol Meyers Squibb loses $500K for each senior leader lost.
Evaluate- Value of Top Performers – Two to three times the performance of average employees (Ulrich and Smallwood)
The VP of engineering for Google states excellent performers outperform their peers by a figure of 300 times
It costs at least 1.5 times an employees fully burdened salary to replace an excellent employee.
Talent Leadership for 1st Line Supervisors
Common attributes for Mangers/Leaders
Employee Development
Deploy
Cross Functional Assignments 7

8. Learning & Development
Professional Development Key Workforce Expectation
Individual Development Plans
Armaments University On-Site
Master’s Classes On-Site
Teaming Fosters On-the-Job Training
Experiential Learning
Corporate Investment in Learning
Our Workforce Learning and Development System balances the needs and desires of employees with the core competencies, strategic challenges and accomplishment of both short-term and long-term Action Plans. Employees have an opportunity for two-way dialogue with their supervisors about learning and development during the IDP process. Supervisors counsel their employees on the training they need to meet objectives and organizational requirements, and the employees can express their own desires. In 2005 ARDEC won the Undersecretary of Defense Acquisition, Logistics and Technology Workforce Development Award.
Our core competencies drive much of our learning and development efforts. Competent armament engineers and scientists are not readily available from academia or private industry, so ARDEC must “grow” the skilled people who can research, develop and engineer innovative armament products.
American Society for Training & Development International
2007 Best Award – 6th of 102

9. Knowledge Sharing Approximately 50% of E&S Newly Hired
Organizational and Employee Knowledge Critical
Oracle Collaboration Suite (OCS) Repositories
Project Information
Lessons Learned
Process Asset Library
Armaments Knowledgebase
Our Knowledge Management Office (KMO) is responsible for providing the infrastructure to capture and oversee information flowing from work teams and processes. Recently the extensive Armaments Knowledgebase repository was migrated from old technology with limited access to our OCS (Figure 7.5-7). This extensive repository contains massive amounts of historical and current organizational technical knowledge including lessons learned, technical reports, test reports, failure investigations and other information for solving current problems. Some project areas have shortened the learning curve for new engineers to become familiar and comfortable with their programs from two years to six months to a year through the use of this repository.
Knowledge is transferred to and from customers through formal documentation of requirements, disciplined systems engineering, customer surveys, and home-on-home meetings that are formally held between ARDEC leadership and customer leadership. The capture of knowledge from suppliers, partners and collaborators occurs primarily through technical data packages and reports, Cooperative Research and Development Agreements (CRADAs), academic alliances, participation in customer/supplier/ partner reviews, and involvement in national and international conferences and symposia. :
Employee knowledge is collected and transferred through:
1) Development of technical data packages
2) Generation of patent disclosures
3) Level 1, 2. and 3 program reviews and after-action reviews on completed projects
4) Formal and informal mentoring
5) Succession planning
6) On-the-job training
7) Classroom training by in-house technical experts
8) Teaming
9) Documented lessons learned and best practices
10) Process documentation in Process Asset Library
11) Armaments history in Armaments Knowledgebase

10. Bottom Line Results Productivity, Effectiveness, Efficiency
40% Less Workforce
Execute 40% More Work
Many have asked us if our leadership commitment to performance excellence
is worthwhile
I want to wrap up with two things which clearly answer that question
Our bottom line results are that when we normalized our revenue to 2007 dollars, since 1991 we now execute 40% more work with 40% less employees
Diversity in Markets,
Integrated Business Development
Carryover Supports Business Sustainability
Productivity, Effectiveness, Efficiency

11. ARDEC Strength: Customer & Market Focus
Multi-point Voice of the Customer (VoC)
Customers part of Strategic Planning & IPT Members
Our Customer Support Triangle is deployed throughout the organization and provides a mechanism for us to hear the VOC in a continuous, systematic way. Members of the workforce involved in this Support Triangle validate customer requirements and expectations over the entire life cycle of a project.
In addition, customers are a part of our Integrated Product Teams (IPTs) and participate in our SPP to provide information on requirements, new opportunities, and industry issues.

12. ARDEC Strengths: Work Environment & Systems
Workforce Environment
Horizontal IPTs
Capability & Competency
Knowledge Sharing
Innovation & Continuous Improvement
Work Systems Design
Competency-Centric Organizational Structure
Competency Management System
Innovation is a key business advantage. We have innovation
EVERYWHERE!
Organizational structure
People
Products
And Processes
Through an extensive Six Sigma study, in 2004 we moved to a Competency-Based structure which fostered proactive, synergistic collaboration
Although innovation was an integral part of our business, we heightened the
importance when we included it in our vision statement of “Innovative
Armaments Solutions for Today and Tomorrow” in 2005

13. ARDEC Strength: Customer -Focused Outcomes
High level of patriotism in workforce
Clear line-of-sight from our work to the customer, strengthens strategic link
The difference in our work makes a difference to the safety of our Warfighters

14. ARDEC Opportunities for Improvement
Understand Product & Service Outcomes
Primary HQ Focus on Top 40 Programs
Performance & Schedule Not Measured for Majority of Programs
Lack of Measures May Hamper Performance Assessment and Allocation of Improvement Resources
Obtain Comparative & Competitive Data
Other RD&E Suppliers
Document & Control Several Key Work Processes
Implementing Business Strategies
Ensuring Full Implementation of Lean Six Sigma Outcomes
It is often easy to understand our strengths, but external “eyes” give insights we might not have discovered or discovered much later
The most beneficial product of the Baldrige process is the feedback report.
Though ARDEC was a 2007 recipient of the MBNQA, there is always room for improvement.
The Baldrige feedback report that ARDEC received in response to its award winning application and site visit in 2007 identified 54 opportunities for ARDEC to improve the quality of its business model.
Some of those Opportunities for Improvement (or OFIs) are listed on this chart.
ARDECs approach for using this valuable feedback to drive continuous improvement is to tie these OFIs to our strategic plan. Not surprisingly, the majority of these OFIs have a strong correlation to the strategic Objectives and Initiatives that ARDEC has independently identified during our Strategic Planning process.
Tying these OFIs to the strategic plan ensure that they become an integral part of ARDECs long term goals. It ensure continued visibility by senior leaders, and underscores the importance of these continuous Improvement efforts to all levels of the organization.
Once OFIs are addressed we capture the approach, deployment, learning, integration and results in our next Baldrige application
Systematic use of the Baldrige framework helps ARDEC to continually improve the quality of the products that we provide to the US Warfighter.

15. Estimated Baldrige Scores 500 Point ARDEC “Glass Ceiling”
Summary
ARDEC is a Role Model
Journey Never Ends
Requires Commitment & Effort
Benefits Well Worth the Effort
Estimated Baldrige Scores
In conclusion, ARDEC’s vision is Innovative Armaments Solutions for Today
and Tomorrow
The real recipients of ARDEC’s journey to excellence are the men and women of our Armed Forces who each day benefit from our world-class products which bring them home safely and help keep America safe for the generations that follow
Thank you for your time and interest
2007 Recipient
500 Point ARDEC “Glass Ceiling”
The Real “Winners”
In ARDEC’s Journey