BATTLE CREEK, Mich. –
Risk can appear in many forms. For Defense Logistics Agency Disposition Services, a business risk could look like the unintentional release of controlled property. It could be the spillage of classified information from erroneously marked information technology turned in by a military unit and later auctioned to the public. It could be a critical software error in the ongoing implementation of the agency’s new Warehouse Management System.
“WMS is a huge, critically important system, and if it wasn’t implemented properly and correctly, it puts us at risk of not being able to perform our core functions,” said Brad Trivett, the Process Health Division chief at DLA Disposition Services in Battle Creek, Michigan.
Each major sub-command of DLA faces some unique and some similar business risks, and in August, Trivett and his office hosted a first-time summit of Risk and Internal Control Administrator, or RICAs, and similarly focused personnel in Battle Creek, Michigan, for two days of collaboration.
“It was great to meet a lot of people we work with but have never met – maybe never even seen – and be able to talk about challenges we face,” said DLA Chief Risk Officer Erich Gabris, citing the summit’s focused and productive outcome-related sessions. “This is something we need to do more frequently to ensure we’re continuing the momentum.”
Trivett credited his team with putting together an event that allowed each MSC an opportunity to “voice opinions and ask questions.” He said the hope was that an in-person forum for networking, information sharing and simply allowing risk management stakeholders to compare notes would help lead to successful outcomes. and building the foundation for the Agency’s A-123/Enterprise Risk program.
“This summit is a great start for us to open the lines of communication,” said Khalid Hamidi, the RICA for DLA’s J3 Logistics Operations directorate and former DLA Energy audit and sustainment chief. “We have to stop treating J-codes and MSCs as separate components. We need to start doing a better job of documenting our business processes, and because it’s a collective effort, we have to continue to communicate and coordinate.”
Various acts of Congress from the 80s and 90s mandate that federal entities provide a regular Statement of Assurance detailing the functionality and accountability of an agency’s internal controls. DLA’s RICA community identifies and addresses risks across the organization and tests the internal controls that support its statement.
Hamidi said DLA’s structure can lend itself to sub-commands sometimes operating like independent entities. His personal hope is that increased collaboration and communication will eliminate duplication of effort, minimize contradictory information given to auditors, and help synchronize strategy.
“We need to break the communications barrier, because the reality is, if you were to document business processes from end to end, you’re documenting things touched by all J-codes and the MSCs,” Hamidi said. “Because there are those handoffs, we need to do a better job at doing things like this summit, where we’re coming together to collectively strategize how we’re going to do this as a unit.”
Trivett said attendees covered many important topics during the summit, including end-to-end process documentation, assessable unit identification guidelines, and opportunities to deconflict guidance and assess possible closer integration between risk management and internal review offices.
DLA Disposition Services Director Mike Cannon said the feedback from the event attendees was positive and said he felt like the summit “energized” the effort to get DLA risk management efforts aligned. It looks like the summit will become an annual or biannual meeting, with DLA Aviation set to host the next iteration.
“We’ve got to use the energy from this to focus on what attendees can control in their organizations to apply and drive some of the change,” said Gabris, noting that the headquarters ERM office provides policy and procedure guidance and the MSCs take ownership and execute. “It’s a team effort. Everyone has to do their part to make this program a success.”
Gabris said that the only way for DLA to provide the assurance required under OMB A-123 is for “every single MSC to be able to stand and say, ‘we have a functioning program.’”
“The MSCs are taking ownership and that’s what [headquarters] likes to see,” Gabris added.