John Whitley on Reforming DoD’s Planning, Programming, Budgeting, and Execution (PPBE) Process

How does the U.S. Dept of Defense allocate and manage its resources? What is its Planning, Programming, Budgeting, and Execution (PPBE) process? How can PPBE Reform Commission address weaknesses in this system? What pitfalls should it avoid? Host Michael Keegan explores these questions and more with John Whitley former acting secretary of the U.S. Army & author of the IBM Center report, Three Reforms to Improve Defense Resource Management.

Broadcast Date: 
Monday, January 2, 2023 - 10:21
Author: 

Three Reforms to Improve Defense Resource Management

Attempting to allocate and coordinate these resources to conduct operations, maintain readiness, and invest in modernization presents an

John Whitley

John Whitley is currently a researcher and advisor with the Institute for Defense Analyses and other organizations. In government, he most recently served as the acting secretary of the Army and, prior to that, served as the assistant secretary of the Army for Financial Management and Comptroller and in acting positions as the director of Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation (DCAPE) and deputy chief management officer (DCMO) of DoD.

John Whitley

John Whitley is currently a researcher and advisor with the Institute for Defense Analyses and other organizations. In government, he most recently served as the acting secretary of the Army and, prior to that, served as the assistant secretary of the Army for Financial Management and Comptroller and in acting positions as the director of Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation (DCAPE) and deputy chief management officer (DCMO) of DoD.

Five Actions to Improve Military Hospital Performance

This, combined with concerns about adequacy in direct health care support for the readiness mission and quality, has led Congress to direct a major overhaul of the direct care system in the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for Fiscal Year (FY) 2017, signed into law December 23, 2016.

Five Methods for Measuring Unobserved Events: A Case Study of Federal Law Enforcement

Measuring program performance is relatively straightforward in many areas of government, such as social services, visa processing, and air traffic control.  But there are instances where assessing performance and success is much harder.  One particularly difficult area involves law enforcement, where a key goal is to prevent or deter bad outcomes – which can often happen without the knowledge of law enforcement officials.

Researcher and Advisor
Institute for Defense Analyses
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(703) 845-2000

John Whitley is currently a researcher and advisor with the Institute for Defense Analyses and other organizations. In government, he most recently served as the acting secretary of the Army and, prior to that, served as the assistant secretary of the Army for Financial Management and Comptroller and in acting positions as the director of Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation (DCAPE) and deputy chief management officer (DCMO) of DoD. In those positions, he led reform initiatives and, at CAPE, led DoD’s resource allocation process (~$700 billion per year), acquisition cost estimating, future force development, and analysis on a wide range of defense programs, including ship requirements, space capabilities, missile defense, nuclear modernization, and hypersonics.

Prior to returning to government, John spent eight years in federally funded research institutions, primarily at the Institute for Defense Analyses (IDA). His work at IDA included resource allocation and performance issues in national security, defense resource management analysis, military healthcare, and border security. He also served as a senior fellow at Center for Naval Analyses. In 2014 and 2015, he supported the Military Compensation and Retirement Modernization Commission in its healthcare work. Other roles have included adjunct lecturer at The George Washington University, director of Program Analysis and Evaluation at DHS, a defense fellow in the U.S. Senate in the office of Senator Jon Kyl of Arizona, as a staff economist at CAPE, and a faculty member in the economics department of the University of Adelaide in Australia. John also served in the U.S. Army.

John has a PhD and MA in economics from the University of Chicago and undergraduate degrees in Animal Science and Agricultural Economics from Virginia Tech. He lives in Alexandria, Virginia, with his wife and children.