Acquiring Expertise? Developing Expertise in the Defense Acquisition Workforce

The goal of this research project is to tell the story of acquisition expertise development within the DOD using the evolution of the Defense Acquisition University as its backdrop. It is a story about the persistent frame that claims expertise leads to acquisition success. It is about 40 plus years of competing perspectives of how best to acquire that expertise and their shaping effects. It is about technology choices amidst cultural and political conflict. It is about how budget, users, infrastructure, existing and emerging technologies, identity and geography all interrelate as elements within the technology of expertise development. Finally, it is about how at various times in the evolution of the Defense Acquisition University the technologies of tacit knowledge transfer have been elevated or diminished.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph. D.

Level thesis:degree_level

doctoral

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Science and Technology Studies

Department dc:contributor.department

Science and Technology in Society

Grantor dc:publisher

Virginia Tech

Year dc:date.issued

2015

Author dc:creator

• Mullis, William Sterling

Chair dc:contributor.committeechair

• Downey, Gary L.

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Snoderly, John Ross
• Allen, Barbara L.
• Schmid, Sonja

• defense acquisition
• tacit knowledge
• tacit specialty expertise
• United States Department of Defense
• social construction of technology

Statement dc:rights

• In Copyright

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Dc Identifier Other

vt_gsexam:4881

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/72963