Acquisitions didn't use Waterfall that I ever saw, until you got to the software specific courses. Then they did, and it was one of several software development lifecycles you were allowed to choose between for projects.
Many program offices and project managers selected it because it was pretty, not because it was sensible.
> These days the Air Force has caught on to "agile". They even have 400-page manuals on the process to follow to be "agile"! We still cut some corners here and there and do what we think makes sense, but there's far less process push-back than there was in the past.
Circa 2010 (+/- a couple years) USAF also picked up Lean in a big way. But their version of Lean was almost exactly the opposite, in practice, of what was done and described by industry as Lean. A key element of Lean being that you actually let the people doing the work provide feedback and direct improvement efforts. USAF's version had the managers (who never did the work) walk around and observe, then change processes to be "leaner". That is, pure scientific management in the Taylorism style.
USAF is a great place for good ideas to get their names reused for old ideas.
Here’s a 2019 presentation about Lockheed Martin’s F-16 team adopting SAFe (Scaled Agile Framework). It was a successful first step because the dev team was able to deliver Program Increments to QA in just nine months, down from 3-4 years.
Many program offices and project managers selected it because it was pretty, not because it was sensible.
> These days the Air Force has caught on to "agile". They even have 400-page manuals on the process to follow to be "agile"! We still cut some corners here and there and do what we think makes sense, but there's far less process push-back than there was in the past.
Circa 2010 (+/- a couple years) USAF also picked up Lean in a big way. But their version of Lean was almost exactly the opposite, in practice, of what was done and described by industry as Lean. A key element of Lean being that you actually let the people doing the work provide feedback and direct improvement efforts. USAF's version had the managers (who never did the work) walk around and observe, then change processes to be "leaner". That is, pure scientific management in the Taylorism style.
USAF is a great place for good ideas to get their names reused for old ideas.