These Fleet Readiness Centers and Naval Shipyards are  responsible for over 94 percent of the Navy’s depot maintenance  workload. 2. NAVAIR and NAVSEA Plans Do Not Fully Address All Elements of a Results-Oriented Management Framework

		NAVAIR and NAVSEA Plans Do Not Fully Address Elements of a Results-Oriented Management Framework, and Linkages with Navy- wide Summary Are Unclear

While the NAVAIR and NAVSEA plans focus their efforts on weapon  system and equipment availability, they do not fully address the elements  of a results-oriented management framework, and the two plans and the  Navy-wide executive summary are not clearly integrated. As a result of these  weaknesses, the Navy may be limited in its ability to use the information in  the plans as a servicewide decision-making tool to meet future challenges. NAVAIR’s and NAVSEA’s mission statements summarize each  command’s overarching purpose and address its major functions and  operations. With regard to the long-term goals, while both plans identify some  strategic goals that generally relate to mission statements, they do not  specify time frames for achieving any of these goals. Both plans partially address strategies to achieve the goals. Officials for each command indicated that  the metrics listed in their plan are intended to “indirectly” gauge progress  toward achieving the plan’s long-term goals. However, the plans do not describe how these  metrics correspond to each long-term goal, the desired level for each  metric, or how the metrics will be used to evaluate each goal. The Navy Does Not Have an Integrated Servicewide Plan for Depot Maintenance

The Navy does not have an integrated depot maintenance strategic plan  that clearly links the elements of the commands’ plans with the  servicewide executive summary. NAVAIR and NAVSEA Plans Do Not Fully Respond to OUSD (AT&L)’s Direction Designed to Meet Future Challenges

While the NAVAIR and NAVSEA depot maintenance strategic plans  describe many initiatives and programs important to the NAVAIR and  NAVSEA depots, they are not fully responsive to OUSD (AT&L)’s direction  to the services that was designed to provide the services with a framework  to meet future challenges. The  NAVAIR and NAVSEA plans each partially address 8 issues and do not  address the remaining 2. The two plans generally discuss the future roles of their depots, but the  plans do not discuss projected future capabilities of the depots or how  those capabilities will be measured. Both plans discuss a  management approach for integrating public- and private-sector depot  sources. However, both plans are  silent with regard to a management approach for integrating joint,  interservice, and multinational capabilities. For the second of the two core logistics capability–assurance issues,  neither plan discusses the OUSD (AT&L) direction to address the  projected effects of weapon system retirements and bed-down (i.e., the act  or process of locating a weapon system at a particular base) and  retirements, despite changes to the Navy’s force structure for aircraft and  ships, as mentioned previously. In addition, the methods for estimating  depot workload are not addressed in the NAVAIR and NAVSEA plans. Capital investment in DOD depots has been an issue of concern in our  prior work. Recommendations for Executive Action

To provide greater assurance that Navy depots will be postured and  resourced to meet future maintenance requirements, we recommend that  the Secretary of Defense direct the Secretary of the Navy to take the  following four actions to revise the Navy’s depot maintenance strategic  plan:    Fully and explicitly address all elements needed for a comprehensive  results-oriented management framework, including those elements  that we have identified as partially addressed or not addressed in the  current plan. The department also concurred with our recommendation to direct the  Secretary of the Navy to revise the Navy’s depot maintenance strategic  plan to fully and explicitly address OUSD (AT&L)’s direction that provides  a framework for the services to address the four critical areas of logistics  transformation, core capability assurance, workforce revitalization, and  capital investment, consistent with OUSD (AT&L) criteria. GAO-10-526.
Why GAO Did This Study

The Navy's depots provide critical maintenance support to operations around the world. The Department of Defense's (DOD) increased reliance on the private sector for depot maintenance support coupled with downsizing led to a deterioration of depots' capabilities and cost increases. In 2007, the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) directed each service to submit a depot maintenance strategic plan and provided direction for the content of those plans. The 2007 U.S. Navy Depot Maintenance Strategic Plan contained a separate plan for each of five functional areas and an executive summary. GAO used qualitative content analyses to determine the extent to which two of the plans address (1) elements of a results-oriented management framework and (2) OSD's direction for the plan's content. GAO examined the plans for Navy aviation (NAVAIR) and ships (NAVSEA), which account for 94 percent of Navy depot workload.

What GAO Found

While the Navy's plans for aviation and shipyard depot maintenance focus efforts on weapon system and equipment availability, they do not fully address the elements of a results-oriented management framework. GAO's prior work has shown that seven elements of a results-oriented management framework are critical for comprehensive strategic planning. The NAVAIR and NAVSEA plans both fully address one of the elements by including mission statements that summarize their depots' major functions and operations, but the plans partially address or do not address the other six elements. For example, even though the plans describe goals for the depots' mission-related functions, they do not specify interim milestones or time frames for achieving the goals. Additionally, the plans include some measurable warfighter support metrics to gauge progress toward achieving the NAVAIR and NAVSEA plans' long-term goals; however, the plans do not describe how these metrics directly correspond to each long-term goal, desired levels for each, or how they will be used to evaluate each goal. Further, the Navy does not have an integrated Navy-wide depot maintenance strategic plan, but instead uses an overarching executive summary that does not have clear linkages to the separate plans and has the weaknesses resulting from the separate plans' missing or limited information on some elements. The NAVAIR and NAVSEA plans do not fully address these concerns because of weaknesses in oversight. Although OSD established an oversight body, which included senior representatives from OSD and the services, to review the services' plans, this body did not review the plans. Also, the Navy did not establish an oversight mechanism to review its plans. The plans' weaknesses may limit the Navy's ability to use its plan as a tool to meet future challenges effectively and efficiently. In addition, the NAVAIR and NAVSEA plans are not fully responsive to OSD's direction to the services that was designed to provide the services with a framework to meet future challenges. OSD directed the services to address 10 specific issues in four general areas: logistics transformation, core logistics capability assurance, workforce revitalization, and capital investment. Both plans partially address 8 of these issues and do not address the remaining 2. For example, both plans discuss management approaches for integrating public- and private-sector depot sources, but the plans are silent with regard to integrating joint, interservice, or multinational depot capabilities. The plans do not discuss the methods for estimating the amount of workload or the projected effects on depot workload caused by weapon system retirements and locating weapon systems at specific installations. The plans do not fully respond to OSD's direction for the plans' content in part because of weaknesses in oversight in both OSD and the Navy. As a result, these weaknesses could additionally limit the Navy's efforts to posture and resource its depots to meet future maintenance challenges.