Guest Post by CAPT Marshall Lytle, Acting Assistant Commandant for C4IT (CG-6):
Transforming the Coast Guard's Command, Control, Communications, Computers and Information Technology (C4IT) assets into the Mission Support Business Model's four cornerstones – configuration management, bi-level maintenance, total asset visibility, and product line management – is a top priority for the Coast Guard.
As we moved to describe C4IT assets as product lines, the nature of the C4IT's breadth and depth across our organization became readily apparent. The Mission Support model had to be flexed a bit to fully reflect the complex and widespread nature of Coast Guard's C4IT enterprise.
Many Coast Guard C4IT assets fit the business model definition of a product line, a group of closely related products with similar attributes. However, a number of C4IT assets were foundational to other product lines. So, we began to group together those technologies into what we now call "Core Technologies". The result is a set of Core Technologies and Product Lines that the C4IT Service Center is creating.
Mr. Mark Powell, the Director of the C4IT Service Center offers an excellent explanation of the C4IT Service Center's Core Technologies on the DCMS Log. I believe that "Core-Technology Management" should be the fifth cornerstone of the business model that ensures the viability of readiness supporting mission operations. I hope you'll read it to learn more.
