When I got my master’s in computer science, relational databases, the answer was third normal form. Well, the first time I did third normal form in an Oracle database, my performance went in the toilet. Doesn’t actually work because nobody actually builds a database, you know, pristinely. And your data’s never that clean and I could go on and on. But you have to learn that. And the way that you learn that is because you screw up. The things we learn the best are the things we’ve made personal mistakes in our lives.
So I got to grow up as a working engineer, which brings a different sensibility to systems engineering writ large. So I think what we went through and what you’re still seeing is this decision to outsource. I think the healthiest organizations I see in my portfolio today are the ones that didn’t buy into that lock, stock and barrel. I will say that I think NSA and CIA have done fabulous jobs with that. NSA does co-teams in terms of development; they are a software powerhouse. CIA, I think – and I can’t talk about there – but I think they also are very, very good at what they do. And some of our others did the whole outsourcing thing and we’re recovering. That’s my assessments.
So now we’ve got to grow those kids. And we’ve got to let them actually build stuff, because you got to learn the hard way that that isn’t what you learned in the textbook doesn’t translate precisely into what actually – what actually works.