Director of the BES Discusses the Importance of Industry Partnership

The annual State of the BES luncheon provides an opportunity for the director of Business Enterprise Systems (BES) to both recognize the past year's accomplishments and, more importantly, articulate where industry partnership is essential to achieving future objectives. During this year's event, attended by a mix of 153 industry and government professionals, Alvin F. Burse, a member of the Senior Executive Service, and program executive officer (PEO) and director, BES Directorate, outlined the BES's most pressing challenges and highlighted how industry can help address them.
Burse emphasized that the Department of the Air Force (DAF) is undergoing a cultural shift in which acquisition is now recognized as a warfighting function. As a result, the BES must deliver rapid improvements to the DAF and Department of War mission outcomes, with speed, efficiency and quality treated as mission imperatives. Additional challenges include increasing competition and responsiveness to operational needs, integrating cybersecurity as a core element of delivery and accounting for unfunded or partially funded mandates during proposal development.

Burse outlined several ways industry can support these objectives. He called for solutions that deliver greater capability to operators more quickly and efficiently, and for deeper collaboration to field capabilities faster-whether through incremental delivery or alternative partnering approaches. Industry partners were also encouraged to clearly articulate how their solutions drive mission outcomes for users, PEO BES, and the broader DAF enterprise. He noted that artificial intelligence and automation are not differentiators on their own; rather, their value lies in demonstrable mission impact. Finally, he emphasized that a strong understanding of agile performance and a commitment to improved software quality remain among the most effective proposal differentiators.

Event Photographs: