Accelerating and Scaling Defense Acquisition with Sharothi Pikar

This week, defense acquisition powerhouse Sharothi Pikar joins Bonnie Evangelista for a deep dive into the world of defense acquisition. As the Deputy CDAO for Acquisition at the Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Office, Sharothi brings a wealth of knowledge from her origins as an army civilian computer engineer to her pivotal role at Cyber Command. She discusses the cultural and organizational mindset shifts needed to accelerate and scale the acquisition process as well as her vision for the future of acquisitions, the delicate balance of partnership and ownership, and the empowerment of program offices.

TIMESTAMPS:

(5:09) Sharothi's journey from army civilian to Cyber Command

(10:41) The challenges of a new organization like CDAO

(12:19) How to prioritize your customer

(13:50) Which comes first: scaling or adoption?

(17:08) How to plan for a successful prototype

(21:25) Embracing the art of pivoting

(26:06) Why maintaining and sustaining a capability is critical

(29:12) The key to developing real-time agile capabilities

(32:08) How to deliver at scale

(34:53) CDAO in 5 years

(39:49) Creating a framework that allows for risk

LINKS:

Follow Sharothi: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sharothi/

Follow Bonnie: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bonnie-evangelista-520747231/

CDAO: https://www.ai.mil/

Tradewinds AI: https://www.tradewindai.com/