An official website of the United States government
Here's how you know
A .mil website belongs to an official U.S. Department of Defense organization in the United States.
A lock (lock ) or https:// means you’ve safely connected to the .mil website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

ANNOUNCING DEPARTMENT OF THE NAVY A+ AWARD WINNERS​

UNCLASSIFIED//

ROUTINE

R 051423Z JUN 20 MID510001222361U

FM SECNAV WASHINGTON DC

TO ALNAV

INFO SECNAV WASHINGTON DC
CNO WASHINGTON DC
CMC WASHINGTON DC

BT
UNCLAS

ALNAV 063/20

MSGID/GENADMIN/SECNAV WASHINGTON DC/-/JUN//

SUBJ/ANNOUNCING DEPARTMENT OF THE NAVY A+ AWARD WINNERS//

REF/A/DOC/UNSECNAV/14MAR2019//
REF A IS UNSECNAV MEMO, DEPARTMENT OF THE NAVY A+ AWARDS PROGRAM//
POC/OCMO/UNSECNAV/COMM:  703-695-9275/E-MAIL:  loranji.m.goodrum@navy.mil//

RMKS/1.  Per reference (a), this ALNAV message announces the Department of 
the Navy (DON) A+ Awards Program recipients, which recognizes achievement in 
innovation and agility from across the DON over the past year.

2.  The purpose of the DON A+ Awards Program is to act as an overall 
authorizing framework for a continuous, highly-visible, credible, and sought-
after signal of recognition throughout the DON for those who best exhibit the 
principles of agility and accountability throughout the lifecycle of 
management.  All Naval personnel who have received award recognition over the 
past year from the Assistant Secretaries of the Navy, General Council, and 
the Deputy Under Secretary of the Navy are eligible for the DON A+ Award.

3.  The DON A+ Award recognizes members of the DON, either working 
individually or in teams, who positively demonstrate one or more of the 
following elements of agility in their management of resources such as money, 
property, people, or
information:  velocity, collaboration, visibility, adaptability, innovation, 
humility, skepticism, and trust. Nominations may be submitted anytime 
throughout the year and will be adjudicated throughout the year on a 
continuous basis.  This years eight A+ Award recipients are:
    a.  Team Award:  Robin Howard (Team Lead), Jason Gregory, Beverly 
Reinharz, Natalie Dahm, Gregory Robinson, Kelly Gibson, Angela Baltor, and 
John Clark; Marine Corps System Command, Accelerated Acquisition (AA) Team. 
Ms. Howard and the AA Team executed a workshop with over 180 participants and 
published a Fastlane Playbook that provided a 60 percent reduction in 
documentation and delivery of critically needed capabilities up to 6-months 
faster than originally planned.
    b.  Individual Award:  SO1 Bradley Denn, U.S. Special Operations Command, 
Naval Special Warfare Command, Group ELEVEN.  SO1 Denn not only recognized 
software inadequacies, but provided immediate solutions with little or no 
impact to the Naval Special Warfare budget, while educating senior leaders on 
commercially available technology that would be quickly adopted to replace 
large, inundated systems.  SO1 Denn also developed a Virtual Reality 
prototype that could be demonstrated for key members to better understand 
Command capabilities.
    c.  Individual Award:  Noel Sanqui, Bureau of Medicine, Naval Health 
Research Center.  Mr. Sanquis work as an accounting officer resulted in a 
dramatically reduced amount of line items on the Active Document Listing by 
54 percent over the past year.  He worked tirelessly to reduce the amount of 
Unmatched Disbursements by 90 percent.  He also oversaw the development of 
desk guides for a wide range of accounting functions, resulting in tremendous 
time savings in staff training.
    d.  Individual Award:  Kristen Allen, Navy Reserve Forces Command.  Ms.
Allen was responsible for Budget Submitting Office 72s successful conversion 
to both the memorandum accounting system Command Financial Management System, 
Consolidated (CFMS-C), and general ledger accounting system Standard 
Accounting Budgeting Reporting System (SABRS).  She also led the development 
of necessary changes to accounting procedures and systems to facilitate 
accurate accounting and reporting across five major General Fund 
appropriations.
    e.  Individual Award:  Troy Grenier, Naval Information Warfare Systems 
Command.  Mr. Grenier developed an Integrated Program Management evaluation 
process for government organizations performing Prime Mission Product 
development efforts.  He pioneered a performance monitoring process that 
allowed the funding/"Grantor" organizations to discretely track and report 
Earned Value Management-like cost, schedule, and deliverables of Working 
Capital Fund /"Performers" in a near real time fashion.  The result was a 
dramatic improvement of program status.
    f.  Team Award:  Benjamin Michlin (Team Lead), Jarrod Groves, Sean 
Blackman, Josh Dulos, Dean Lee, Vincent Siu, Ruey-Juin Chang, Gary Williams, 
Rick Cruz, Charles Yetman, Dan Green, Viral Bhalodia, and John Serrano; Data 
Engineering and Analytics Group, Naval Information Warfare Center.  Dr. 
Michlin and the Digital Aviation Readiness Technology, Engine team 
implemented the Performance to Plan mandate to increase fleet readiness and a 
rapid data-driven decision making process for senior leadership.  The team 
created machine-learning models for determining the monthly number of mission 
capable jets per squadron by incorporating manning-training-equipment 
datasets from Naval FA-18 squadrons.
    g.  Individual Award:  Melissa Mosley, Financial Improvement and Audit 
Readiness.  Ms. Mosley worked continuously with Defense Financial and 
Accounting Services (DFAS) on areas requiring improvement by deep diving into 
the DFAS process and comparing data to internal systems such as SABRS & 
Standard Accounting and Reporting System - Field Level.  She was able to 
identify steps and processes requiring improvement within DFAS, including but 
not limited to the order of authorized approver signatures, data elements 
within Field-Level Journal Voucher forms and logs.  The result was a 
significant improvement in test scores.
    h.  Team Award:  Major Adam Yang (Team Lead), Austin Duncan, William 
Bradley, Jerrod Moore, Charles J. Baumann, Timothy Riemann, Walker Mills, 
Shannon Winslow, Garbiel Pons, Jeffrey Nadaner, Bob Arant, Tyler Quinn, 
Valerie A. Jackson, Stephani L. Miller, Robert A. Kocher, Sara Wood, Reilly 
Wade, and Mark Sable; Destination Unknown Project, Marine Corps University. 
Major Yang and the Destination Unknown project team assembled a writing and 
illustration process to develop and publish a graphic novel series that 
explores future moral, tactical, and leadership challenges in warfare. 
Destination Unknown relied solely on the talent of individual Marines, and 
improves the currency of Professional Military Education by connecting with 
junior ranks on the mediums which they prefer  short stories, illustrations, 
graphic novels, and social media.

4.  Additionally, DON A+ Award winners will automatically be forwarded for 
consideration for the Office of Management and Budget sponsored Gears of 
Government Awards Program.  The DON will have the opportunity to select the 
most deserving eight individuals or Team representatives (four Navy and four 
Marine Corps) for this Award, which recognizes the contributions of the 
Federal Workforce in support of the President's Management Agenda in the 
areas of mission, service, and stewardship.  In addition to being recognized 
by the Secretary of the Navy, Navy and Marine Corps winners are forwarded for 
recognition by the Secretary of Defense (SECDEF) along with similar award 
winners from the rest of Department of Defense (DoD).  All DoD SECDEF winners 
will then go on to compete against similar winners from other Federal 
Agencies at the National level for potential selection for recognition in a 
White House Ceremony.

5.  The DON Office of the Chief Management Officer (OCMO) is the responsible 
organization for the DON A+ Program.  The Assistant Secretary of the Navy 
(Research, Development and Acquisition) supports OCMO in the administration 
of the A+.  Further guidance will be provided in separate correspondence and 
through the DON A+ Awards webpage.  The DON A+ Awards webpage is located at:
https://www.secnav.navy.mil/ocmo/pages/awards.aspx.

6.  Released by the Honorable Gregory J. Slavonic, Assistant Secretary of the 
Navy (Manpower and Reserve Affairs) Performing the Duties of the Under 
Secretary of the Navy.//

BT
#0001
NNNN
UNCLASSIFIED//
 

Google Translation Disclaimer

Guidance-Card-Icon Dept-Exclusive-Card-Icon