Dissertation research topic search

How about a study on the quality of the schools that government employees attend. You could use something like the Barron's guide to use as a bench mark.

Organizational conflicts of interest.

Centralization in acquistion

Effectiveness of performance based contracts

I think the OCI topic would be the most interesting and fun.

I am currently pursuing a doctoral degree in Business Management and I will be beginning the early stages of my dissertation in November/December of this year. I have a very loose idea of a topic that deals with the success (or failure) of the DAWIA degree/24 hr requirement for 1102's. I am not married to the topic, and it has not yet been reviewed or approved by my dissertation committee, so I am looking for other options that may be more suitable or acceptable to my committee.

I appreciate any responses that the esteemed members of WIFCON can provide! Those responses do not need to be formatted in any particular way, I am just brainstorming in a virtual environment with this request.

Thanks!

dwgerard,

I think that your idea for a topic is good. I have read opinion pieces on the topic, but I don't know of any formal research.

Whatever topic you choose, make sure that it is interesting to you. You will be spending a lot of your time on it and an internal desire to know the answer to a question, even if it is ultimately not answerable, will make the time fly by.

Centralization in acquistion

Effectiveness of performance based contracts

I think the OCI topic would be the most interesting and fun.

Either of these three are excellent.

There isn't alot of detailed information on OCI available. Besides bring an interesting topic, a dissertation would be helpful to our community.

Centralization as a topic could work in two ways - agencies that centralized their buying functions (the people side) and agencies that centralized commodities . It could also include contracts for centralized or consolidated things such as GWACS, MACS and strategic sourcing.

There are some PBA success stories and many that weren't successful - analyze why some worked and others didn't.

How about a study of the Gansler Commission on Army Contracting with respect to the recommended management changes (such as creating a new Command and adding a Commanding General Officer (certified in Contracting)). It's been several years - is it working?

http://www.army.mil/docs/Gansler_Commissio...inal_071031.pdf

Thanks to everyone on their suggestions! I will look at the research on the suggestions and decide on a primary and a few secondary potential topics that I will propose to my dissertation committee. I will post the accepted topic title here once it is accepted, and I will also post a link to the complete dissertation if possible on this site.

I am currently pursuing a doctoral degree in Business Management and I will be beginning the early stages of my dissertation in November/December of this year. I have a very loose idea of a topic that deals with the success (or failure) of the DAWIA degree/24 hr requirement for 1102's. I am not married to the topic, and it has not yet been reviewed or approved by my dissertation committee, so I am looking for other options that may be more suitable or acceptable to my committee.

I appreciate any responses that the esteemed members of WIFCON can provide! Those responses do not need to be formatted in any particular way, I am just brainstorming in a virtual environment with this request.

Thanks!

Consider addressing the consequences of the 1102 downsizing during the 1990s acquisition reform movement and its imact on the acquisition workforce now. Do we have adequate senior leadership to do on the job training for complex competitions?

I am currently pursuing a doctoral degree in Business Management and I will be beginning the early stages of my dissertation in November/December of this year. I have a very loose idea of a topic that deals with the success (or failure) of the DAWIA degree/24 hr requirement for 1102's. I am not married to the topic, and it has not yet been reviewed or approved by my dissertation committee, so I am looking for other options that may be more suitable or acceptable to my committee.

I appreciate any responses that the esteemed members of WIFCON can provide! Those responses do not need to be formatted in any particular way, I am just brainstorming in a virtual environment with this request.

Thanks!

Hello dwgerard,

I'm a new 1102 (I start next week as a Keystone), so I don't have any topic suggestions. However, I am a PhD ABD close to finishing my dissertation. My advice is try to get your topic as narrow and specific as possible. A lot of PhD students try to take on something that is just way too much and they end up never finishing. Remember, your objective here is not to try to save the world, but to graduate! There will be plenty of time to save the world when you are done.

I take it you are already working in the contracting workforce? What is your motivation for getting a PhD? Are there opportunities for PhDs in contracting?

Good luck with the PhD!