RDML McCoy (NAVSEA 05, Navy’s Chief Engineer) Presentation to Shipyard
Engineers on Technical Authority (15 Sep 06)
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There are many challenges facing the Navy today, but he wanted to keep the brief
upbeat. On balance, shipyard engineers are doing a very good job. You have to
really love what you do to come to work every day in a naval shipyard. He has
tremendous respect for what shipyard and NAVSEA engineers do.
Technical authority is Job One for NAVSEA
o He has been given $300 million by the CNO to improve and refine the
state of technical authority across the Navy. Possibly some can be used
for Virginia class.
o He used to think that technical authority was having the right person
making the decision, but it includes stewardship of people (since they are
the ones making the decisions): education, skills, training, development
and tools and processes as well.
 The average age of the Navy’s industrial and technical processes is
fourteen years. There has not been the money or the time to doing
much updating, but we are getting ready to build significantly
different combatants (such as the all aluminum hull LCS). Are we
ready? How much do we know about the processes and materials
that will be needed to support them?
 There are twenty-seven or twenty-eight ship designs or studies
going on right now, some of which include radical new
technologies. Should our next generation amphibious ships or
surface combatants be nuclear powered? The DDG 1000 will have
integrated electric drive.
o His job as NAVSEA Chief Engineer is to preside over and nurture the
technical authority pyramid. The Navy has 162 officially designated
technical warrant holders for ship systems. The warrant holders are
formally designated and must pass a series of oral boards. NAVSEA has a
process for assessing the health of each warrant (a dashboard that assesses
the education of the holders, the capacity of the warrant, and
demographics (age of those holding the warrant) among other factors).
The process rolls up to a Red, Yellow, or Green assessment for each
warrant. The desired outcome is no reds, obviously. For further reading,
see:
 From the Top — Technical Authority, by Captain Larry Baun,
Wavelengths Online, July 21, 2004 (in this document or on the
web).
 Technical Authority—Making Sure the Right People Fit the Right
Job, by Jack Templeton and William Palmer, Wavelengths Online,
July 21, 2004 (in this document or on the web).
 Human Capital Digital Dashboard – NAVSEA’s Future Method of
Measuring Community Health, by Matthew Tropiano Jr., Defense
AT&L: November-December 2005
1

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Reserve Engineering Duty Officer Alignment with NAVSEA
Technical Authority, by LCDR Mark McLean, NAVSEA DET
109, 14 February 2006.
 NASA/Navy Benchmarking Exchange (NNBE) Volume II,
Progress Report, Naval Reactors Safety Assurance, July 15, 2003
This is partial documentation of the collaboration and comparison
NASA and the Navy did started by Sean O’Keefe’s, NASA
Administrator at the time and former Secretary of the Navy. Pages
23-24 document the theory behind the problem hierarchy triangle
used by Naval Reactors.
We need to give some thought to the NAVSEA 05 Red Lines
o God bless Ronald Reagan for embarking on an expansion of the Navy in
the 80s, but today we are at 282 ships and they are aging. We want to
build enough ships to have 313 ships. This will require us to build 200
ships over the next twenty years. [At this point, he covered similar data to
what he brought up in the talk to Engineering Duty Officers about
shipbuilding budgets, DoD and Navy shares of the discretionary budget,
and personnel costs.]
o You are only as good an engineer as your last technical decision and we
have made some poor technical decisions in the recent past.
 USS Dolphin (AGSS 555) Flooding and abandonment at sea. The
Navy kept operating the ship with problems and should not have
lived with so many.
 The ship was commissioned in 1968. It is home ported at
the Naval Research and Development (NRaD) facility in
San Diego, and is the Navy's only operational, dieselelectric, deep-diving, research and development submarine.
 On 21 May 2002, at about 1130 PDT, while operating
approximately 100 miles off the coast of San Diego,
California, Dolphin was cruising on the surface, recharging
its batteries, when a torpedo shield door gasket failed, and
the boat began to flood. Due to high winds and 10- to 11foot swells in the ocean, approximately 70 to 85 tons of
seawater entered the ship, an amount perilously close to the
boat's reserve buoyancy. The flooding shorted electrical
panels and started fires.
 After 90 minutes, Commander Stephen Kelety, Dolphin's
commanding officer, ordered the crew of 41 and two
civilian Navy employees to abandon ship. The
Oceanographic Research ship McGaw was operating in the
vicinity and immediately responded.
 The fire and flooding was beyond the ability of the crew to
control so they were evacuated by small boat to McGaw
after the submarine hatches had been secured. All
crewmembers were safely recovered with only a few minor
injuries. Two crewmembers were recovered from the water
2
by United States Coast Guard helicopter during the
transfer. McGaw transported the crew to San Diego.
 The last time an American submarine caught fire and was
abandoned was in 1988, when the diesel sub Bonefish lost
three sailors in a battery compartment fire.
 Dolphin underwent three and a half years of repairs and
upgrades at a cost of $50 million, then completed sea-trials
during the summer of 2005 and returned to her duties for
one year.
 In mid-2006, the Navy decided to retire Dolphin, citing the
$18 million her operations cost annually. She is scheduled
to be inactivated on 22 September 2006 and
decommissioned in January 2007.
 Curtailment of aviation capability for the USS John F. Kennedy
(CV 67).
 NAVSEA had to condemn the arresting gear since the
foundations of the equipment had deteriorated beyond their
yield strength for a hard landing. We knew this problem
was coming, but no one “threw the penalty flag.”
 Two FFGs in Mayport had uncontrolled flooding due to needle
guns penetrating the hull. This was followed by having to take an
FFG off deployment for the same problem. This was three ships in
a row and no one got excited prior to this about the looming
problem. We finally had to take 60 days to inspect the 31
remaining ships of the class. 23-24 had significant problems with
their hull integrity.
 USS Leyte Gulf (CG 55) had to be taken off-line since its hull was
deflecting so badly that some thought it might suffer from a fatigue
failure. Inspections revealed that all hull structural support in the
affected area had corroded away.
 There may be other examples of not taking the correct action in the
midst of a deteriorating condition. We have to assume that
NAVSEA is the last line of defense in these situations. No one
else is going to backstop us.
 The USS Ohio (SSGN 726) was heading for an on time
conversion delivery, but when it came time to certify the
ship, Electric Boat “forgot” to do the hull Non-destructive
tests. Everyone was so disappointed about the impact on
delivery and so focused on cost and schedule that they
requested to defer the inspections.
o When a ship’s crew goes to sea, they should never have to worry about the
hull. There are certain things that we are not going to tolerate in the
program and missed hull weld NDTs are one of them. RDML McCoy
does not “give up” hull structure or stability.
 There was no push back when he made the decision to do the hull
weld NDTs on USS Ohio (just like the situation on JFK). The fleet
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may not like it, but they will respect us when we identify the red
line.
 The people who made the above decisions are not bad people. We
are all operating in a resource-constrained environment, but
NAVSEA’s technical warrant holders have the authority,
responsibility, and accountability for making the right decisions.
Making risk informed technical decisions
o NAVSEA 05 engineers have the responsibility and authority to provide
risk-based options to the fleet, but need to do a better job than they are
now of doing so.
o Example 1: The fleet asked if the ten-year docking of the USS Mahan
(DDG 72), based in Norfolk, could be extended to twelve years.
Motivations for the request were the feeling that the ship repair
contracting was going to charge too much for the work and there was a
desire to incorporate some structural upgrades into the availability that
would not be ready in time for this docking.
 Engineers looked at the data they had. Shafting became the
limiting component and there was no data for shaft performance
beyond eight to ten years so the engineers at NAVSEA said do, the
docking could not be extended. RDML McCoy’s belief is that if
all NAVSEA can do is look at the “book” and read it to people, the
Navy does not need engineers at NAVSEA. Just hire someone to
read the “book” to us.
 The real tasking was this: the fleet wanted to know what the
requirements were and what the pros and cons were for extending
the docking interval so RDML directed the engineers to take
another look at the problem.
 If shafts are the limiting component and you do not repair/replace
them at the desired periodicity, what is the worst that can happen?
The shafts could break, but it seems unlikely that two would break
at the same time and the ship is a dual shaft ship so it probably
would not be stranded (Soule – although you might want to
consider operational restrictions for heavy weather). The worst
time for a shaft to fail might be maneuvering in port and an
unexpected shaft repair at another inconvenient time might affect
the ship’s deployment (either could not go on time or would have
to curtail an ongoing one).
 Since it appear inconceivable that a shafting casualty would sink
the ship (Soule – again, you may have to consider heavy weather
operations) or kill someone, the impact to ship’s operations is more
of a fleet commander decision than one for NAVSEA (Soule – the
decision process gets a bit more complicated for nuclear powered
ships given the high profile of anything that happens to them, that
is why NAVSEA 08’s decision process will probably include
different factors).
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
Once NAVSEA presents what is known and what its engineers
believe the risks to be, we have to be willing to ask the fleet what
risk level they are willing to accept. We cannot guarantee the
assessment without more reliable data, but this appears to be worst
case and what we think the risk is.
o Example 2: The bow sonar dome boot of the new USS Virginia (SSN 774)
was delaminating and starting to come off in November 2005. Post
Shakedown Availability (PSA) was scheduled for Feb 06 and no drydock
was available before then. The operators asked “What are the repair
options? Can we defer the repair or do a temporary repair and operate the
ship until PSA?”
 The technically acceptable risk-based approach would be to
consider worst case. The worst case in this situation would be that
the sonar dome falls off or the boot fails completely. In the former
case, no one would die and the ship would not sink. In the latter
case, it would add $3 million to the repairs in PSA.
 NAVSEA recommended a temporary repair (lag bolts for a
sling/straps around the boot) with speed and depth operational
limits.
o Example 3: An LSD in San Diego wanted to defer its docking for four to
five months to finish important training, but it had significant hull
cracking in the bow structure. NAVSEA recommended a temporary
repair, operational limits, and periodic monitoring in order to extend the
drydocking date.
o Example 4: The City of Corpus Christie has high solids paint delaminating
from the torpedo tube impulse tank. Full blast and paint appears to be a
schedule “buster” that will preclude finishing the ship before 22 Dec.
NAVSEA’s technical answer is to full blast and paint the tank. This is
why the fleet has the impression that NAVSEA “just does not get it.”
 The shipyard’s engineers (RDML McCoy made it clear at this
point he was only talking to non-nuclear engineers at this point
since he has no authority for nuclear engineering) have dealt with
nuclear power and submarines their entire careers. He sees people
struggle with making the right technical call every day. RDML
McCoy noted that he has been what Engineering Duty Officers call
a “pump kicker” (i.e., doing fleet maintenance in depot facilities)
his entire career (having served in Charleston, Mare Island,
Norfolk, Portsmouth, and Puget Sound) and he never imagined he
would have cognizance over all manner of ship design issues to
reduce costs. Every day engineers at NAVSEA are involved in
taking things off ships that we have always had in order to reduce
costs (such as taking fire insulation off CVN 78 for $15 million or
allowing the LCS engineroom to be so noisy that the human stay
time with even double hearing protection is only 60 minutes or no
sound insulation on CVN 78 below the flight deck) or we will not
be able to build and afford the 313 ship Navy. The money issue is
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real and he sees it every day impacting decisions. He worries
about what we are giving up after three to four hour design reviews
that leave participants mentally exhausted at completion.
o The message he wants non-nuclear engineers to receive is that everyone in
NAVSEA has an obligation to look at what we do with regard to technical
answers. There are three basic answers we should be giving to the fleet
for technical issues:
 Make it like new and use the book answer (this is the blast and
paint the impulse tanks on City of Corpus Christie answer)
 Identify the worst-case impact and assess that impact on
operations (on City of Corpus Christie, that might look like blast
or scrape the paint off, but do not repaint, replace the zincs, and put
no paint back on until the next docking four years from now).
 Recommend a temporary repair with monitoring (on City of
Corpus Christie, that might look like hand prep the surfaces, fair
some touch up paint on the tank. This might result in additional
paint flaking off in the future that may require more frequent
replacement of the slide valves).
o Bad things can happen in our business. Approximately 350 ships sink
per year.
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From the Top — Technical Authority, by Captain Larry Baun, Wavelengths Online, July
21, 2004.
DIVISION—This month’s theme technical authority—where it should reside and how
and when it should be delegated—is one of our top five management initiatives. This
subject is important to you and the Division because it is understood by Navy leadership
that technical authority brings military value to the warfare centers and NAVSEA. All of
our work at the Division supports our ability to execute our role from the technical
authority perspective. We must ensure that we understand and comply with our role in
technical authority and support this aspect of NAVSEA’s mission.
You have probably heard discussion on the report by the Columbia Commission on the
subject of technical authority. Simply stated, the Columbia Accident Investigation Board
concluded that NASA’s dilution of technical authority by excessive delegation and
reliance on outside support for making technical decisions ultimately contributed to an
inability to make a technically pure decision that was “independent”—in other words,
may have been adversely affected by business decisions. According to the literature, this
lack of clear technical authority, sense of complacency, and lack of appropriate resources
all contributed to decisions made which, at least indirectly, led to the Columbia disaster.
During the subsequent investigation, the Navy—NAVSEA in particular—was cited as an
example of appropriate use of technical authority—that is, it is an inherently
governmental function that is separate from program management functions. Since the
Columbia accident, NASA has taken steps to develop a technical authority structure
similar to NAVSEA’s. The requirement for the Navy to maintain technical authority is
based on law (CFR Title X, Chapter 503-5013) and regulated by Navy and NAVSEA
instructions. This does not mean that private industry cannot support technical
authority—we do this today—but it recognizes that funding, business, and operational
concerns need to be separated from influence on technical decisions —the technical
authority needs to be independent of outside influences. By “independent,” I don’t mean
that business, funding, or operational concerns are ignored. We operate the Navy in this
environment and call on our scientists, engineers, and managers to understand the
environment and the risk involved. A correct technical decision or recommendation
frequently considers the risk and outside factors but is governed by the technically correct
answer.
What does all this mean to you? For starters, you should know that there are formally
designated technical warrant holders (TWHs) warranted by Commander, Naval Sea
Systems Command. These warrants are signed by Vice Admiral Phillip Balisle
(COMNAVSEA) and issued through Gregory Maxwell (NAVSEA 03, Human Systems
Integration), Rear Admiral Paul Sullivan (NAVSEA 05, Ship Design Integration and
Engineering), Rear Admiral Alan Hicks (NAVSEA 06, Warfare Systems Engineering),
and Rear Admiral William Timme (NAVSEA 07, Undersea Warfare), SEA 00V, and 017
also administer certain warrants. There is a clear line of authority and accountability
present. A “pyramid” of personnel supports each TWH (there are currently 168 within
NAVSEA). The article on page 3 contains a detailed explanation of the pyramids.
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In the past, this pyramid was understood to be the myriad of government engineers,
scientists, and private industry and academia in the respective disciplines and specialties
but was not always well defined or formal. We are in the process of formalizing and
“populating” these pyramids, identifying by name those who support the TWHs and how
they do it. Two levels are identified: “engineering managers,” who are in turn supported
by “lead engineers.” Again, these positions may exist at NAVSEA Headquarters, within
Warfare Center divisions, Fleet activities, or in private industry. What is important is that
the positions are by name vice billet (although they may be synonymous), and they are
based on technical competency.
The Division has four technical warrant holders; check out the article on technical
authority on page 3 for a list of Division warrant holders. Many of you are assigned to
engineering manager or lead engineer positions within individual technical authority
pyramids. It is important for those in these positions to clearly understand their role and
where they stand within their pyramid; certainly TWHs should understand—in detail—
the structure of the pyramid that supports them, who is in it, and the “health” of the
pyramid (i.e., the age demographics, workload, etc.). If you are not assigned by name to a
technical authority pyramid, that does not mean your skills are not valued or needed. It is
understood, but not yet well defined, that the “pyramid” has a foundation of people, that
consists of many of the employees in the warfare centers and is supported by the
numerous taskings and jobs that we do. You should understand what technical authority
pyramid your work supports ... it may be several. Our product area directors (PADs),
while not directly responsible for technical pyramids, have a stewardship responsibility to
ensure that the work within their product area supports the health of the pyramid.
Division commanders share in this responsibility. Those who are not named specifically
within a pyramid should understand what areas they work within; it is likely that they
will support multiple pyramids.
While I’ve provided some detail above, I think it is important to understand the approach
the Navy and NAVSEA have taken to technical authority and how it applies to you. The
Division’s lead for interface with NAVSEA in populating technical authority pyramids
and all tech authority issues is Jack Templeton (24). Please take time to read the articles
in this month’s Wavelengths for an overall understanding of your role—and don’t
hesitate to discuss this with your supervisor if you have questions.
www.dt.navy.mil/wavelengths/archives/000086.html
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Technical Authority—Making Sure the Right People Fit the Right Job
By Jack Templeton and William Palmer
WEST BETHESDA—The concept of technical authority, which for decades has been the
focal point of the Navy’s hull, mechanical, and electrical (HM&E) technology research
and development for both surface and submarine platforms, has taken root at the
Division. In recent years, with the transition of more acquisition and in-service
engineering services from NAVSEA, the Division has become an acknowledged full
spectrum engineering organization. To that end, the Division is a key member of an
ongoing NAVSEA headquarters initiative intended to formalize a process that establishes
and enforces technical standards and policies.
The scope of this process is currently captured in NAVSEA Instruction 5400.97A,
Engineering and Technical Authority Policy, dated February 3, 2003. This document
states that COMNAVSEA is the technical authority for ships, weapons, systems, and
infrastructure as defined in the document. COMNAVSEA in turn warrants SEA 03, SEA
05, SEA 06, SEA 07 and SEA 00V (and recently SEA 017) for technical authority in
their respective areas. Jointly with COMNAVSEA, they warrant their respective
technical authority warrant holders. The warrant holders in turn establish an infrastructure
(or pyramid) of engineering assets to fulfill their duties.
There are three basic components to the technical authority pyramid: at the top is the
warrant holder; the midsection contains the engineering managers—effectively the
supervisory element of the technical community under whom the engineering staff
reside—and the pyramid’s base is comprised of those engineers who actually do the
work. There are currently more than 150 warrant holders in NAVSEA, meaning that
there are this many different areas of expertise represented by the associated warrant
holder. Much of the detail associated with the makeup of these pyramids is captured in
two additional complimentary NAVSEA instructions: NAVSEA Instruction 5400.61D,
Systems Engineering and Technical Authority Policy, dated February 3, 2003; and
NAVSEA Instruction 5400.57D, Engineering Agent Selection, Assignment,
Responsibility, Tasking, and Appraisal, dated February 3, 2003.
What is a warrant holder? Jack Templeton (24), himself a warrant holder, defines the
position as “an individual who’s a recognized technical expert in a particular engineering
area.” Warrant holders are the “go to” people when a decision is required, when design
standards or practices are being deviated from, where safety of life at sea is at issue, or
impact of mission effectiveness is of concern. Four warrant holders are resident within
the Division: Templeton, in charge of surface ship arrangements; Paul DiTaranto (9612),
heading the submarine sail systems warrant; Andy Paryzek (23) for the Egyptian fast
missile craft; and Brooks Darden (23), leading the boats and crafts warrant. The
remaining warrant holders work at NAVSEA headquarters or within other field activities,
including Naval shipyards and other Warfare Center divisions.
Templeton says the new organizational structure will benefit not only NAVSEA and the
Division, but our sponsors and the operators in the Fleet as well. “One value added by
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this pyramid process is that it’s hoped that it will allow engineering management across
the enterprise to assess the health of our respective warrant areas and potentially support
core equities health assessment. By having a relationship between the technical area
expertise which is captured in these pyramids and the programs of record (which can
number as many as 30 or more), we can assess if we have enough engineers to support
not only the technology development but also support the interaction with the programs
and make sure the designs are progressing as well. From a program manager’s or
operator’s viewpoint, they can rest assured that the appropriate expertise is being brought
to bear on design issues they face, and this expertise is accessible when needed.”
Templeton also explains that the technical authority process should help headquarters
managers better appreciate the relationship required with the field activities to better
understand staffing requirements. “We’re always struggling with what the workload
forecast is for upcoming programs.”
How does technical authority fit in with the current warfare center/product area business
structures? Templeton says flag-level Navy officials are currently looking at the answer
to that very question. At the recent Engineering Leadership Conference held at the
Washington Navy Yard May 11 through 13, C. Randy Reeves, Product Area Director
(PAD) for Ships and Ship Systems, cited a number of key roles of the PAD. Specifically,
he noted that the PAD will share a stewardship role with the various technical authority
warrant holders to sustain the capabilities of the technical authority pyramids. He also
noted that the PAD will concur with all engineering agents assigning documents to
ensure technical alignment with Warfare Center capabilities.
For further information on technical authority, please contact Jack Templeton at 301-2275572 or templetonjk@nswccd.navy.mil.
http://www.dt.navy.mil/wavelengths/archives/000098.html
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NASA/Navy Benchmarking Exchange (NNBE) Volume II
Progress Report | July 15, 2003
Naval Reactors Safety Assurance
www.nasa.gov/pdf/45608main_NNBE_Progress_Report2_7-15-03.pdf
Event Assessment Process
Problems are assessed using a variant of the classic Heinrich Pyramid3-approach with
minor events at the base and major events at the top (see figure 3.6).
During training of prospective commanding officers, one instructor teaches about
megacuries of radioactivity and then a second presenter addresses picocuries (a
difference of 1018). The picocurie pitch is very effective because it emphasizes how little
problems left uncontrolled can quickly become unmanageable. The point is to worry
about picocurie issues, which subsequently prevents megacurie problems. Radioactive
skin contamination is treated as a significant event at NR. The nuclear powered fleet has
had very few skin contaminations in the past five years, and the total is comparably
orders of magnitude lower than in some civilian reactor programs.
3 H.W. Heinrich, Industrial Accident Prevention – A Scientific Approach, 1950.
(see figure on next page)
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The Triangle Theory
Pinnacle Event –
Reactor Accident (a
similar event for
NASA would be loss
of the Space Shuttle
S
e
v
e
r
i
t
y
Deficiencies
The NNPP Triangle
The NNPP Triangle
Problems
manage
you
1st
Order –
Incidents
2nd Order –
Near Misses
You
manage
problems
3rd Order –
Deficiencies
NNPP Pyramidal Problem Representation
The triangle and hierarchy of problems (number and severity) model the experience of
accident investigators that most incidents and serious problems do not strike like a “bolt
from the blue,” completely unexpected and hard to anticipate.
1st order – Incidents – least frequent type of problem, represents serious breaches of
defense systems leading to major injury or equipment damage
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2nd order - Near Misses - less frequent than deficiencies, more serious problems that are
signs of deeper weakness and could lead to much bigger problems
3rd order – Deficiencies - small problems of low individual consequence and importance,
most numerous category
1st order problems are typically preceded by a number of 2nd order problems and an
even larger number of 3rd order problems that an organization has been tolerating for
some time. In almost every case of an organizational accident like the loss of a Space
Shuttle, the organization was tolerating and not correcting many 3rd order deficiencies.
By focusing on reducing and aggressively investigating 3rd order deficiencies,
organizations “put pressure” on the triangle and push more problems lower (or prevent
them in the first place) and build a broad population of questioning attitudes and
awareness of deficiencies that will ultimately reduce the likelihood of 1st order incidents.
In this way, organizations can look closely at how they accomplish work and attempt to
design processes to make second and first order problems exceedingly unlikely.
In the Naval Nuclear Propulsion Program, any problem reaching 1st order requires that a
report that goes directly to NAVSEA 08 (this is called an “incident”). Naturally,
correspondence of this nature and the dialog between the senior staff of an organization
and their counterparts at NR gets the senior leadership of an organization involved in
very important details associated with problems. This is by design. This process seeks to
inspire/encourage treatment of the lower level problems before they contribute to a more
serious event. The local Naval Reactors Representative Office (NRRO) performs monitor
watches to evaluate how well the organization is managing its 2nd and 3rd order
deficiencies. By maintaining issues at 3rd order, they are usually more manageable. At
level 3, organizations manage the problems, 1st and 2nd order problems manage the
organization and bring additional scrutiny of regulators, reducing the flexibility and
management discretion.
Every corrective action follows a closed loop corrective action process that addresses the
problem, assigns a corrective action, tracks application of the corrective action and
subsequently evaluates the effectiveness of that action. A second order problem is
considered a "Near Miss" and typically receives a formal management review. Ideally,
the only difference between the way an organization treats a 1st order problem and a 2nd
order one is the formal correspondence sent to NR HQ. Headquarters gets involved with
all first-order and some second-order problems. The visibility of issues available to the
Admiral allows him to choose the appropriate level of involvement with first, second, or
sometimes third-order issues.
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