715 



29 

 THE MANAGEMENT BLUEPRINT 



Implementation of partnerships requires, in addition to adherence to the principles 

 outlined previously, a strong, yet flexible, management blueprint. The management 

 issues associated with conduct of research are complicated by the planning, 

 coordination and associated details required of an effective partnership. The 

 managem.ent plan must deal in specific terms with the concerns of resources, personnel, 

 infrastructure, schedules and deliverables. All of these categories must be organized 

 according to an agreed upon set of priorities. 



To facilitate the management of the proposed partnership concepts, a management 

 blueprint must be developed immediately to establish the operational structure and 

 guidelines for the concerns listed above. 



Resources 



The initiatives proposed herein reqviire supplements in funding. The funding source 

 must be centralized to both facilitate its obligation/commitment, and to separate it from 

 the influences of mdividuai mission focus of a specific agency. The investment of 

 resources should be planned to accommodate the plan for implementation of the 

 partnership initiatives over a well-established and agreed upon phase-in period 

 (nominally five years). An estimate of the additional resources required to implement 

 all of the proposed initiatives is $30-50 million per year over that time frame (for a total 

 of $250 million). 



Personnel 



The issue of staffing is critical to successful implementation of the partnerships. 

 Recalling the partnership principle of 'high-level involvement', there must be a long- 

 standing oversight committee of the principal operational federal agencies, with ex- 

 officio membership from the Federal, academic, industrial and other non-Federal 

 sectors. The critical nature and high visibility required of the partnership activities 

 dictates continued involvement by the highest level representatives of the agencies. 

 This National Ocean Leadership Council (NOLC) should be a chartered organization, 

 with formally established membership requirements, leadership structure, dedicated 

 staffing, and meeting schedules. The executive activities associated with project 

 management should be delegated to a group, arguably the same as the Coordinating 

 Group of this partnership initiative. The NOLC would report on an annual basis, 

 highlighting its investment priorities, and products of its efforts, in. the context of 

 national needs to the Administration and the US Congress. A conceptual structure is 

 shown in Figure 2. 



Infrastructure 



The successful implementation of this management plan cannot rely exclusively on 

 periodic convening of the Coordinating Group and NOLC. The working groups shown 

 in Figure 2 would be the agents for developing plans specific to particular issues. 

 Irutially the working groups would function as planning forums for specific initiatives, 

 such as those identified in this report. The definition, charge and performance schedule 



