Search Results

We all have something we are “good” at. Maybe you pick up a baseball for the first time and throw a strike, or you have a ratatouille taste pallet and anything you cook is amazing? For me it was art. I struggled with most other subjects, but art was a subject in which I excelled. Growing up, this attitude made me “good at art”, which later led me to a career in it. Fast forward to 2021, I have a successful career as a Senior Graphic Designer, but it no longer challenges me. I feel stagnant in my current job, as I have felt in other positions during my career. The sterile environment a year into Covid only exacerbated this feeling. A change was due, which made me think of a career I was always curious about: that of a Software Developer. Three years prior, I had taken UI and UX courses at Nashville Software School as a way to spice up my resume. During that time, I saw other students taking a Software Development Bootcamp that intrigued me; however, at the time it seemed like an unrealistic prospect. Yet three years later the idea of pursuing a career as a Software Developer still excited me. With the “end of the world” vibe in the air, I felt reckless, applied to Nashville Software School, and got a scholarship. The scholarship alleviated the anxiety of finances during the boot camp, yet my main obstacle was my mindset, which told me “I am not good at this”. Flashback to my elementary school years and the mindset that I grew up with. Praised for high grades in Art and English but nothing in regards to courses with more logical thinking, of which I associated with coding. I steered away from these more challenging subjects, because I wasn’t “good” at them. However, I craved a challenge, and the “Aha” moment after taking the time to investigate and solve a coding problem was magical. I knew coding wouldn’t be easy because I wasn’t good at it, but it didn’t mean I couldn’t get better. I used this mindset whenever I struggled and instead of shutting down with negative thoughts such as, “I’m not smart enough for this?” I reframed my thought process to, “I don’t know this yet, that’s ok. I can learn.” Or even better, “I don’t know this yet, but why would I? This is all new!” Whenever a failure came I took it as an opportunity to ask questions, practice using my developer tools, and acquire more knowledge. To say I struggled at Nashville Software School is an understatement; however, I pulled through, and in doing so I created a more exciting future for myself. Every day I start work I know I will learn something new, continue to grow, and be a better version of myself. Best of all, I can give myself a high five, because if my high school self saw me now she would think that the world went through a black hole and I was in an opposite land. There’s something cool that I, not a black hole, could change my future in this way. Now that you know my story, I have a challenge for you. Think of all the amazing experiences this world has to offer, now think of something you have been putting off. Maybe you want to paint but you aren’t “artistic”, or you put off running a race because you aren’t “athletic”? Maybe you want to learn Spanish and move to Alicante. Whatever it is, don’t let anything hold you back, give it a shot and see if it sticks. Your future is yours to create, no matter where you are on your journey. Lauren Dimbeg is a Software Developer at CANA LLC. You can reach her via her email at ldimberg@canallc.com

These last two years of LIFE have been anything but smooth sailing; with a crazy pandemic lingering, a challenging school year with opportunities for my boys to learn how to stand strong for their constitutional rights, a cancer misdiagnosis (yes, misdiagnosis!), and much more, it was definitely time to BREATHE. CANA introduced a new Sabbatical benefit available to team members beginning after their third year with the company. The intent of the CANA Bridge is to provide a unique and meaningful way for CANA team members to invest in their personal and professional “why” - what moves them, invigorates them, and gives them meaning. In May 2022, I celebrated my three-year anniversary with CANA. So after allowing the world to overcome me a little too much for a little too long, I knew that a CANA sabbatical was just what was needed for this girl to do a little SOL SEARCHING! Watch below as I tell you about my CANA Sabbatical Experience: VLOG GALLERY To learn more about CANA, please visit canallc.com. Stephanie is a Senior Project Manager here at CANA. You can contact Stephanie at sallison@canallc.com or on Linkedin.

By Jesse Kemp, CANA Principal Program Manager Across all the military services, wargaming has become an increasingly popular tool to test new warfighting concepts, examine the use of new technologies, and exercise various scenarios against near-peer and peer adversaries. As an example, the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory executes 10-12 wargames per year, with multiple overlapping game lines of effort running simultaneously. Yet despite its broad adaptation, wargaming has some acknowledged limitations. Those limitations, and the risks they pose, were the subject of a recent War On The Rocks article by Dr. Jon Compton, where he argued that the DoD’s over-reliance on wargaming for investment planning could have significant negative impacts. Wargames as event planning are fun to attend, and most who attend them come away convinced they learned a great deal. Yet, these event-style wargames produce little in terms of ways forward, innovation, or usable answers. Further, they frequently create negative learning and reinforce existing biases due to the lack of any foundational research or ancillary support studies. Regardless, wargame providers continue to conduct them to the exclusion of more analytically robust designs of research that incorporate smaller, more focused games into broader discovery efforts, and resistance to change appears to be high. For logisticians participating in wargaming events, the frustrations articulated in Dr. Compton’s article are often felt even more acutely. Despite acknowledgments from very senior leaders across the DoD that logistics challenges must be analyzed and addressed, it is rare to find a wargame’s objectives bounded or informed by the limitations of logistics capabilities. Others in the wargaming community argue that trying to bring quantitative analytics, such as logistics feasibility, into wargaming events risks detracting from their primary focus–exploring the human dimension of complex problems. In a September 2022 article titled, “Wargaming and the Cycle of Research and Learning” Dr. Peter Perla emphasized the distinction between a wargame and operations research: “A true wargame is best used to investigate the decision processes of its players, what they believe that leads to those decisions, and how those processes interact; it is not well suited to the calculation of outcomes of physical events–such calculations, when they occur, are inputs to the game, not outputs.” The Cycle of Research In their articles, Dr. Compton and Dr. Perla make a similar case for an integrated “cycle of research” where wargaming, modeling and simulation, and analysis outcomes are combined towards focused learning objectives. While theoretically sound, this approach can have challenges in execution. First, how accurate can a cycle of research be if its wargaming inputs reinforce existing biases or ignore hard problems like logistics? And what if other inputs to a cycle of research are also flawed? Like wargaming, operations research – the process of reducing highly complex problems into component parts and seeking quantitative and repeatable outcomes – has its own set of limitations. Where wargaming events frequently leverage the collective experience of multiple senior leaders and subject matter experts, operations research projects tend to encounter the opposite: very little senior leader involvement, especially in their early stages. This can lead to flawed models, inaccurate assumptions, or results that lack operational context. Thus, independently, both wargaming and operations research have the potential to come up short. Ultimately, the cycle of research could be enhanced by more closely linking the key leader engagement opportunities wargaming events afford with the precision and rigor of operations research techniques. What if, as an example, analytic techniques could be brought to bear fast and in unobtrusive ways during a wargame, effectively quantifying the impacts of participants’ decisions without impeding the pace of the game or altering its primary objective? Imagine if after wargame participants set operational objectives and developed their plans to achieve those ends, weapon-to-target pairings could be quickly assessed to measure a plan’s efficacy. Imagine also if logisticians could quickly and visually “map” the supply chain required to support an operation, overlay distribution resources necessary to maneuver and sustain the force, and rapidly simulate the movement of forces, supplies, and follow-on sustainment resources. These tools could provide valuable in-game feedback on the logistics feasibility of proposed plans. The good news is that the technology required to deliver these types of analytic enhancements to wargaming already exists. Working in partnership with Headquarters Marine Corps over the past four years, CANA developed and applied a unique set of analytic techniques to support the planning for prepositioning and war reserve programs and their material investments. More recently, the Office of Naval Research began working with CANA to incorporate similar analytic methods into a science and technology project designed to aid operations and logistics planning for fleet-level and maritime operations center battle staffs. Tailoring these analysis methods to support wargaming applications is a logical next step and a mission we are excited to embark upon. CANA at MORS: Examining Logistics and Supply Chain Resilience Through Wargaming For this reason, we’re excited to announce our participation in the upcoming MORS Wargaming with Pacific Partners special event in February of 2023. This event will provide an ideal forum for CANA to highlight how currently-available analytic techniques can be adapted and applied to wargaming for enhanced outcomes. And because it is such an underserved element in almost every wargame, our primary focus will be highlighting its use in logistics and supply chain resiliency, demonstrating ways to rapidly quantify the implications of operational plans and provide objective assessments of feasibility. But the most powerful use of these innovative analytic methods could be to enable the design of wargames with logistics as the main objective. By examining key variables such as supply routes, supply locations, amounts of prepositioned stocks, transportation fleet design and positioning, and how/where operational energy is produced and transported, planners can determine what logistics investments are most influential in determining mission success. Supply Chain Analysis as a Service at CANA Logistics wargaming is, in fact, part of a broader line of effort underway at CANA called Supply Chain Analysis as a Service. Our team of subject matter experts and operations research professionals are designing ways to examine the key components of a supply chain and dynamically test its resilience under stress. Customizing these analytic techniques for use in both wargaming and more long-term planning and design applications is a key part of this line of effort. Moreover, this methodology has the potential for value in non-military applications such as food security, disaster preparedness, or other related scenarios. This exciting new frontier, at the nexus of wargaming, logistics, and supply chain analysis, offers many opportunities to enhance support for stakeholders in the DoD, Federal agencies, state governments and beyond. With both analytics and logistics in our company DNA, CANA is well-positioned and prepared to be an influencer in this important area. #wargames #logistics #supplychain Jesse Kemp CANA Principal Program Manager jkemp@canallc.com

On March 7th, I had the pleasure to represent CANA at the George Mason University (GMU) Career Jam. The GMU Career Jam is an annual career fair, where students from select schools and majors at GMU gather to network with companies and organizations that are looking to add new talent to their team, market their company and brand, and also do some networking themselves. The event was hosted at Mason’s Fairfax campus on the bottom floor of the Johnson Center, in Dewberry Hall. This event hosted almost 50 companies/organizations, and over 130 students! To learn more about GMU Career Fairs and their other recruiting events, click here. This was a very unique and amazing experience for me, as I am a 2022 GMU graduate and was on the other side of the table just a few years ago. This event was also very beneficial to CANA, and CANA esports, as we look to expand our brand awareness in the collegiate space. Event & Takeaways This Career Jam was organized very well from start to finish. Prior to the event, attending companies/organizations were sent a packet that walked through everything we needed to know for the event, including parking, wifi access, and a list of the other participating companies/organizations. There was an hour-long period before the start time for the companies/organizations to set up their table and network. It was interesting to see the variety of branding and marketing materials each company/organization brought to the event. Students I met and spoke with many amazing students at this event. All students looked like they were on a mission. They were very intrigued and interested, they acted professionally, and most of them took the opportunity to talk to every table. Specifically for CANA, our monitor and CANA esports slideshow were eye-catchers for most. Even though all did not stop to speak with me, they all did a double take to see what CANA esports was exactly. CANA drew the most attention from the Computer Science (CS) majors, as our unique background in federal and commercial analytics was captivating to them. I enjoyed speaking with all the students about what CANA esports is, what we are doing in the esports industry, and where we want to go. With GMU having an esports club, many of the students were interested in our esports recruitment platform and our focus on scholastic esports. I had many interesting conversations that allowed me to gather first-hand insight and opinions on what students think of esports, the offerings we have, and how else we could support the industry. Each student had different comments and questions, but they were all hinting at one main point; they would love to see scholastic esports become more acknowledged and accepted. Data and analytics are a few pieces that can support this in a major way. There were some students that were immediately disinterested once they heard me say, “We are a technology solutions company”. However, I piqued their interests and garnered their attention once I made it a point to stress to them that I am a Business Analyst who leads projects and a market. I work more on business operations and project management than I do on the technical side of CANA. I made this point to show these students that every company needs to have other areas of operations besides its technical capabilities and purposes. This way they know not to completely disregard an opportunity that comes their way due to the type of company GMU Staff Other than engaging with the students, it was great to see many of the program directors engaging each company that was in attendance. CANA drew a lot of interest from the professors and program directors because GMU, like many other colleges currently, is working to integrate esports into its overall curriculum and offerings. I had the pleasure of discussing with them how scholastic esports is a crucial sector of the overall industry. It can drastically help build a sustainable pathway to success in esports. A structured scholastic esports system can mend the fragmentation the industry currently deals with, which can lead to an overall more sustainable business model and industry as a whole. It was fascinating to hear the thoughts and ideas of GMU professors and program directors on esports and how they plan to implement it at Mason. Their comments and questions were much more geared toward why is esports beneficial to both the students and the school from an academic standpoint. What most don’t realize is that esports is an amazing path for students in STEM careers. It gives them an opportunity to learn through something they enjoy. We had some really good discussions about the benefits just an esports club team can have, but also the major upside to having a curriculum built around esports. With every discussion had, I made it apparent that CANA esports strives to support scholastic esports in the best ways we can. Conclusion I wanted to thank George Mason University for putting this event together and inviting CANA to be a part of it. From this event, we were able to grow our exposure for CANA esports, meet with potential new talent, and build a stronger relationship with GMU. This was also extremely beneficial for my own professional development. I had an amazing time speaking with the students, attending companies, and GMU staff. As CANA esports builds for the future, with a main focus on scholastic esports, we look forward to more events like this, growing the relationships we made, and expanding our network! CANA esports - providing the analytics intel for success. Jack Murray is a Business Analyst and esports lead at CANA LCC. Connect with Jack via his email jmurray@canallc.com

October 2023 Boo! Happy Halloween, CANA Connection readers! What a treat this past quarter has been! As we gear up for the spookiest day of the year, we’re also looking ahead to the future of electric mobility and Energy Operations. Our military forces are pushing hard to increase energy resilience, optimize resources, and reliably power the technology of the future. With the world’s focus on reducing carbon emissions and transitioning to cleaner energy sources, electric vehicles and improving our mobility infrastructure are becoming increasingly popular. In fact, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA), there were over 10 million electric cars on the world’s roads in 2021. In this issue, we’ll explore the latest developments in electric mobility and operations, including new technologies, policies, and initiatives that are shaping the future of energy. So sit back, relax, and enjoy this electrifying edition of CANA Connection! Operational Energy and the Military Shawn Charchan | Technical Director of Energy Solutions Adam Evans | Principal Operations Research Analyst Take a deep dive into energy innovation and transformation. CANAers Lauren Dimberg and Kassie McRostie plumb the depths with Adam Evans and Shawn Charchan and talk about the military’s operational energy roadmap and what excites them about the future. Kassie McRostie (KM): How did you become involved with the Department of the Navy Advanced Energy Research Toolkit (DON AERT) project? Shawn Charchan (SC): I’ve been privileged to work next to some amazing analysts and the DON energy director is a supportive and trusting client. All I had to do was listen to all of them and this project emerged naturally. Adam Evans was the thought leader here. Adam Evans (AE): It’s been a winding road for me, from Army sustainment studies to Marine logistics-over-the-shore (LOTS), finally to the DON energy client’s initial interest in Navy tanker sufficiency. We wanted to look at the problem in a different way, and he was happy to support that. Lauren Dimberg (LD): What is the DON AERT project and how did it come about? SC: DON AERT is a 50/50 split between building tools and performing analysis to support client questions. It is simply the next stage in a decade-old relationship. AE: The genesis of AERT lies in the recent energy transformation we see in developments like electric vehicles, solar and wind farms, and advanced battery tech like the power wall. We recognized that the military needs to think differently about the potential of the technology and develop ways to incorporate energy considerations in combat, beyond the fuel-delivery paradigm of traditional energy analysis. KM: How important is DON AERT to the advancement of energy efficiency? SC: Efficiency is a term that I am unabashedly opinionated about. When I think about efficiency, I frame it through the lens of being able to more effectively put “steel on target” as our client says. It is a bonus if we reduce environmental impacts, but we are talking about warfare here. AE: In the early days of the energy efficiency movement, it appeared that efficiency could handicap the mission, so military professionals exhibited skepticism over the prospects of real energy change. Recent developments in energy technology, however, are starting to show that energy efficiency and improved mission performance are becoming more correlated. DON AERT can evidence that correlation, giving power to the importance of energy efficiency. LD: What does the future look like for DON AERT? SC: Our government sponsor for this effort is an intellectual powerhouse and very driven. He has contributed to CANA, being viewed as a thought leader within the larger Operational Energy community. The future of AERT is that CANA will continue to build our tools and will not only serve as a thought leader, but will have a set of tools that enable us to provide the most well-developed energy models the Navy or the other services have. KM: What role has AI played in the Operational Energy community and DON AERT? SC: We have quite a way to go before we incorporate AI. It can enable us to generate novel ways of using emergent energy-related technologies to operate in new ways. Look up alpha go move 37. To get there we have to be pragmatic and practical, though. We will get there, but these things take time. LD: What are the energy innovations you’re most excited about? What do you think is going to be a game-changer? SC: What a great question! How does near-field and far-field wireless power transmission affect a destroyer with a cluster of unmanned air, surface, and subsurface systems? Should power be used for directed energy weapons or Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR)? Where precisely in the Philippine archipelago should a geothermal energy plant be placed? AE: Coordinated drone operations facilitating logistics, communications hub operations, and smart ISR mapping, not to mention coordinated fires. While the nature of war will remain with us, unmanned systems are changing its conduct. I wonder what humans’ role in managing and coordinating these AI-informed drone swarms will be in the future? Energy advances brought us to this point. KM: What are the main obstacles the military forces face in using emergent OE technologies? SC: That’s an easy one to answer: the valley of death, as they say in the acquisition community. Getting from research of a technology to a product being delivered to the fielded forces is always very challenging. AE: Acquisition is a tough challenge. My personal challenge in this field has always stemmed from data availability. Notional or surrogate data is great to a point, but eventually you need real representative data to proceed with a study. The military has always been quick with ideas and funding, but slow to back that up with the effort and effective guidance needed to collect, clean, and make relevant data available. #operationalenergy #logistics #EABO #sustainment #logistics #logisticsovertheshore #electricenergy #hydrogenenergy #innovation #technology #navy TEAM CANA MEMBER SHOWCASE Will Berry | Principal Program Manager Will Berry, CANA Principal Program Manager, talks with CANA Digital Media Coordinator Kassie McRostie about his passion for electrifying transportation, the status of the eTHOR program, and how he plans to bring CANA’s Electric Mobility Infrastructure (EMI) Market to life. Join us for an electrifying discussion. Kassie McRostie (KM): As an advocate of electrification, what excites you and/or worries you about how things are progressing in the United States? Will Berry (WB): In 2020, just three years back, Electric Vehicle (EV) sales in the U.S. passed 250,000 for the first time. This year, the market will jump past 1 million. In Q3, Tesla remains the undisputed leader in EV sales, with Ford a distant #2 on the list, selling just over 20,000 EVs. Most analysts expect a flood of new EVs in the coming three years, with the number of available EV products likely to double by 2027. With this changing landscape, EV sales volume growth in the U.S. is expected to continue. Of late, product availability has grown exponentially, while consumer acceptance has grown in a more linear fashion. Those trends will likely continue, making for some very interesting market dynamics in the years ahead. Change is never easy. My concerns are the needed volume of infrastructure to be able to satisfy the market and the reliability of that infrastructure. Up-front costs in rural areas can be higher, especially for DCFC stations, since installations in rural areas are more likely to require expensive electrical service upgrades. KM: Where do you see CANA fitting into this electric mobility market? WB: CANA can provide integration of, and connection to, the disparate authorities having jurisdiction over electrification opportunities and requirements. Of course, we consider our ability to educate about the market to be a huge capability as well. KM: What differences do you see between working in the commercial sector and working with federal clients, if any? WB: Each sector brings its own benefits and complexities. For example, the fiscal year for the Department of Defense (DoD) begins on October 1st and ends on September 30th of the following calendar year. Something so simple has a profound effect on timelines and funding. There’s a lot to understand about Dept of Defense contracting strategies, but the only real way to be more effective is through “doing”. On the other hand, commercial entities have the responsibility of quarterly reporting and must remain flexible to ever changing market conditions. Regardless, I think it comes down to people and communicating. KM: Can you give us a quick overview of the eTHOR project you’re working on? WB: eTHOR is an acronym for the Electric Tactical Humanitarian Operations Resource. It evolved from a program called THOR. It was developed by Verizon Frontline as an advanced network technology built for first responders, and developed over three decades of partnership with the public safety community. The Verizon communication stack was harnessed on a modified Ford 650 - an enormous truck. It showed great promise right away to support humanitarian disaster situations. It’s important to note this was estimated as a three year project build which got reduced to an 18-month delivery. So with development completed, a number of people, including former Marine LtCol Brandon Newell, had the vision to develop something that keeps the core attributes of mobile communications, but on a smaller, yet still powerful, battery electric vehicle platform and a smaller, powerful, communication set. And that’s what led us to our stakeholder team of DANNAR and AWS. With the tight timeline, a key focus was development that was utilizing commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) technology. KM: What does eTHOR bring to the table that sets it apart? WB: Regarding eTHOR, I mentioned it was developed from proven COTS technologies that, when integrated together, are like a Swiss Army knife of capabilities. It provides exportable energy and a powerful communication platform that, in turn, can have ancillary tools added such as radar and sensors. One of the things I feel very fortunate about with the eTHOR project is the dedicated stakeholders I worked with to collectively develop it. It starts from the top with governmental leadership and funding from Operational Energy Capability Improvement Fund (OECIF) and Naval Information Warfare Center-Pacific. Without those two organizations leaning in, it never would have happened and on such a short timeline. There was also great leadership with our commercial stakeholders, namely DANNAR and AWS. These two companies are on the leading edge of their respective technologies. Over the past two years our partnerships on the eTHOR prototype have resulted in an all electric, zero emission, 375 kWh rugged, mobile and exportable power station - the DANNAR Mobile Power Source (MPS) - coupled with an AWS Innovation, Connectivity and Experimentation (ICE) platform that supports IoT methodology, Private 4G LTE / 5G connectivity, multiple commercial connectivity options via TERRA, to include Satcom (Starlink), and commercial connectivity options. What’s particularly exciting are that elements of the eTHOR are now actively supporting real-world operations. KM: What about CANA? What makes it unique to you? WB: With CANA, I think it has always been about people, expertise, and relationships. It’s how you get things done. eTHOR is a great example of that. KM: What does the future look like for eTHOR and the partnership with CANA? WB: Our team’s modeling, simulation, and analysis of eTHOR and its capabilities are ongoing. We are also continuing to conduct eTHOR demonstrations to show a broader military and civilian audience the capabilities of the eTHOR platform and to gain feedback from potential end users. That might include input from soldiers who could possibly use the eTHOR in a future battlespace, or it might be feedback from a civilian public safety officer who is helping a local community in a myriad of safety-related activities. In fact, we will be bringing eTHOR to Southern California in a few short weeks for a live demonstration to stakeholders. We’re always looking for opportunities to impress upon people eTHOR’s potential. Stay tuned for a more in-depth discussion with Will Berry in an upcoming CANA podcast! If you want to know more - now - about the CANA EMI Initiative or about the eTHOR project, you can reach out to Will Berry at: wberry@canallc.com. #electricvehicle #eTHOR #transportation #ev #zeroemissions #emobility #ecofriendly #goelectric #chargingstation #evcharging #technology #charginginfrastructure #chargingsolutions #renewableenergy CANA shares electric mobility message Cherish Joostberns | Principal Communications Analyst & Resource Manager Employees of a certain age might remember “Meetings, Bloody Meetings” - a 1976 corporate training film starring John Cleese about a man dreaming he’s on trial for holding disorganized and terrible meetings. As corporate training films go, it is - improbably - a Monty Python-esque “classic”. And for all of us that ever watched annual training films, we know that’s an accomplishment! We’ve included the link to the original here, for anyone looking for a Halloween trick or treat! With CANA being a remote company across multiple time zones, we think we’ve put a pin in running tight, productive meetings. When we have the opportunity to travel and meet the team, clients, and peers, we know it’s a big deal. Face-to-face events allow for learning and out-of-the-box thinking in a way a Zoom meeting or boardroom cannot. Conferences, so many conferences, will have their own sets of headaches - weak wifi, disappointing pastries, bad microphones, or even empty seats - but they are almost always a net positive in who comes to the table and what CANA gets out of every one of them. We know we’ve crossed paths with many of you! In the past few months, CANA attended a number of live events so we could engage in, and promote, electric mobility ideas, initiatives, and opportunities. We’ve met a lot of people, shook a lot of hands, and shared a lot of passion. First stop this August was Newport News, Virginia, for the Association of Marine Corps Logisticians (AMCL) Symposium. A great many of the CANA team were there, by way of first-hand Marine Corps and Navy logistics experience and their current CANA roles. Rob Cranston, CANA President; Jesse Kemp, Principal Program Manager; Tommy Kline, Principal Logistics IT Integrator; Terry Hagen, Principal Logistics Analyst; Jerome Dixon, Senior Operations Research Analyst, and Greg Lewis, Principal Logistics Analyst, among others, were panelists, moderators, and audience members for sessions like “Making 21st Century Logisticians”; “The Fully Burdened Cost of Energy”; and “Advanced Manufacturing”. These are the topics that continue to push issues of energy resiliency, security, diversification, and innovation to the forefront. Several members of CANA flew to Hawaii in late summer for the Operational Energy Logistics Symposium, to include Greg Lewis and CANA’s Technical Director of Energy Solutions, Shawn Charchan. Of note, the symposium was a public introduction of the Advanced Operational Energy Toolkit (AERT), an ongoing effort CANA is establishing within the energy analytics community to research and explore energy systems and emergent energy-related technologies. It will enable users to understand how this emergent tech will enable future forces to use energy as a battlefield enabler and operate in new and novel ways Will Berry, CANA Principal Program Manager and lead for CANA Electric Mobility Initiatives, also attended the Tactical EV Expo in San Diego. Will met with an array of commercial vendors and federal and military stakeholders interested in developing an already available electric and hydrogen tactical transportation solutions. It was a perfect opportunity to share the continued progress of CANA’s partner, the SoCal Tech Bridge, and the eTHOR prototype partnership. SoCal Tech Bridge Director Ben Cohen was on hand as well, speaking about the challenges and opportunities in bringing electrification to the battlespace. CANA wrapped up the government’s fiscal year in late September at the Marine Corps Air Station (MCAS) Miramar Air Show. When people stopped looking up, they checked out the ingenuity on hand at the Air Show’s Tech & Innovation Expo, where CANAers Will Berry, Chris Cichy, Principal AI Analyst, and Shawn Charchan were gathered with partners like AWS and DANNAR LLC to bring the eTHOR prototype and electric energy excitement to literally hundreds of thousands of visitors. Elements of eTHOR have already been involved in real-world missions, and that continued validation of its relevance is always exciting to share. If you attended any of these events, or would like to connect with anyone who attended, we would love to hear from you! Let’s keep the coffee hot, the pastries plentiful, and the conversation going! #electricmobility #tacticalvehicles #logistics #marinecorps #navy #operationalenergy #eTHOR #energysystems #electricvehicles #electrictechnology #sustainability #installationresilience Join us on the CANA CONNECTION PODCAST The CANA Connection offers insights from the team CANA experts into analytics, logistics, supply chain operations, big data, and more. Check out some of our recent sessions. https://www.canallc.com/podcast CANA Connection Spotlight: The Hauser PhD Duo Talks Marriage, Career Success, and More On this special Spotlight edition of the CANA Connection Podcast our guest host Kassie McRostie, has a lively conversation talking with PhD Operations Research Analysts CANA power couple Margaret and Greg Hauser. Join us as we talk about their onramp to life as operations research analysts, collaborative brainstorming and problem-solving, and a healthy work-life balance. [Connect] Let's talk about INFORMS & Analytics in Education with Laura Albert PhD IJoin the CANA Connection Podcast as we talk with analytics professional and educator Laura Albert Ph.D. She is the David H. Gustafson Chair and Professor of ISyE at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2023 INFORMS President. In this episode, our host Rob Cranston talks with Laura about her informative and entertaining blog, about the future of analytics in education, cyber security, and how INFORMS has helped shape her career. [Connect] The CANA Connection Podcast is available on your favorite podcast platforms. Apple Podcasts, Amazon Podcasts, Google Podcasts, and Spotify! The CANA Connection Newsletter July 2023 © CANA LLC. All rights reserved

Logistics, wargaming, MORS, and Hawaii made the perfect combination for CANA this past February. The MORS Wargaming with Pacific Partners was a unique event that was the first MORS conference ever held outside the continental United States. CANA was honored to lead the logistics wargaming focus area for the conference and to be joined by just under one hundred attendees representing many U.S. DoD agencies and services, other non-DoD agencies, and our international partners (Australia, Great Britain, and Germany), academic, and commercial supporters. The conference was divided into three days. The first day consisted of multiple tracks designed to teach more about the development and application of wargaming in certain areas. CANA contributed two significant presentations on how to apply analytics in wargaming by Jesse Kemp and how to apply wargaming to explore the use of advanced technologies by Norm Reitter. Both Norm and Jesse touched on using wargaming to test supply chain resilience and how this could inform organizations on actions to mitigate supply chain disruptions. Jesse Kemp presenting to a full house Day two of the conference featured several panels that addressed issues such as training for wargaming, the role of commercial software, and how funding for wargaming worked across different organizations in the U.S. and with our partner countries. Day three's final day of the conference was filled with fun workshops to demonstrate topics covered in prior days. CANA led a four-hour workshop. The workshop focused on designing a logistics wargame at two different levels, strategic and operational. The eighteen participants contributed to the basic design for each game's scope, purpose, scale, players, and scenario. By the end of the day, all participants were left with a basic overview of what it takes to develop an engaging logistics wargame to answer important questions. The MORS Wargaming with Pacific Partners conference was a resounding success. The conference enabled individuals from various countries and organizations to deepen their understanding and knowledge of wargaming and its various applications. It was an incredible opportunity for CANA to share its expertise and learn from others while establishing new connections and collaborations. The success of this conference serves as a testament to the continued importance and relevance of wargaming as a tool for solving complex logistical problems, and we look forward to what the future holds for this field. Walt DeGrange Walt DeGrange is the Director of Analytics Capabilities. You can contact him via email at wdegrange@canallc.com or on Linkedin.

I have always enjoyed volunteering, it gives me the chance to help my community and get to know it better. It is also an opportunity to meet new people and learn from their experiences. Recently, I had the chance to volunteer at St. Luke's Community House for their Mobile Meals program, this program uses volunteers to deliver meals to people who are unable to leave their homes due to illness or disability. One of the things that made it possible for me to volunteer was the flexible hours that Cana LLC offers. Flexible hours or flextime means employees have different start and end times for their workday than the standard 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. This allowed me to take an hour off from work to help with Mobile Meals and make up the time by working later into the evening when I am more productive. Having flexible hours increases productivity and gives employees the flexibility to volunteer and support their community. The benefits of flexible scheduling don’t stop there, according to this Fingerprint for Success post, employees with flexible schedules tend to be more satisfied with their job and have a better work-life balance. Does your current employer offer flextime, what are your thoughts on it? Lauren Dimbeg is a Software Developer at CANA LLC. You can reach her via her email at ldimberg@canallc.com or on Linkedin.

In recent years there has been a huge AI boom. New technologies like OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Github’s Copilot have excited the public and paved the way for rapid innovation. As a result, we are seeing many new AI technologies across fields: AI based anti-virus software, medical databases with integrated AI tools, and AI virtual assistants for programmers. AI technology will soon become a necessity for companies wishing to keep their data secure. In the near future, criminals will use AI to create more effective malware, more believable phishing attacks, and to convincingly impersonate users. The best way to counter these attacks may be to fight fire with fire. AI security systems could be used to detect attacks as they are happening, identify suspicious emails written, or monitor users for suspicious or risky activity. For example, researchers from the Commonwealth Cyber Initiatives at Virginia Tech and Deloitte are currently developing an AI system that can detect interference and jamming attacks on 5G networks as they are happening, and take automatic actions to prevent the system from going down. Through the use of AI, this system could stop attacks in a fraction of the time it would take a non AI system or manual reviewer. Healthcare will see a large amount of AI integration in the coming years. With AI technology healthcare providers will be able to improve their data gathering and analysis capabilities. One important use of AI is to improve the way we capture and reconstruct images, which can be extremely valuable for diagnosing and treating patients. In addition, AI can be given access to electronic health records and genomic data, allowing doctors to easily find relevant records to a specific case, and allowing researchers to find previously undetected connections between the health records and genomic data. On a more global scale, AI could be used to monitor the spread of diseases, allowing international health organizations to spot potential pandemics before they spread. Of course, the AI technologies that will most affect CANA will be those that assist with software development. Already many new technologies have been developed for software developers, most notably, Github’s Copilot and soon Copilot X. Copilot assists programmers by giving code suggestions and generating code from natural language prompts. In the near future, Copilot X will offer additional features such as locating bugs and generating tests for selected sections of code, writing descriptive descriptions for pull requests, and an early adoption of OpenAI’s GPT -4. Another up-and-coming AI tool for developers is Warp, an AI assistant for your terminal. Similar to Copilot, Warp can provide command suggestions, explain errors, or write scripts. No matter what field you are in, AI will soon become a necessary part of your business and everyday life. Whether you need to protect company secrets, improve your health, or develop the next big technology, AI will be there. We must keep up to date with the latest developments because AI is the future. Tristan Rentsch is a Software Developer at CANA LLC. For more information or to reach out to Tristan email him at trentsch@canallc.com

Shawn Charchan | Technical Director of Energy Solutions Adam Evans | Principal Operations Research Analyst Take a deep dive into energy innovation and transformation. CANAers Lauren Dimberg and Kassie McRostie plumb the depths with Adam Evans and Shawn Charchan and talk about the military’s operational energy roadmap and what excites them about the future. Kassie McRostie (KM): How did you become involved with the Department of the Navy Advanced Energy Research Toolkit (DON AERT) project? Shawn Charchan (SC): I’ve been privileged to work next to some amazing analysts and the DON energy director is a supportive and trusting client. All I had to do was listen to all of them and this project emerged naturally. Adam Evans was the thought leader here. Adam Evans (AE): It’s been a winding road for me, from Army sustainment studies to Marine logistics-over-the-shore (LOTS), finally to the DON energy client’s initial interest in Navy tanker sufficiency. We wanted to look at the problem in a different way, and he was happy to support that. Lauren Dimberg (LD): What is the DON AERT project and how did it come about? SC: DON AERT is a 50/50 split between building tools and performing analysis to support client questions. It is simply the next stage in a decade-old relationship. AE: The genesis of AERT lies in the recent energy transformation we see in developments like electric vehicles, solar and wind farms, and advanced battery tech like the power wall. We recognized that the military needs to think differently about the potential of the technology and develop ways to incorporate energy considerations in combat, beyond the fuel-delivery paradigm of traditional energy analysis. KM: How important is DON AERT to the advancement of energy efficiency? SC: Efficiency is a term that I am unabashedly opinionated about. When I think about efficiency, I frame it through the lens of being able to more effectively put “steel on target” as our client says. It is a bonus if we reduce environmental impacts, but we are talking about warfare here. AE: In the early days of the energy efficiency movement, it appeared that efficiency could handicap the mission, so military professionals exhibited skepticism over the prospects of real energy change. Recent developments in energy technology, however, are starting to show that energy efficiency and improved mission performance are becoming more correlated. DON AERT can evidence that correlation, giving power to the importance of energy efficiency. LD: What does the future look like for DON AERT? SC: Our government sponsor for this effort is an intellectual powerhouse and very driven. He has contributed to CANA, being viewed as a thought leader within the larger Operational Energy community. The future of AERT is that CANA will continue to build our tools and will not only serve as a thought leader, but will have a set of tools that enable us to provide the most well-developed energy models the Navy or the other services have. KM: What role has AI played in the Operational Energy community and DON AERT? SC: We have quite a way to go before we incorporate AI. It can enable us to generate novel ways of using emergent energy-related technologies to operate in new ways. Look up alpha go move 37. To get there we have to be pragmatic and practical, though. We will get there, but these things take time. LD: What are the energy innovations you’re most excited about? What do you think is going to be a game-changer? SC: What a great question! How does near-field and far-field wireless power transmission affect a destroyer with a cluster of unmanned air, surface, and subsurface systems? Should power be used for directed energy weapons or Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR)? Where precisely in the Philippine archipelago should a geothermal energy plant be placed? AE: Coordinated drone operations facilitating logistics, communications hub operations, and smart ISR mapping, not to mention coordinated fires. While the nature of war will remain with us, unmanned systems are changing its conduct. I wonder what humans’ role in managing and coordinating these AI-informed drone swarms will be in the future? Energy advances brought us to this point. KM: What are the main obstacles the military forces face in using emergent OE technologies? SC: That’s an easy one to answer: the valley of death, as they say in the acquisition community. Getting from research of a technology to a product being delivered to the fielded forces is always very challenging. AE: Acquisition is a tough challenge. My personal challenge in this field has always stemmed from data availability. Notional or surrogate data is great to a point, but eventually, you need real representative data to proceed with a study. The military has always been quick with ideas and funding, but slow to back that up with the effort and effective guidance needed to collect, clean, and make relevant data available. #operationalenergy #logistics #EABO #sustainment #logistics #logisticsovertheshore #electricenergy #hydrogenenergy #innovation #technology #navy You can reach Shawn Charchan, Technical Director of Energy Solutions, at scharchan@canallc.com or on Linkedin. You can reach Adam Evans, Principal Operations Research Analyst, at aevans@canallc.com or on Linkedin.

Several of CANA’s key Principal Operations Research Analysts will give presentations at the upcoming 83rd Military Operations Research Society (MORS) Symposium taking place in Alexandria, Virginia June 22nd through 25th. Learn more about the Symposium here. #mors #event #symposium #conference #education

CANA is a proud sponsor and participant in the upcoming Paralyzed Veterans Golf Open (PVGO) taking place on May 18th at The Golf Club at Lansdowne in Lansdowne, Virginia. All proceeds go to support the Operation Paving Access for Veterans Employment (PAVE) program. So far this year’s tournament has raised over $400,000 for Operation Paving Access for Veterans Employment (PAVE) program, which has worked with over 500 employers to help more than 600 veterans find work. The event has raised over $2.6 million since 2008. More info here. #golf #community #veterans #charity #pvgo #outreach #event #WaltDeGrange #CANAFoundation

CANA LLC wins Marine Corps Research and Innovative Technical Analysis (RITA) Professional Services contract with Northrop Grumman. CANA is part of a team assembled by Northrop Grumman, which has been awarded a competitively bid, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity, and multiple award contracts from the Marine Corps Combat. #contract #RITA #MarineCorps