How can a govenment agency have a strategic focus without a strategy?

I just read a report prepared by the GAO a few years ago, examining warehouse utilization by government agencies, excluding the Department of Defense.  In November of 2014, they published a report titled, “Strategic Focus Needed to Help Manage Vast and Diverse Warehouse Portfolio.”  Including appendices, it runs to fifty pages, and if you have insomnia go here to read it.

According to the report, “in fiscal year 2013, three agencies held or leased most of the civilian warehouse space either owned or leased by the federal government:  GSA, Interior, and DOE.  Of the approximate 90-million square feet of warehouse space occupied by civilian agencies, GSA accounted for about 29-million square feet, Interior for about 15-million square feet, and DOE for about 11-million square feet.”  It continue, “Cumulatively, these three agencies held or leased about 63 percent of total civilian warehouse space.”

The report then dives into an exploration of whether or not space is the right sort of space, leasing terms, and a variety of operational issues.  Did you see the shift GAO made, either intentional or unintentional?  The title of the report calls for “Strategic Focus,” yet the report never addresses the fundamental strategic question of why 90-million square feet of storage is required.

The writer Oscar Wilde said, "the Americans and the British are identical in all respects except, of course, their language.”  I’ve also seen it in a slightly different form attributed to George Bernard Shaw.  Flip a coin and go with the source that makes you feel happier. 

Shouldn’t government agencies be managing inventories, not warehouses?  The real challenge lies in figuring out how to make inventories move, how to manage the inventories, and once that is sorted out managing the warehouse is simply the implementation challenge.  It sure seems like the GAO looks at it backwards, and managing warehouses and figuring out how to lease and fill them as the implementation challenge 

Somewhere along the line the GAO missed some really important steps, validating the requirement, followed by an analysis of alternatives.  GAO jumped right into obtaining space.  How can the GAO have a strategic focus on warehouses – as they claim - without an inventory strategy?  Next time around, maybe the GAO should read a definition of strategy.  According to the Business Dictionary, strategy is a “method or plan chosen to bring about a desired future, such as achievement of a goal or solution to a problem.”

Warehouse managers fill space.  Logistics managers fill orders.  Supply chain managers fill the pipeline.

Word chiuce matters.