ACQ Suite: Ensuring the DoD Acquisition Workforce Receive Necessary Data and Data Rights
ACQ Suite Examples
5 Phase IP Strategy Process Overview
Summary
This Defense Acquisition University ACQ Suite addressed one of the most persistent and quietly dangerous challenges in defense acquisition: securing the right data and data rights early enough to avoid regret later. While the topics of data, IP strategy, and contract requirements are foundational to long-term system sustainment, they are also notoriously dense, procedural, and easy to underestimate until a program is already in trouble.
The ACQ Suite was designed as a capstone learning experience that brought together years of instructional development across multiple courses and reframed them into a cohesive, scenario-driven narrative. The goal was to help acquisition professionals move beyond rule memorization and instead understand how data rights decisions unfold over time, across competing priorities, and under real program pressure.
Solution
🏅 DAU Honor Roll Course
CTEC redesigned the ACQ Suite as a connected, interactive learning experience built around a shared narrative. Rather than treating each course as an isolated lesson, the suite followed a Program Manager and Integrated Product Team navigating acquisition scenarios where data, data rights, and IP strategy directly shaped outcomes. A holographic guide named Destinee provided continuity across timelines, reinforcing how early decisions echo forward in very real and often inconvenient ways.
The experience blended live action video, storytelling, and web based interactivity across multiple phases of the acquisition lifecycle. Each course illustrated how requirements, negotiations, and strategy evolve over time, using branching scenarios to show there is rarely a single correct answer, only better informed tradeoffs.
The narrative and instructional design were refined over several years, while production was executed on a highly compressed schedule. Aggressive prototyping and Unreal Engine previsualization aligned expectations early and accelerated approvals, maintaining clarity without sacrificing quality.
The result was a tightly integrated, high-profile suite translating complex acquisition and IP policy into experiential learning, designed to hold up not just in the classroom, but in front of the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense Intellectual Property Cadre.
My Role
I served as Creative Director for the ACQ Suite, overseeing creative direction across all courses under an extremely compressed schedule. The challenge was translating a multi-year narrative vision into a matter of weeks, requiring calm decision-making and disciplined execution.
I led UI design, created a substantial portion of the content graphics, and coordinated production across two additional graphic artists. With three courses developed in parallel, success depended on clear visual systems, shared standards, and constant communication to ensure the suite felt cohesive rather than rushed.
Early Unreal Engine previsualization helped communicate the multi-timeline scenario structure, align expectations, and build client confidence before full production. Throughout delivery, I worked closely with instructional designers, developers, and leadership to keep the experience coherent and instructionally sound.
In short, I helped turn a long-term vision into a rapid, successful delivery—proving complex acquisition storytelling can still land on time with the right structure and design discipline.