[DSRP Evidence](https://dsrpevidence.org/)

# Context matters: different approaches to looking at people, problems

## Details

**Authors** Dwyer, John, III

**Year** 2019

**Publisher** Defense Logistics Agency (DLA Troop Support Public Affairs)

**Kind of work** press

**Discipline** Military

**Secondary disciplines** Business & Management

**Kind of engagement** public

**Applied** false

[Read it](https://www.dla.mil/About-DLA/News/News-Article-View/Article/2039194/context-matters-different-approaches-to-looking-at-people-problems/)

## In authors' words

### What they set out to do (purpose)

A news report on a Dec. 5, 2019, Campaign of Learning event in Philadelphia, where DLA Troop Support leaders heard outside speakers on new ways to approach workforce and operational problems.

### How they did it (methods)

A news article summarizing talks by Army Col. Hise Gibson, a systems engineering professor at West Point, and Army Col. Kennon Gilliam of the Army Center for Strategic Leadership.

### What they found (results)

Gibson recommended that DLA managers use the "DSRP" model of thinking, which requires them to consider Distinctions, Systems, Relationships and Perspectives, so that leaders can "start to see where relationships and systems" connect across their work. He paired this with his research on multiple team management in the Army Corps of Engineers, Europe District, which found about 45% of employees overtasked.

## Commentary

### In short

A West Point systems engineering professor carries DSRP into the Defense Logistics Agency and presents it to working managers as a tool for seeing problems whole. The report shows the theory moving from academy teaching into the logistics side of the Department of Defense, where it is offered as a practical way to think through workforce and operational problems.

**Patterns it shows** D, S, R, P

**Added** 2026-10-10

**How to cite this** Dwyer, John, III (2019). Context matters: different approaches to looking at people, problems. Defense Logistics Agency (DLA Troop Support Public Affairs).