Last fall when we talked, you were discussing the early benefits of your integration efforts, not the least of which was being able to shift some personnel and fabrication for the USS George H.W. Bush (CVN 77) from the Northrop Grumman Shipbuilding Gulf Coast yards. What kinds of progress have you been making on your business integration efforts since then?

The most recent thing that we have done is that several months ago we consolidated the Northrop Grumman Shipbuilding supply chain organization. That gives us the opportunity to do some useful things with our supply chain/vendor network. We already had been doing some things with buyers from different yards, where if they were buying the same things, we would get them together. But it was not organized in a way that I thought really provided us with much in the way of savings and synergies. On big-ticket items like steel, I think we’d already made a lot of progress. On smaller commodities and components, however, I think that we had a lot of opportunities. We’ve now created a single supply chain organization for all of our shipbuilding components. As I said before, it’s $2-2.5 billion we spend every year in 49 states, so it’s virtually across the country. When you build a warship, it’s a statement of national purpose, and it’s that supply chain where that national purpose takes root. That’s where it begins. Giving ourselves the opportunity to create efficiencies, and to leverage the value – the buying power if you will – will allow us to help ensure the success of the Navy going forward.

Doesn’t it also help keep the votes in Congress coming your way, too, if you’re doing it in enough districts?

There’s certainly that element, but this is about making sure that the people we have to do the Navy’s work are qualified to do that work, that they give us a quality product, that they give it to us when we need it, and they give it to us for the price we need.

How’s your personnel base holding up in terms of retirements versus new hires and trainees?

We’re about to go into a pretty heavy hiring process at Newport News, and we have been hiring aggressively on the Gulf Coast. What’s happening in Newport News is that we’re going through the post-Cold War retirement phase of our workforce. What’s happening on the Gulf Coast is that we’re bringing entirely new people into the business. So it’s a couple of different personnel challenges on both ends of our business geographically.

We’ve by and large been able to hire to the numbers that we wanted to hire to. But it’s not just hiring people. It’s making sure they have the training and certifications that they need. It’s making sure they’re qualified to do the work that we assign them, and that we’re able to track and evaluate all of that. Creating or enhancing those training courses and institutions where we already have them is a big part of what we’re working on right now.

How is your nuclear power venture with the French company Areva coming along?

Very well. We just broke ground for the production facility last month up in the North Yard. And Areva continues to travel the world trying to sell reactors, and they seem to be having a great deal of success. For us, it’s an opportunity for us to do what we do best. We have a nuclear quality culture that our shipbuilders will be able to participate in, and help “boot them up.” The plant here in Newport News will be fully operational in 2012, and we’ll be building commercial nuclear power plant components for facilities all over the world.

As we sit here today, how do you feel about this company that you run?

I’m pretty optimistic about the future. If you step back and look at the portfolio of things that shipbuilding is going to be doing … somebody has to be building something, and we’re going to be making something. We are still working through some of the challenges of recapitalizing the Gulf Coast shipbuilding facilities after Hurricane Katrina, for example. As we have worked our way through those issues, as we work our way out of those issues and we integrate this business, I see a portfolio of work that will provide a healthy base of business for many years.

My focus is on making sure that we continue to provide the kind of future and the kind of leadership that our shipbuilders deserve.