All, A long, private, side discussion later I've come to the conclusion I will not find a way to somehow make this R&A requirement near and dear to your hearts. I keep trying to find a way to make you all care without going the doom and gloom route but I can't seem to. I'm just not smart enough :( So… Here it is… When you submit a paper with my name on it without *first* getting approval you are potentially involving me in a crime. Not yourself, unless you are willfully disclosing sensitive information, just me. When I was cleared I promised I would abide by all the rules that are in place to protect us from purposefully or *inadvertently* disseminating classified. The problem I have with this project and our sponsor is that I don't even have the information I would need to understand exactly what is considered classified. My *only* recourse is to depend on the R&A process then. If you inadvertently stray into a sensitive area in your material (which is not that difficult for this group to do), press the submit button, and my name is on it then *I* have violated the agreement I signed and, also, technically committed a crime. Will I go to jail? Probably not. People make foolish choices all the time. I've only ever even heard of folks going to jail when they intentionally disseminate classified. Stupid people in my world only lose their clearance. Will it cause me a world of hurt? Almost certainly. For this kind of thing, I strongly suspect my clearance would be at least suspended. Since my employer notified me that my "continued employment is subject to the ability to acquire and hold" a security clearance I also fear it could cost me my job. Depends on whether and how long for my clearance was suspended I would guess. Thus, when you do this it puts a lot of strain on me. I believe it is unnecessary strain, this fear I have, and I do feel some resentment because of that. You might choose to believe I'm just being paranoid. You might be right. I don't know for sure. What I do know is it scares me, every time. In short, I'm subject to rules you aren't. The repercussions for breaking those rules can be quite harsh and I really would like to avoid them, or any alternate version of them. What can you do about this? One of two things, I think, really; You can leave my name off your paper or you can comply with the R&A requirement. If you leave my name off a paper and I believe I deserve credit we are going to have a problem. I suspect you would have the same problem if I did the same to you, no? At the same time, you don't need to credit me just because I'm here or the position I have. Use your conscience and the Golden Rule and we'll be fine. The only other alternative that isn't going to cause me a problem is compliance with what you agreed to do when your organization signed the contract. Even if my name is not on the paper the sponsor could (has already warned me they will) fail to fund us all for violating this. What exactly is the requirement? At it's essence, the sponsor does not want us to submit a paper without getting approval first. The guidelines describe a time limit and a process. The time limit is 45 days. You need to keep that in mind if you want to *know* it will happen before the submission deadline. My experience has been that it usually happens much quicker than that but I also realize I don't have a valid complaint if it doesn't. It has been suggested that a less-than-final draft might be good enough. It certainly doesn't address the sponsors goal; Recall they want to be able to approve what gets published. I think whether or not you give them an interim draft, whether or not they approve an interim draft, you are required to give them the final draft and gain approval *before* you submit for publication or presentation. That's the personal appeal… More an explanation really since I've said it all before in one way or another and it hasn't changed what keeps happening. The doom and gloom :( The next time a paper is submitted without R&A and my name is on it I'm going to seriously consider offering our sponsor the I go or you do choice. In fact, I have already considering it and I've decided to resolve it this way, with this letter, with this warning. I'm not promising it but I feel that unless there are seriously mitigating circumstances around the event you can consider this a virtual promise of what will happen. If my name is not on it the sponsor will decide if it's that last time. If they do, we all get an object lesson but I'm hurt no more than anyone else and, so, do not feel compelled to write a long, ugly, letter like this one about it. I hope that is clear enough. What has been happening scares me and it feels so unnecessary. You don't live in my world, you aren't subject to the same rules and laws that I am, and you don't need to understand it. You only need to respect it. Please? Again, I'm very sorry I couldn't come up with a nice way to say all this. This changes nothing in how I feel about anyone or anything like that. I just absolutely *need* folks to stop making this mistake. It is literally driving me to distraction. Thank you for your attention, --Lee