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Federal Contracting

Mo’ Money for Defense … and Contractors

For years now, the Department of Defense (and all other government agencies) has had to deal with the unpredictability of possible government shutdowns and ongoing resolutions. According to Pentagon Comptroller, David Norquist, “We’re in a very different place now.” At the Professional Services Council’s 54th annual Vision Federal Market Forecast conference, he explained, “Under a continuing resolution, we often had to wait until spring to do some things—now we can finalize them now or do them on schedule.”

Norquist predicted major shifts in the defense budget’s structure based on the Administration’s December 2017 National Security Strategy. Its underlying theme, he said, “is a return of great power competition” with Russia and China, which will require sub-agencies and contractors to better serve the warfighter.

According to Norquist, the defense budget is “large and complex”: bigger than the combined inventories, employees, and assets of WalMart, Apple and the state of California. Audits are necessary to fill gaps and plug holes.

His team will look at the condition of equipment, supplies, warehouses, and other buildings to generate “a laundry list of weaknesses.” Auditors will ask whether the items exist, whether the data are accurate, whether items are missing, and what shows up on financial statements.  Contractors who built the systems being used, he added, will be privy to “the very quick feedback loop on what’s being fixed.”

Norquist advised contractors to focus on an agency with a problem to which they bring a solution. Contractors who can solve an agency’s challenges or fulfill a need will be the winners in 2019.

If you have questions or need assistance give us a call at 301-913-5000.

 

 

Upcoming Events

If it’s been a while since you attended a live event, training, or a webinar, it might be time to consider checking into as updates and changes are happening. Stay ahead of the curve. Give us a call at (301) 913-5000 if we can answer questions about any of the following:

Building Maintenance and Operations Overview & DPA Training – Virtual 10/25/2018
Announcing the Building Maintenance and Operations Overview and Delegation of Procurement Authority Training. The training will provide detailed ordering procedures for the new BMO government-wide strategic sourcing contract vehicle.

 

GSA Schedule 66 Training 11-6
What’s up with Schedule 66? Drones and a whole lot more!

 

Building Maintenance and Operations Overview & DPA Training – Virtual 12/13/2018
Announcing the Building Maintenance and Operations Overview and Delegation of Procurement Authority Training. The training will provide detailed ordering procedures for the new BMO government-wide strategic sourcing contract vehicle.

There’s Actually a Strategy…

Earlier this year, the Cross-Agency Priority (CAP) Goal: Leveraging Data as a Strategic Asset was released, with a goal to develop and implement  comprehensive Federal Data Strategy. Over the next year,  the first government-wide data strategy will be developed, along with plans for implementation.

The Federal Data Strategy is chartered to define principles, practices, and a first-year action plan to deliver a more consistent approach to federal data stewardship, use, and access. This development team will also test solutions and assumptions with the Data Incubator Project, which will help identify priority use cases and methods that should be replicated or scaled.

Four Federal Data Strategy areas of exploration include:

  • Expertise data governance
  • Decision making and accountability
  • Access, use, and augmentation
  • Commercialization, innovation, and public use

This strategy will be built on the expertise and input of those who contribute ideas, examples, comments, and suggestions. If you have any, now is the time to share!

Want ideas considered?  Let’s talk at 301-913-5000.

Modernizing the Federal Workforce

Transformation of the Federal Workforce

The current Administration says it is making progress towards transforming the federal workforce and framework that governs it. Over the summer, low-scoring agencies improved employee engagement and chose executives to lead upcoming workforce initiatives.

Development is slow but headed in the direction of preparing the federal workforce for “future” skills while addressing hiring and performance management frustrations. The goal is to have a simplified hiring process, while giving agencies more flexibility, in place by March of 2019. (On average it took 106 days to hire a new employee in 2017.)

Employee and Performance Engagement

During the summer, NIH piloted a tool for employee and performance engagement, the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey (FEVS). This tool has helped low-performing agencies find opportunities to improve employee engagement. OPM drafted guidance to help low-performing agencies improve the FEVS scores. In the future, all agencies will be asked to give OPM more detail on their plans to improve engagement.

Federal Workforce/ Private Sector Workforce

By April of 2019, results from a study of the federal government’s compensation package will be available to compare to the private sector.  Among other tasks, all supervisors and managers are scheduled to have performance management training, which will align the federal to the private sector workforce.

The goal of these new plans, measures, and tools is to prepare the federal workforce for future skills and address long-held performance management and hiring practices.

Please call EZGSA at 301-913-5000, if we can answer any questions.

Reverse Auction is Reversed!

GSA’s Federal Acquisition Service (FAS) is decommissioning the ReverseAuctions (RA) platform on September 30, 2018. The RA platform will not be available for either the creation or management of auctions after this date. Auctions with end dates after October 1, 2018, will be allowed to conclude as scheduled, and GSA will maintain RA system access for users, allowing for the retrieval of auction related documents through December 31, 2018.

Note: FSSI OS3 vendors can continue to log in and bid on OS3 auctions.