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Author: John C. Kilgallon Publisher: ISBN: Category : Languages : en Pages : 36
Book Description
This paper examines the state of the Army's information technology (IT) acquisition workforce, in light of the push for outsourcing. It then makes recommendations to improve the workforce. For the last few decades, a variety of market forces and government initiatives have pushed the Army to outsource IT system development. From having entire units of government programmers and hardware engineers, the Army has steadily moved toward outsourcing, using commercial industry to design and build its IT solutions. But at the same time the Army has moved away from designing and building its own IT systems, IT has become more prevalent and pervasive within the Army. It has become even more critical to Army success in the field. Almost every Army system fielded today contains some sort of computer system. In this era of net-centric warfare, these computer systems are expected to share information with each other securely and efficiently. It is these interconnections that have helped the Army fight and win in recent wars. There is mounting evidence in the military, the federal government, and private industry that too much outsourcing can be a bad thing. It can leave an organization without the talent needed to oversee the outsourced work, and eliminate a career ladder that allows Army IT leaders to learn their trade before making multi-million dollar procurement decisions. Congress has realized this in the last few years, and is beginning to push the armed services to strengthen their control over IT outsourcing efforts. This paper makes the case for the uniqueness of IT acquisition as compared to the acquisition of non-IT products and for the need of skilled and experienced Army IT acquisition professionals and leaders to oversee the contractors and ensure quality results. It analyzes the current Army IT acquisition workforce along with current Army and DoD policy. From this analysis, it determines that there is much confusion over the exact duties that the IT Acquisition Workforce should be performing, there is no single entity responsible for shaping and developing the workforce, there is inadequate technical education and training, and finally that there is a lack of hands-on development experience that would help in overseeing the commercial contractors doing the work. The paper offers several recommendations to strengthen the Army's IT acquisition workforce including: determining the specific duties and responsibilities of the IT Acquisition Professional, centrally managing the entire workforce, formalizing a mid-career hiring program, creating a non-management technical track, and keeping some technical work inhouse to train government personnel so that they can better understand and oversee contractor's technical efforts.
Author: John C. Kilgallon Publisher: ISBN: Category : Languages : en Pages : 36
Book Description
This paper examines the state of the Army's information technology (IT) acquisition workforce, in light of the push for outsourcing. It then makes recommendations to improve the workforce. For the last few decades, a variety of market forces and government initiatives have pushed the Army to outsource IT system development. From having entire units of government programmers and hardware engineers, the Army has steadily moved toward outsourcing, using commercial industry to design and build its IT solutions. But at the same time the Army has moved away from designing and building its own IT systems, IT has become more prevalent and pervasive within the Army. It has become even more critical to Army success in the field. Almost every Army system fielded today contains some sort of computer system. In this era of net-centric warfare, these computer systems are expected to share information with each other securely and efficiently. It is these interconnections that have helped the Army fight and win in recent wars. There is mounting evidence in the military, the federal government, and private industry that too much outsourcing can be a bad thing. It can leave an organization without the talent needed to oversee the outsourced work, and eliminate a career ladder that allows Army IT leaders to learn their trade before making multi-million dollar procurement decisions. Congress has realized this in the last few years, and is beginning to push the armed services to strengthen their control over IT outsourcing efforts. This paper makes the case for the uniqueness of IT acquisition as compared to the acquisition of non-IT products and for the need of skilled and experienced Army IT acquisition professionals and leaders to oversee the contractors and ensure quality results. It analyzes the current Army IT acquisition workforce along with current Army and DoD policy. From this analysis, it determines that there is much confusion over the exact duties that the IT Acquisition Workforce should be performing, there is no single entity responsible for shaping and developing the workforce, there is inadequate technical education and training, and finally that there is a lack of hands-on development experience that would help in overseeing the commercial contractors doing the work. The paper offers several recommendations to strengthen the Army's IT acquisition workforce including: determining the specific duties and responsibilities of the IT Acquisition Professional, centrally managing the entire workforce, formalizing a mid-career hiring program, creating a non-management technical track, and keeping some technical work inhouse to train government personnel so that they can better understand and oversee contractor's technical efforts.
Author: John E. Peters Publisher: Rand Corporation ISBN: 0833040480 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 178
Book Description
This monograph addresses the following two specific questions: What should a robust acquisition investment strategy look like-one designed to perform well against all anticipated threats? How should the Army acquisition community assess the appropriateness of its investment strategy over time? The study proposes adaptation of a RAND tool called Assumption-Based Planning to help Army personnel maintain proper alignment between strategic guidance and the Army acquisition program and budget. It uses this tool to create a model that recommends acquisition investments across a broad range of capabilities. The model works toward the goal of satisfying the complex and evolving requirements specified in the national security guidance. The model applies five main steps, by identifying (1) the assumptions that underlie Army acquisition policy; (2) load-bearing assumptions, i.e., important assumptions that underpin and shape Army acquisition plans; (3) signposts or indicators that an assumption is becoming vulnerable; (4) shaping actions that can be taken to keep assumptions viable, and (5) hedging actions that can be taken to prepare for unwelcome but unpreventable developments. For the acquisitions community, shaping and hedging actions both take the form of investments.
Author: Publisher: ISBN: Category : Languages : en Pages : 63
Book Description
Contracting personnel from the Army and other Federal agencies who are involved in information technology service acquisition decisions should read this report because it provides an assessment of how the Army can improve small business participation in indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity (IDIQ) contracts. The Inspector General (IG), DoD initiated the audit of the Army Information Technology Enterprise Solutions-2 Services (ITES-2S) contract because of the material impact this contract will have on the acquisition of information technology resources within DoD and the Federal Government. The ITES-2S contract has a ceiling price of $20 billion, a 3-year base period, and three 2-year option periods. The purpose of the ITES-2S contract is to support the Army enterprise infrastructure and infostructure goals with information technology services worldwide. The U.S. Army, DoD, and all other Federal agencies will be authorized to fulfill requirements under the ITES-2S contract. The Army Information Technology, E-Commerce, and Commercial Contracting Center contracting officials did not justify consolidating contract requirements for the ITES-2S contract. Also, the officials selected an inappropriate North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) code in the solicitation of the contract. As a result, ITES-2S is a bundled contract that improperly restricted small business competition and was unsuitable for small business award. Bundling a contract without justification violates U.S. Code and Federal regulations. The Army Contracting Agency internal controls were not adequate. The IG identified material internal control weaknesses on the adherence of the ITES-2S contract NAICS code to the Federal Acquisition Regulation requirements. The IG requested that the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Acquisition, Logistics, and Technology halt all ITES-2S contracting activity and future task orders until after the problems identified in this report are resolved.
Author: U S Government Accountability Office (G Publisher: BiblioGov ISBN: 9781289030230 Category : Languages : en Pages : 30
Book Description
GAO's continuing reviews of the acquisition workforce, focusing on the Department of Defense (DOD); the Departments of the Army, Navy, and Air Force; the Departments of Veterans Affairs, Energy, and Health and Human Services; the General Services Administration; and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, indicate that some of the government's largest procurement operations are not run efficiently. GAO found that requirements are not clearly defined, prices and alternatives are not fully considered, or contracts are not adequately overseen. The ongoing technological revolution requires a workforce with new knowledge, skills, and abilities, and the nature of acquisition is changing from routine simple buys toward more complex acquisitions and new business practices. DOD has adopted multidisciplinary and multifunctional definitions of their acquisition workforce, but the civilian agencies have not. DOD and the civilian agencies reviewed have developed specific training requirements for their acquisition workforce and mechanisms to track the training of acquisition personnel. All of the agencies reviewed said they had sufficient funding to provide current required core training for their acquisition workforce, but some expressed concerns about funding training for future requirements and career development, particularly because of budget cuts made recently at the Defense Acquisition University.
Author: Strategic Studies Strategic Studies Institute Publisher: CreateSpace ISBN: 9781505563375 Category : Languages : en Pages : 30
Book Description
The Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan mark an era of unprecedented outsourcing in contingency operations. Although significant outsourcing occurred in prior wars, never has the scale been so large for so long. Counterintuitively, as outsourcing increased, the number of government acquisition personnel decreased. This led to waste, fraud, and abuse. The Commission on Wartime Contracting made several findings and recommendations to prevent future contract administration problems in contingency operations. A principal concern is that the U.S. military needs to increase the number of acquisition experts, change its culture, and treat government contracting as a core competency. In response to outsourcing concerns, the Office of Federal Procurement Policy issued Policy Letter 11-01 on the Performance of Inherently Governmental and Critical Functions. The Letter provides strategic-level guidance to federal agencies to assess risk and accountability when outsourcing. Although the Letter provides helpful guidance, it is only a first step. More is needed to prevent the contract administration failures of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan from recurring. This Paper examines further-needed steps and ways in which the U.S. military can change its culture and make government contracting a core competency
Author: Jennifer Bocala Piolo Publisher: ISBN: Category : Contracting out Languages : en Pages : 24
Book Description
Information technology (IT) is a critical and costly enabler of Army Operations. When authorized Army activities obligate funds to support IT contracts, it becomes the responsibility of those activities to perform continuous validation of the requirements for IT support. However, the Army's current initiatives and processes for IT procurement and acquisition are not sufficient to conduct thorough analysis and prevent duplication of effort. One of the primary issues facing the Army IT acquisitions process is the failure of users to clearly define IT requirements and outline the scope of those requirements. Users often do not adequately articulate their operational needs. It is only through the use of effective cost benefit analysis conducted by IT savvy procurement teams that the Army can reduce costs and improve productivity in the modern era of fast paced technological advances and ever decreasing fiscal resources.
Author: Publisher: ISBN: Category : Languages : en Pages :
Book Description
The Department of Defense (DOD) is on the brink of operations in Iraq while seeking to respond to changes in security threats and still meeting the challenges transforming the military. DOD spends an average of $150 billion annually on acquisitions that support these and other missions. Moreover, this investment is expected to grow considerably in the future as DOD works to keep legacy systems while investing in future capabilities such as unmanned aircraft, satellite networks, and information and communications systems. Such demands clearly require DOD to be as efficient and effective as possible in obtaining the systems, services, and equipment it needs to carry out its mission. But GAO's reviews continue to show that DOD is not carrying out acquisitions cost-effectively and that the acquisitions themselves are not always achieving DOD's objectives. Pervasive problems persist regarding high-risk acquisition strategies and unrealistic cost, schedule, and performance estimates. This testimony focuses on two aspects fundamental to successful acquisitions in DOD: (1) the implementation of sound policies for making sourcing decisions, and (2) the adoption of best practices. Government agencies increasingly are relying on services to accomplish their missions. The Department of Defense now spends more than half its contracting dollars acquiring services, about $77 billion in fiscal year 2001, the latest year for which complete data are available. In addition, the Department reports that it has over 400,000 employees performing commercial-type services. Determining whether to obtain required services using federal employees or through contracts with the private sector is an important economic and strategic decision. In fact, competitive sourcing is a key component of the President's Management Agenda. But historically, the process for determining whether the public or the private sector should perform services needed by federal agencies--set forth in Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Circular A-76--has been difficult to implement. The impact such decisions have on the federal workforce has been profound, and there have been concerns in both the public and private sectors concerning the fairness of the process and the extent to which there is a "level playing field" for conducting public-private competitions. DOD could significantly improve its performance in a number of areas by adopting some of the best practices we have identified. Specifically, DOD could improve its performance in the areas of information technology outsourcing, acquiring information technology systems, acquiring services, major weapon system acquisitions, and acquisition workforce challenges.
Author: Karen L. Coccio Publisher: ISBN: Category : Contracting out Languages : en Pages : 30
Book Description
The recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have strained the limits of DoD's organic and externally sourced capabilities with literally tens of billions of dollars of required contracts and hundreds of thousands of private sector personnel contracted to support the war effort. Not surprisingly, DoD's extensive reliance on contractors resulted in contractors performing inherently governmental (IG) functions or activities that closely support IG functions including the oversight and management of the contract activity itself. The use of contractors to perform related inherently governmental functions and core competencies, and DoD's and the Federal government's response to those infractions, threatens to undermine the contracting profession and further constrain the flexibility and responsiveness of DoD in particular and the US government in general. This paper examines the contracting framework including the management of the contracting workforce before and during the current war efforts, assesses the general level of encroachment on DoD core contracting competencies, and evaluates the consequences of intrusions across the jurisdictional boundaries of the contract management task environment on the acquisition workforce profession.
Author: Publisher: ISBN: Category : Languages : en Pages : 0
Book Description
The Department of Defense (DOD) is the federal government's largest consumer of information technology (IT) resources, spending almost $22 billion on IT in fiscal year 2001. For this reason, it is critical that DOD adopt effective IT acquisition practices. To better understand commercial IT acquisition practices and how they potentially compare with those used at DOD, we reviewed existing research, held discussions with academic and professional authorities, and interviewed executives and managers at leading commercial organizations about their IT acquisition decisionmaking and management activities. We used this information plus the extensive research and trade literature available on IT acquisition practices to develop a consensus view of what is critical to success when acquiring IT services. On October 31, 2001, we provided the results of our study to your offices via electronic mall. These results are included as an appendix to this letter. The purpose of this letter is to officially transmit the information to you in published form. In brief, we present a generic framework of practices from leading commercial organizations, which use the term outsourcing to describe activities associated with acquiring IT services. The framework is composed of a set of leading practices that represent those most critical to successful outsourcing. Grouped into seven common phases, the practices and underlying critical success factors define an IT outsourcing process.
Author: John C. Kilgallon
Author: John C. Kilgallon
Author: United States. Department of Defense. Acquisition 2005 Task Force
Author: John E. Peters
Author: 
Author: U S Government Accountability Office (G
Author: Strategic Studies Strategic Studies Institute
Author: Jennifer Bocala Piolo
Author: 
Author: Karen L. Coccio
Author: