Open Dialogue on Improving How to Do Business with the Federal Government Ideas

The Federal Strategic Sourcing Initiative (FSSI) should be on every small business federal contractor's list of issues to quickly be educated upon. The FSSI has been identified as a procurement vehicle which it is expected will be applied to over 90% of all Federal Government Spending. In a nutshell, FSSI awards contracts to a select few while leaving the vast majority at-risk of losing government business. For example, ...more »

Contractors are supposed to submit their initial best offer because award might be done without discussion. But we all know that once the contractors are ranked and graded and the competitive range is established, most of the time, the Contracting officer will issue a request for Best and Final Offer. Proposal development is costly. Multiple submissions also cost money. Contracting Officers are "required" to always ask ...more »

In business, time is money. In war, time is lives. Companies and the warfighter alike are threatened by the glacial pace of current procurement cycles. Purchases that have always taken months now take years. As prominent authorities on policy have noted (citing examples such as unmanned systems and MRAP), the USG often has the most success when bypassing the system entirely: “When it is necessary to go around the ...more »

The dollar cost involved in the production of a proposal has already been broken down in other Ideas. I would like to add the human cost to the mix. It seems to be standard practice for solicitations to be released right before the Acquisition Office leaves for the week or season. It is common for Industry to receive a solicitation on a Friday afternoon, or a couple of days before a major holiday (this seems especially ...more »

Over the last decade, the number of laws, regulations and provisions that apply to commercial item have dramatically increased. For example, in 1996 under 52.212-5(b) there were 17 provisions of law or executive orders identified as applicable to commercial item contracts. In 2012, the number has climbed to 51. The resulting explosion of statutes and regulations applicable to commercial item contracting increases ...more »

there are increased requirements for reporting and compliance that are not reimbursed by the Government but require contractors to develop tracking and reporting systems and have dedicated resources to maintaining the system and information for reporting. CDM is an excellent example of this.