Federal agencies should utilize the General Services Administration more when procuring commercial items, urged Federal Acquisition Service Commissioner Tom Sharpe.
“Agencies should not be solving their own office supply problems,” Sharpe said at a July 18 Association for Federal Information Resources Management event.
In 2012, FAS was responsible for 12.3 percent of the federal market share of commercial procurement; Sharpe says that number should reach 17 percent before the end of 2013.
When Sharpe left the Internal Revenue Service to work at GSA in January he said he thought it was an “acknowledged principle” that the federal government should have a centralized buyer, but he quickly found out that it is not.
“There are too many procurement stops and too much duplication,” he said, repeatedly.
Not using GSA as a centralizing procurement source is a “behavioral issue,” Sharpe said.
Keep reading this article at: http://www.fiercegovernment.com/story/sharpe-behavioral-issues-behind-agency-aversion-gsa/2013-07-18
