A year ago, headlines were all about IT procurement reform, with Congress threatening to impose new rules on government that promised to increase effectiveness and improve results.
This quickly gave way to more sage advice arguing that what we needed was not procurement reform, but instead, continual and incremental improvements in procurement processes and adoption of best procurement practices.
Today, I see little evidence that the government procurement market is converging on the best IT procurement practices. Instead, agencies appear to be adopting diverse strategies focusing on finding expedient, protest-resistant procurement solutions rather than focusing on enhancing mission outcomes.
Many of these practices are gaining market share, but may fall short of achieving long-term mission objectives and have unintended outcomes that ultimately may prove disadvantageous to both government and industry.
Keep reading this article by Bob Lohfeld at: https://washingtontechnology.com/articles/2015/10/08/insights-lohfeld-procurement-practices.aspx