FITARA | The Contracting Education Academy

January 25, 2018 By cs

Agencies failed to identify over a quarter of IT contracts in 2016

A recent Government Accountability Office report has found that within 22 federal agencies reviewed, 31,493 IT contracts accounting for $4.5 billion went unidentified by those agencies in 2016.

The Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act, or FITARA, enacted in 2014, requires covered agencies’ chief acquisition officers to identify IT contracts for the chief information officers to review and approve. However, GAO found that nearly 30 percent of those contracts were not identified appropriately in 2016.

“The percentage of additional IT contract obligations GAO identified varied among the selected agencies. For example, the Department of State did not identify 1 percent of its IT contract obligations. Conversely, 8 agencies did not identify over 40 percent of their IT-related contract obligations,” the report said.

Keep reading this article at: https://www.federaltimes.com/federal-oversight/2018/01/12/agencies-failed-to-identify-over-a-quarter-of-it-contracts-in-2016/

November 27, 2017 By cs

Homeland Security’s top buyer: Still all-in in agile

The Homeland Security Department is no stranger to agile and is still committed to the modular software development process despite the failure of its large-scale agile buying experiment.

At a recent event hosted by the technology group AFFIRM, Homeland Security’s Chief Procurement Officer Soraya Correa said the department is still promoting agile software development because “we’ve finally woken up and realized we can’t keep doing [things] the way we were.”

“We can’t continue to let our enemies … get ahead of us,” she said.

Keep reading this article at: http://www.nextgov.com/emerging-tech/2017/11/homeland-securitys-top-buyer-still-all-agile/142540/

April 27, 2016 By cs

Implementing contracting best practices: The challenge ahead

As the current administration heads to the finish line, political appointees are focusing on leaving a legacy in concrete accomplishments from their agendas.

But what can the acquisition community expect for the remainder of this presidential term?

We know that acquisition change will semi-repeat through authority transfers between users and membership due to legislative mandates under the National Defense Authorization Act, the Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act, and individual agency authorizations. The administration’s acquisition legacy will likely include initiatives in workforce professionalism, such as wider use of the Federal Acquisition Regulation’s entire tool kit and longstanding supply-chain practices, such as strategic sourcing and category management. It will also include the partial restoration of restrictive common-sense communications between government and industry, and a “nuts and bolts,” back-to-basics education policy that redevelops fundamental skills in analysis and judgment with the ultimate elusive goal to ensure “critical-thinking skills” throughout the process.

However, finding measurable improvements in significant acquisition program performance indicators or long-lasting cultural progress is difficult for sure. The acquisition workforce faces the continued reality of a risk-averse culture encouraged by multiple levels of post-game quarterbacking; a political climate fixated on punishment; lack of or challenging hiring processes; the incredibly dispersed and uncertain nature of government budgets, oversight, and management execution; and several new Executive Orders affecting socioeconomic goals.

Keep reading this article at: http://www.federaltimes.com/story/government/acquisition/blog/2016/04/21/implementing-contracting-best-practices-challenge-ahead/83333606/

April 22, 2016 By cs

DoD IG report reveals ongoing struggles in IT acquisition reform

IT-acquisition reform remains an area of ongoing concern for Federal agencies and government contractors.

Indeed, as we previously discussed, the GAO has added IT Acquisitions and Operations to its bi-annual list of programs it identifies as posing a high risk for fraud, waste, abuse, and mismanagement. Strengthened by Congress’ passage in December 2014 of the Federal IT Acquisition Reform Act (“FITARA”), OMB has implemented several initiatives to reduce redundancy, improve efficiencies, and lower costs with respect to the government’s procurement and management of IT resources.

If DoD responds to the IG's report by stepping up its efforts under the Federal Data Center Consolidation Initiative, one result could be increased opportunities for IT contractors offering cloud computing and other services. — If DoD responds to the IG’s report by stepping up its efforts under the Federal Data Center Consolidation Initiative, one result could be increased opportunities for IT contractors offering cloud computing and other services. (Click on the image above to see the full memorandum.)

However, a recent Department of Defense (“DoD”) Inspector General (“IG”) audit report analyzing one of these initiatives—the Federal Data Center Consolidation Initiative (“FDCCI”) —highlights the ongoing struggle that Federal agencies face when seeking to execute IT reform. Through the FDCCI, OMB set a goal of closing 40 percent of Federal data centers by the end of FY 2015 in order to reduce Federal agencies’ energy and real estate footprints and to achieve cost savings by streamlining data management systems.

Keep reading this article at: https://www.insidegovernmentcontracts.com/2016/04/dod-ig-report-reveals-ongoing-struggles-in-it-acquisition-reform/#more-6753

April 21, 2016 By cs

Getting FITARA right

Although it’s been nearly 16 months since President Barack Obama signed the Federal IT Acquisition Reform Act (FITARA), we still have a lot of work to do to strengthen the management of government’s IT.

Considered one of the most significant IT reforms since the Clinger-Cohen Act, FITARA expands oversight of the almost $90 billion in federal IT spending. The law’s main objectives are:

Provide better visibility into IT expenditures.
Improve risk management in IT investments.
Engage other senior officials in the oversight of IT investments.
Give more authority to the federal government’s more than 250 CIOs to plan, approve and execute IT acquisitions.

Keep reading this article at: https://fcw.com/articles/2016/04/13/comment-delprete-fitara.aspx

See June 10, 2015 memorandum entitled “Management and Oversight of Federal Information Technology” from the Office of Management & Budget at: https://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/omb/memoranda/2015/m-15-14.pdf

A recent Government Accountability Office report has found that within 22 federal agencies reviewed, 31,493 IT contracts accounting for $4.5 billion went unidentified by those agencies in 2016.

The Homeland Security Department is no stranger to agile and is still committed to the modular software development process despite the failure of its large-scale agile buying experiment.

As the current administration heads to the finish line, political appointees are focusing on leaving a legacy in concrete accomplishments from their agendas.

IT-acquisition reform remains an area of ongoing concern for Federal agencies and government contractors.

Although it’s been nearly 16 months since President Barack Obama signed the Federal IT Acquisition Reform Act (FITARA), we still have a lot of work to do to strengthen the management of government’s IT.

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