Innovation | The Contracting Education Academy

June 25, 2019 By AMK

OFPP issues 4th ‘myth-busting’ memo

The purpose of this memorandum is to improve awareness of vendor engagement strategies that Federal procurement thought leaders are using to create a more responsive buying process, modernize the acquisition culture, and deliver greater value to the taxpayer.

The memorandum also asks each Chief Financial Officers Act (CFO Act) agency to ensure it has designated an industry liaison to work with the agency’s Acquisition Innovation Advocate (AIA), the Office of Small Disadvantaged Business Utilization (OSDBU), and other key acquisition personnel to promote modern vendor communication practices and counter misconceptions that drive today’s risk aversion culture.

The President’s Management Agenda challenges agencies to deliver 21st century services by modernizing information technology, increasing transparency and accountability, and building a modem workforce. 1 To keep up with the rapidly accelerating pace of technological change, a number of agencies have sought better ways to communicate with industry so they can better understand the commercial marketplace, attract new contractors, and encourage current partners to use new processes and develop, test, and offer more modern solutions. Despite this progress, the pace of adoption has been limited relative to the total volume of activity that potentially could benefit from these efforts; only a fraction of our transactions are using these new ways of doing business. For this reason, the Office of Federal Procurement Policy (OFPP) is taking two steps to improve awareness of these modem communication practices.

First, OFPP is using its long-standing “myth-busting” campaign to spotlight how front line acquisition officials and managers have been challenging entrenched ideas about engagement between the public and private sectors. Attachment I highlights ten misconceptions related to innovative practices and showcases successful agency efforts. As additional myths are identified and new practices evolve, new examples will be posted on the Innovation Hub2 of the Acquisition Gateway to foster dynamic conversations among the acquisition workforce.

Keep reading memo at: https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/SIGNED-Myth-Busting-4-Strenthening-Engagement-with-Industry-Partners-through-Innovative-Business-Practices.pdf

June 20, 2019 By AMK

Government innovation? Weirdness comes in threes

How often have you heard that the government is stodgy and resistant to change? Large bureaucracies, both in business and government, do trend that way. But three curious initiatives from federal agencies occurred in the days leading to the long Memorial Day weekend.

Unrelated, they nevertheless connect thematically by showing an instinct towards government innovation, that is, a government willing to try something different.

First was the appointment of Jose Arrietta as the chief information officer of the Department of Health and Human Services. I’ve interviewed Arrietta a couple of times. He’s a smart cookie. He’s possesses good technology chops, having been one of the people trying to prove how blockchain can work in federal settings. In his relatively short time at HHS, Arrietta saw to it that the first blockchain application received authority to operate. That in itself is radical.

But as Jason Miller reported, Arrietta is an unconventional choice to lead an IT complex as vast and diverse as that of HHS. It’s government innovation in personnel. He’s mainly an acquisition guy, and acquisition is an important part of technology and information management. The blockchain application is in fact acquisition. Now Arrietta will have to show he can widen his viewpoint and make things happen in all areas overseen by a CIO.

Keep reading article at: https://federalnewsnetwork.com/tom-temin-commentary/2019/05/government-innovation-weirdness-comes-in-threes/

May 17, 2019 By AMK

All this ‘innovation’ won’t save the Pentagon

The Defense Department, a hierarchy fixated on technology, is unequipped to confront a world of disruptive challenges.

I recently had the privilege of attending a Silicon Valley conference attended by leaders across the national security “innovation ecosystem.” The term reflects today’s veritable freshet of interest in defense innovation, from self-styled “virtuous insurgents” and defense “hackers” to individual agency innovation offices and entirely new outfits with on-the-nose names such as the Defense Innovation Unit and the Defense Innovation Board. All this may suggest that the national security apparatus is at last confronting the need for long-overdue changes to how we do business.

For two days, I listened to senior people from the military services, large defense agencies, and major components of the intelligence community as they described various “mission acceleration” efforts—that is, finding shortcuts that allow us to do what we’ve been doing a bit faster, a bit cheaper, a bit better.

This is a problem.

Innovation—from the Latin innovare—literally means to “make new.” But defense and other national security leaders often confuse it with automation or modernization. Automating an existing process doesn’t change the process itself. Nor does it change the game to incrementally improve the range, speed, or—forgive me—the “lethality” of existing weapons. Such efforts are like a homeowner fixing a broken window, painting a dilapidated wall, or adding a bathroom without considering the decaying foundations of the house itself.

Keep reading article at: https://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2019/04/all-innovation-wont-save-pentagon/156487/

April 26, 2019 By AMK

What the 809 Panel didn’t quite get right

The Section 809 panel offers an important new idea on how the defense acquisition system could be improved to provide the Pentagon greater access to innovative new technologies that are rapidly developed in the private sector.

But the panel fumbled its recommendations with a contradictory and incoherent legislative approach that would hurt more than it helps. That should not undermine the significance of the panel’s underlying idea: a new focus on the source of funding for commercial items instead of the marketplace in which they are sold. This could encourage companies to develop defense-unique products at their own expense. Today, many are driven away when they are forced to accept regulated pricing and burdensome, government-unique contract terms and conditions.

Successes and Failures

We had high hopes when we helped to write the commercial buying acquisition reforms in the Federal Acquisition Streamlining Act of 1994 and the Clinger-Cohen Act of 1996. These reforms broadened the definition of commercial items, established a commercial item preference, and authorized waivers to government-unique requirements and contract clauses for the purchase of commercial solutions.

As a result, the government went from 476 contracts under simplified commercial item procedures in 1996 to nearly 13 million contracts worth almost $75 billion in 2011. As our colleague Jon Etherton has explained, this enabled the U.S. government to catch up with the information technology revolution that had swept the private sector in the 1990s and likely saved the Department of Defense (DOD) billions of dollars by avoiding unnecessary research and development and the extended acquisition lead times associated with government-unique products.

Keep reading this article at: https://breakingdefense.com/2019/04/what-the-809-panel-didnt-quite-get-right-greenwalt-levine/

April 17, 2019 By cs

Acquisition is ‘ripe for emerging technology,’ says OFPP’s Newhart

The White House’s Office of Federal Procurement Policy (OFPP) is targeting opportunities to use emerging technologies to improve the federal acquisition process.

Joanie Newhart, associate administrator of acquisition workforce programs within OFPP, said at FedScoop’s 2019 IT Modernization Summit. She said that her office and the federal Chief Acquisition Officer Council are “focused on emerging technology and how can we use it in acquisition. We think it’s going to explode this year, so we want to get in front of it and use it wisely.”

While many federal agencies are still trying to grasp how they might use emerging technologies, like automation and artificial intelligence, to drive mission outcomes, many support offices, such as acquisition teams, are finding opportunities to automate burdensome and manual workloads with the novel tech.

Keep reading this article at: https://www.fedscoop.com/emerging-technology-ofpp-joanie-newhart/

The purpose of this memorandum is to improve awareness of vendor engagement strategies that Federal procurement thought leaders are using to create a more responsive buying process, modernize the acquisition culture, and deliver greater value to the taxpayer.

How often have you heard that the government is stodgy and resistant to change? Large bureaucracies, both in business and government, do trend that way. But three curious initiatives from federal agencies occurred in the days leading to the long Memorial Day weekend.

The Defense Department, a hierarchy fixated on technology, is unequipped to confront a world of disruptive challenges.

The Section 809 panel offers an important new idea on how the defense acquisition system could be improved to provide the Pentagon greater access to innovative new technologies that are rapidly developed in the private sector.

The White House’s Office of Federal Procurement Policy (OFPP) is targeting opportunities to use emerging technologies to improve the federal acquisition process.

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