professional services | The Contracting Education Academy

January 21, 2021 By cs

GSA kicks starts 2021 with an acquisition potpourri

When it comes to federal procurement, the General Services Administration takes no off days.

While the GSA’s Federal Acquisition Service employees will never be mistaken for elite athletes — where this concept of no days off comes from — they aren’t wasting any time setting up 2021 to be a busy year for contractors and for new governmentwide acquisition contracts.

In the span of two weeks, GSA released the draft solicitation for Polaris, the small business GWAC to replace the debacle that was Alliant 2 Small Business as well as two requests for information — one for artificial intelligence and machine learning capabilities, and one to develop a new professional services vehicle.

These initial pieces of market research or acquisition strategy planning come as GSA already is reviewing bids for spots under the 8(a) STARS III GWAC and the ASTRO program. GSA expects to make awards for both of these programs in spring 2021 or thereabouts.

Keep reading this article at: https://federalnewsnetwork.com/reporters-notebook-jason-miller/2021/01/gsa-kicks-starts-2021-with-an-acquisition-potpourri/

July 20, 2020 By cs

Agencies expected to spend almost $200 billion on acquisition in FY20’s fourth quarter

The fourth quarter spending surge is upon us, and it appears the federal acquisition community isn’t just focused on getting money out the door, but request for proposals, too.

Agencies are expected to spend $194 billion between now and Sept. 30, according to Bloomberg Government. Departments will spend a big chunk of that total on technology — $28 billion — and on professional services — $32 billion.

But this has been a trend for some time.

“The $182 billion in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2019 spending obligations is about a $7 billion decrease from 2018, but fiscal 2019 represents about a $30 billion increase since 2016,” BGov said in a recent webinar. “Spending in the last month of the fiscal year is usually more than that of July and August combined.”

Of that $194 billion expected to go out the door in Q4 2020, BGov estimates that agencies will spend $101 billion in September, the most in one month since 2018 when they spent $99 billion.

Keep reading this article at: https://federalnewsnetwork.com/reporters-notebook-jason-miller/2020/07/agencies-expected-to-spend-almost-200b-on-acquisition-in-q4-2020/

August 16, 2018 By AMK

Changes are coming to professional services thanks to contract management

Changes are coming in the way the General Services Administration purchases services.

In April, the Office of Federal Procurement Policy released a new strategy to use category management to reduce multiple award contracts, and contractors will begin seeing the results soon.

“Services are procured very differently than commodities. What I’m focused on, and what senior leaders across government are focused on, in particular senior procurement executives, are we really need to move how we’re buying services to a performance-based environment,” said Tiffany Hixson, assistant commissioner of the Office of Professional and Human Capital Services within the Federal Acquisition Services at GSA. “We’ve been on this journey for many years. It really needs to be rebooted, and we’re going to continue to push in terms of how we buy services to being performance based. Buying engineers by the pound is not an effective way to deliver mission capabilities.”

During Deltek’s Spending Spree event July 19, Hixson said procurement officials need to focus on the outcome they want from a particular contract action, not necessarily the price. While there are some subcategories of professional services where price can be a driver, more often than not, officials should be looking at the value of the capability delivered.

Keep reading this article at: https://federalnewsradio.com/acquisition/2018/07/changes-are-coming-to-professional-services-thanks-to-contract-management/

March 6, 2018 By AMK

Agencies increasingly need help with complex professional services contracts

General Services Administration contracting officers are seeing a shift in big, complicated procurements as more agencies come to the shop looking for professional services rather than IT.

Overall, the Office of Assisted Acquisition Services — which helps other agencies that either don’t have a procurement shop or don’t have the expertise to manage large, complex buys — has seen double-digit growth over that last two years and is expecting to do so again over the next two years, Tom Howder, assistant commissioner for Assisted Acquisition Services, said at ACT-IAC’s Federal Insights Exchange on Feb. 22.

Part of that growth has been due to the addition of professional services as an area of expertise. That area is now outpacing IT in growth.

Keep reading this article at: http://www.nextgov.com/cio-briefing/2018/02/agencies-increasingly-need-help-complex-professional-services-contracts/146209/

May 22, 2017 By AMK

GSA starts translating Trump’s priorities into acquisition policy

The General Services Administration is going to have its hands full this summer as it works toward translating President Donald Trump’s contracting priorities into policy.

Jack St. John, GSA’s chief of staff, outlined a few of these priorities for a crowd of contractors at the May 11 Coalition for Government Procurement’s Spring Conference in Falls Church, Virginia.

“We are in the process of making changes, one of which is switching the [Transactional Data Reporting] requirement from a mandatory to a voluntary process. We’re going to reexamine the burdens and benefits of TDR,” he said.

GSA released the final data transaction reporting rule June 23, 2016, creating a requirement for government contractors to submit information about transactions through the schedule contracts and those governmentwide acquisition contracts run by the agency.

Keep reading this article at: https://federalnewsradio.com/acquisition/2017/05/gsa-starts-translating-trumps-priorities-into-acquisition-policy/

When it comes to federal procurement, the General Services Administration takes no off days.

The fourth quarter spending surge is upon us, and it appears the federal acquisition community isn’t just focused on getting money out the door, but request for proposals, too.

Changes are coming in the way the General Services Administration purchases services.

General Services Administration contracting officers are seeing a shift in big, complicated procurements as more agencies come to the shop looking for professional services rather than IT.

The General Services Administration is going to have its hands full this summer as it works toward translating President Donald Trump’s contracting priorities into policy.

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