small business goals | The Contracting Education Academy

April 17, 2017 By AMK

Pentagon headed to court against small business advocate

A small-business advocate has won a day in court with Pentagon attorneys to argue whether the Defense Department should release shielded internal documents that the plaintiff argues will reveal a government bias against small defense contractors.

Lloyd Chapman, founder of the Petaluma, Calif.-based American Small Business League, for years has sought to expose the workings of the 28-year-old Comprehensive Subcontracting Plan Test Program designed to “determine if comprehensive subcontracting plans on a corporate, division or plant-wide basis [instead of for individual contracts] would lead to increased opportunities for small businesses.”

Chapman argues the program covers up ways in which large contractors get work intended for eligible small businesses, and even the Pentagon has expressed a desire for Congress to terminate the program as not effective in organizing contact awards.

On April 12, the small business league announced a new stage in its ongoing suit against the helicopter maker Sikorsky Aircraft Corp. (acquired by Lockheed Martin in 2015) and the DOD. U.S. District Court Judge William Alsup of the Northern District of California, last week set December as the time for a full trial that will include discovery and as many as 10 depositions from the Defense Department on the mysterious program. “The ASBL believes the release of the information will prove the Pentagon has defrauded small businesses out of over two trillion dollars in subcontracts since the program was established in 1989,” the league said.

Keep reading this article at: http://www.govexec.com/contracting/2017/04/pentagon-headed-court-against-small-business-advocate/136980

October 14, 2016 By AMK

Congress appears poised to gut government contracts for small business

M.L. Mackey and her husband started their company, Beacon Interactive Systems, 22 years ago. Since 2002, they have made their living primarily selling software to the Navy. As far as defense contractors go, theirs is a small business, to be sure: In the last 14 years, Beacon has booked almost $14 million in direct sales to the government, and done even more work as a subcontractor on other projects.

small-business-policy But recent work building shipboard operating software for energy management — a project, Mackey says, that has been “extremely well received from the waterfront to the Pentagon” — has led Mackey to think bigger. “We’re actively transitioning our Navy products into maritime internet of things and manufacturing internet of things products,” she said. The company, she says, has formed strategic partnerships to launch itself back into the private sector as a prelude to building an internal sales force. Meanwhile, she anticipates that within a few years, she’ll be bidding on, and winning, much larger Navy contracts — worth as much as $15 million.

Mackey credits Beacon’s success building the energy management software to a close working relationship with Navy program managers. “We were able to brainstorm and iterate directly with our fleet customer and develop a technology that directly addressed their needs,” she says. “When they wanted to do more, they were able to directly engage with us. And we as a company have more of the I.P. we need to bring to the private sector market expansion. But none of this would have happened if I didn’t have a prime contract.”

Keep reading this article at: http://www.forbes.com/sites/robbmandelbaum/2016/09/30/congress-appears-poised-to-gut-government-contracts-for-small-business/#4009748a2e3d

March 10, 2016 By AMK

April course conveys details of all federal small business programs

During the first week of April 2016, The Contracting Education Academy at Georgia Tech is repeating its popular three-day course that delves into the intricacies of the government’s Small Business Programs.

The course focuses on the government’s efforts to improve small business participation in both prime contracting and subcontracting.

The class will be held in the world-class Global Learning Center on Georgia Tech’s campus in midtown Atlanta. Registration details may be found by clicking here.

Known as “CON 260B – Small Business Programs,” the course is a Defense Acquisition University (DAU) level 2 contracting course that goes a long way to ensure that those in the acquisition field – Defense and civilian agencies alike – are more aware of and responsive to small business goals.

Historically, this class was designed for small business specialists, however The Academy has fashioned this class so that it is applicable to all interested parties – contracting officers and contracting staff, small business specialists from all agencies, small business advocates, as well as prime contractors and small business themselves.

A review of DAU’s prerequisite course, CON 260A, is included in the Contracting Academy’s CON 260B course.

Small business participation in federal contracting is a high-profile issue. For example, a recent Department of Defense (DoD) memo (seen here) reiterates how essential small businesses are to our nation’s economic recovery because they produce more jobs, represent a major source of innovative solutions to warfighter needs that help maintain our status as the world’s finest military, and contribute more to gross domestic output. The Contracting Academy is committed to supporting DoD and other agency directives aimed at achieving higher levels of small business participation in federal contracting.

Contracting officers — and all leaders who manage budgets and allocate funds for contracts — are collectively responsible for achieving the government’s 23 percent small business goal. To ensure that this responsibility is met, many federal agencies’ senior executives are evaluated and held accountable for small business participation in contracting. A mandatory performance requirement for supporting this goal includes language that “establishes a command or program climate that is responsive to small business concerns.”

The Academy’s CON 260B is very relevant to the training needs of everyone involved in the process of seeing to it that small businesses participate in government contracting and subcontracting opportunities. This includes, of course, small businesses themselves as well as large businesses who are required to establish small business subcontracting goals.

The Academy offers CON 260B, a 3-day course, as an open enrollment course which virtually ensures seating for all registrants. Register here for the next CON 260B – Small Business Programs class at Georgia Tech in Atlanta.

2.1 CEUs are granted to those successfully completing this course.

This 3-day course is also available for instruction at your site. For more information or to make arrangements, call 404-894-6109 or email info@contractingacademy.gatech.edu.

October 30, 2015 By AMK

SBA watchdog warns of IT security risks, poor data in contracting goals

The Small Business Administration (SBA) has made solid headway in addressing most of its 10 major management and performance challenges, but took a step backward on information technology security, its inspector general reported.

SBA also falls short in verifying data and toughening enforcement to curb the number of large companies that improperly win contracts intended for small businesses, according to a report and score card released Oct. 15.

Noting that recent governmentwide security breaches have “heightened the importance of continuously monitoring networks and software applications,” the IG and an external auditor identified IT security “weaknesses when on-boarding and separating SBA personnel,” the report said. The agency lost ground over the past year in implementing such recommendations as reporting IT security weaknesses, segregating duty controls and assuring that “access controls are in place and operating effectively, and contractors are not granted system access until they have obtained the required background investigations and/or security clearances.”

On the SBA-led governmentwide effort to award 23 percent of all prime contracts to qualified small businesses, the score card provides ammunition to outside critics who argue that too many large firms are siphoning off contract set-asides.

Keep reading this article at: http://www.govexec.com/oversight/2015/10/sba-watchdog-warns-it-security-risks-poor-data-contracting-goals/122919

June 26, 2015 By AMK

VA cheated small businesses out of millions of dollars in contracts, whistleblower alleges

Small businesses, including veteran-owned businesses, have been cheated out of millions of dollars in federal contracts because the Department of Veterans Affairs failed to follow contracting laws.

That’s the conclusion of members of Congress who have been investigating VA’s purchasing practices. The VA has been spending more than $6 billion a year on medical supplies without following contracting rules, such as a requirement to set aside purchases below $150,000 for small businesses, according to Jan Frye, the VA’s assistant secretary for acquisitions and logistics. Frye brought these issues to the VA’s top management, then turned whistleblower when he wasn’t satisfied with management’s reaction. Now he’s been a star witness at three congressional hearings on the matter.

Keep reading this article at: http://www.bizjournals.com/atlanta/news/news-wire/2015/06/24/va-cheated-small-businesses-out-of-millions-of.html

A small-business advocate has won a day in court with Pentagon attorneys to argue whether the Defense Department should release shielded internal documents that the plaintiff argues will reveal a government bias against small defense contractors.

During the first week of April 2016, The Contracting Education Academy at Georgia Tech is repeating its popular three-day course that delves into the intricacies of the government’s Small Business Programs.

The Small Business Administration (SBA) has made solid headway in addressing most of its 10 major management and performance challenges, but took a step backward on information technology security, its inspector general reported.

Small businesses, including veteran-owned businesses, have been cheated out of millions of dollars in federal contracts because the Department of Veterans Affairs failed to follow contracting laws.

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