Federal procurement is being attacked from all directions. The General Services Administration (GSA) was recently called to task by federal auditors and Congress for alleged "scope of work" violations. As a result, GSA implemented its current "Get It Right" campaign and also a reorganization of the Federal Technology and Supply Services division. Furthermore, the head of the Office of Federal Procurement Policy was indicted for illegal activity. Lastly, numerous issues have surfaced as a result of Hurricane Katrina including problems with the use of sole source contracts, excessive pricing issues, and the discovery that large businesses have received federal contracts meant for small businesses.
Who is to Blame?
Congress and federal agencies blame recent problems on the reductions in the procurement workforce, contract bundling, and antiquated small business regulations. Wait a minute. Could it be the age old cycle again? Prime contractors hate competition and will do anything to eliminate it. Right or wrong, it is the American way.
Federal agencies publicly embrace full and open competition but are forced to limit it because the government would grind to a halt if everything was bought through full and open competition. Conducting full and open competitions for contracts (or the appearance of such) is incredibly time consuming and staff intensive. Further, the choice of a small business over a proven large business is risky - or at least end users think it is. Time and taxpayer money are wasted when the procurement has probably already been pre-sold by a favored vendor (and most opportunities are).
Where Will It End?
A few more procurement people will be hired, regulations will be redrafted and then take years to be implemented, and the reform campaigns will slowly fade into an inevitable bureaucratic black hole. And several years from now, the cycle will start again. The same old forces will cause problems to resurface, everyone will publicly declare their concern, and reform programs will surface.
What does this all mean for the next several years? There will be an increased reliance on multiple award schedule contracts or some new form of them. This will be particularly true for GSA Schedules, the granddaddy of them all. GSA Schedules encourage competition in that any one of the thousands of schedule vendors (including thousands of small businesses) at least have the opportunity to pre-sell while other types of multiple award schedules cut the field of pre-sellers down to a favored few large vendors.
