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Return to Article: OMB reports job competitions saved $1.4 billion last year

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  Barbara,

  As one tasked with the tracking of these things, I can tell you that the answer to your questions is an absolutely positive "That depends..."

  All costs for the conduct of a study are supposed to be tracked and submitted in the reporting. Some agencies do this pretty well, others don't.

  The continuing costs are to be tracked for 5 years in DoD (my agency) but the inputs again are only as good as those doing the tracking. With downsizing everywhere, again, some activities do it thoroughly and others give it a cursory swipe and consider it "good enough for government work."

  If all associated took it seriously, the data would be better. But in each case, the information provided is biased according to those that are handling it. If it's a disgruntled employee that thinks the term A-76 automatically means "fire every civil service person and contract out the government" then the data will be slanted one way. If it's an individual that sees the A-76 program as beneficial to every tax-paying citizen as looking after the nation's checkbook, all results will be slanted the other direction. Most are somewhere in between.

  I believe that the numbers are what they are as an overall average because in this, like politics, we're probably a pretty evenly divided nation so hopefully the bias cancels out.

  Database Manager Posted January 26, 2005 10:42 AM
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  A claim of $1.4 billion in savings is superficial at best unless it comes with some explanation of how that savings was calculated. Did it include all or just some of the cost of conducting the competition? Did it include costs associated with inevitable scope changes during the first several months of a contract -- government or private? Did OMB fail to provide that information or did GovExec fail to report it?

  Barbara Moskowitz Posted January 24, 2005 9:03 AM