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Return to Article: Panel sets course for Army contracting overhaul

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  This is all a product of the 90's "rightsizing", increased reliance on contractors, and a "brain drain" of experienced personnel, not to mention the speed and scope of our current operations. No one person or organization...other than our top elected government officials are solely to blame. Now that the problems have been identified, lets work on correcting them and stop finger pointing.

  TL Posted January 29, 2008 9:21 AM
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  The Army's inability to oversee contracts has now fallen on another government agency. In a knee jerk reaction the civilain employees of DCMA who were only to deploy for 6 months are now involuntarily extended to one year. No plan to replace them at the end of their tour. No plan for the influx of personnel. The poor planning continues. I don't see how throwing more money and people at a problem with no direction will help this mistake.

  JT Posted November 25, 2007 7:39 AM
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  In a wartime situation we are now faced with, and having roughly the same amount of contracts we had in 1995, with half the contractors and government aquisition team; is it any wonder our right-sized operation is now in trouble?

  Samuel H. Cohen Posted November 8, 2007 10:10 AM
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  Quit doing all this shuffling and finger pointing and changes to the system now in place. It worked once, make it work again by holding people in the command or supervisory positions RESPONSIBLE for what their sections or departments do. You are speaking of making changes and adding HIGHER LEVEL personnel to insure better quality of tracking and work. MAKE THE PEOPLE IN THOSE POSITIONS ACCOUNTABLE AND CORRECT ACCORDINGLY. Active or civilian all the same. Quit tap dancing around the issue and go directly to the source.

  Kelly Rand Posted November 6, 2007 4:10 PM
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  Further stovepiping the contracting function is not the answer. Contracting is just one cylinder in the acquisition engine and all cylinders must work in harmony to have a smooth running engine. This harmony of which I speak is generated via true teamwork; when all team members (contracting personnel, technical personnel, quality assurance personnel, etc.) work toward the same objective off the same sheet. Stovepiping works contrary to true teamwork...whenever humans are involved anyway. Each stovepipe agency may publicly espouse to be working toward the same objective but each stovepipe has someone in charge with his/her own agenda. So at the level where the work is actually performed, people have a tendency to follow their boss's agenda and not that of an ad hoc team. To improve contracting we must move our analysis past the simple argument of organizational flattening vs stovepipeing that we seem to go through in 20 - 25 year cycles.

  Steve Posted November 6, 2007 7:48 AM
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  I do not see how tweaking the number of staff will produce an improvement in contracting. The basic problem that I see is that the people with the requirements (the end user) are too far removed from the contracting process. The people managing the contracting are experts in following the FAR and properly documenting the action, but they know nothing about the product they are procuring. The end result is a lack of prioritization in the procurement process, a disconnect between requirements and the true needs, and an ineffective oversight of the contractor performance. The need is for more than just contracting experts. The need is for contracting experts that also have some attachment to the end user and expertise in the product they are purchasing.

  Will Posted November 6, 2007 7:44 AM
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  Empower operating personnel to make purchases up to the Simplified Acquisition Threshold (currently $100,000) with a Government Purchase Card by placing orders against current contracts (including GSA and DoD contracts). This will both fulfill the Federal Acquisition Regulations and free up contracting personnel to concentrate on writing and managing contracts instead of placing orders; which the field personnel are perfectly capable of performing without going through contracting.

  Kevin Blume Posted November 5, 2007 10:23 AM
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  Been doing this work since 1981 - The problem is not only from receipt of requisition onward the problem is also that the requiring activity does not know/understand they are a significant part of any acquisition. THey need to be trained on how to plan in concert with experienced KOs - who we have fewer and fewer of. Frequently top level management is the problem due to their long yerm lack of any acquisition training. Also, the requirement for a single contracting command staffed by Army acquisition core members with civilian team members (like the old Army Materiel Command) needs to occur. Top level management in DC has created this problem when they:
  1. Cut the acquisition workforce by more than 50% in the early 1990s
  2. Put an academic from Harvard in charge at OFPP who caused the belief that we are like a normal business and we and the contractors are "all on the same team-group hug"
  3. The idiots at Defense Department in 1990s (Secy Cohen) reduced the active Army from 1 + Mil to less than half that & moved all non boots on ground Army into the reserves/guard - further gutting line officers with (or with the opportunity to acquire) contracting experience.

  Kim K Judd Posted November 5, 2007 10:09 AM