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Return to Article: DHS readies contract to outsource data center services

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  Of course Holcomb is "pleased" with this decision. He left DHS for the private sector, and now stands to benefit financially if DHS throws business to his company. Sounds like a real conflict of interest to me. Aren't government managers prohibited from doing business with their former agencies for a period of time after they leave government?

  ICEman Posted February 6, 2008 1:16 PM
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  I think the general gov pop. have a narrow point of view (not necc their fault) in understanding what rules and regulations the "private" sector must adhere to when working with the government. Depending on which outside vendor plays the marketing game, they can be on someone's mental "perferred" vendor list. Then the RFQs can be written to exclude others that can compete based on price, quality, and value. Private sector has to demonstrate the value of their services. It is up to the governemnt to use the contracting vehicles correctly.

  Nancy Rushin Posted February 4, 2008 12:49 PM
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  I've recently done this for my project and it's worked very well. Our agility in offering new services shot up, and our availability improved drastically for very little investment. There's nothing worse for a project than sullen data center staff that know they have you locked in.

  Other commenters complain about shifting the risk. We didn't look at this as shifting the risk, but instead hiring someone with the scale to invest in risk mitigations like greater redundancy, better monitoring, standard builds, etc.

  Red Posted January 7, 2008 5:43 PM
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  Great! Now who's going to watch the contractors and what do we have to pay them? Sure contact out the hardware but at the very least it should be run by government system administrators not some commercial contractor who has no legal obligation to make sure it works. That's what's nice about government workers. They took an oath that makes them legally responsible.

  Robert Sowders Posted December 24, 2007 10:03 AM
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  Idiots! (in my opinion)

  When are "leaders" going to realize that when you contract out your brain for operation; you/the organization become like an addict to the pusher. The function of operation becomes entirely dependent upon the supplier, at whatever cost 'he' ultimately charges. 'You' eventually loose your options and control of the 'brain' of the mission. Not to mention the security and proficiency concern issues that has repeatedly been exposed in government contracted services; particularly in DHS. Work such as computer systems operation, maintenance, and software development should be recognized as "Inherently Governmental" in nature. After all, it is absolutely vital to the function of any mission and our security as a nation.

  "Duh"! Idiots I tell you! Follow the players and follow the money! This smell is familiar!

  Lee Posted December 21, 2007 9:43 AM
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  Here we go again. We should all get nervous when critcal missions are treated like a hot potato by federal agencies and/or the armed services. "Shift the risk" to the contractors? Number one: why would a federal IT manager responsible to their mission ever want to "shift risk"? Number two: Its just more semantics - you cannot shift risk anymore than you can delegate responsibility.

  I think we have all seen more miserable failures than successes based on this model. Enough said. Good luck.

  Don Posted December 21, 2007 8:01 AM
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  Another low bid fiasco. This will be another joke.

  Wise Old Owl Posted December 21, 2007 7:59 AM