Panel rejects certificate standards for contractors

Software billionaire Bill Gates probably isn't interested in doing any computer work for the federal government right now but legislation passed by a House panel Wednesday would allow the Microsoft founder and university drop-out and other "certificately-challenged" to do just that.

The Federal Contracting Flexibility Act-also known as the Fed-Flex Act-"would require federal agencies to justify the use of the minimum personnel requirement frequently written into government contracts" said the bill's author, Rep. Tom Davis, R-Va. The House Government Reform Subcommittee on Government Management, Information and Technology approved the bill (H.R. 3582).

Davis attacked what he described as "credential creep" as one of the leading contributors to the country's information technology worker shortage, which he estimated nationally at 364,000.

Davis, whose Northern Virginia district is home to one of the nation's most important high-technology areas, said that certificates are not necessarily a good indication of ability in the world of information technology, where companies usually train workers on the rapidly evolving technology.

"The government will get better results if it issues performance-based statements of work and leaves it up to the offeror to propose how they will satisfy the requirement," Davis said.

The federal government is the largest purchaser of information technology in the world, with about $28 billion in goods and services in a year, according to Davis. But computer moguls such as Gates and Michael Dell, of Dell Computer Corp., who do not hold college degrees, would not be able to perform information technology work for many federal agencies, Davis said.