Procurement Through Technology – Why Not in Gov?

Imagine if all the contracting officer representatives (CORs) and government task leaders (GTLs) at your agency were fully up to speed at all times on the FAR and on all of the various policies and procedures that your agency has in place to ensure that procurements and contracts are managed effectively, and with integrity.

Are you already there? If so, you certainly owe it to the rest of the Executive branch, and Congress for that matter, to share how you got there!

If you are not there, why not?

Let’s consider just one facet of the problem.

Does everyone in the agency who has any responsibility for any part of the procurements and contracts management lifecycle have direct access to an electronic library of all current and relevant regulations, policies, guidance, checklists, templates, training materials and other supporting information?

Implementing something like this is hardly a technical challenge any more. It just needs the agency to make it a priority and get it done.

So many government IT projects get in trouble, or even go off the rails, in large part because government managers aren’t properly equipped with the basic information they need to get their jobs done properly.

There’s an old saying that may apply here—“the cobbler’s children have no shoes”. We should be making certain that some of the technology we procure and manage goes toward solving these basic procurement and contract management problems!

Of course there is another old saying that may apply here as well—“you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink”, but that is a problem for another day.

Jim Tyson – Word to the Wise

I am an IT Senior Executive www.linkedin.com/in/jimtyson1/ with over 30+ years of experience.  I have a passion for human nature and Information Technology.

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