If Federal Acquisition is Broken, How Do We Fix It?

A January 2013 report from the Congressional Research Service cited a House Armed Services Committee report that declared:

“Simply put, the Department of Defense (DOD) acquisition process is broken. The ability of the Department to conduct the large scale acquisitions required to ensure our future national security is a concern of the committee. The rising costs and lengthening schedules of major defense acquisition programs lead to more expensive platforms fielded in fewer numbers. The committee’s concerns extend to all three key components of the Acquisition process including requirements generation, acquisition and contracting, and financial management.”

Granted, the report was talking about how the DoD acquires weapons systems, but there are indications that other facets of federal acquisition in general are in need of improvement. In fact, Jaime Gracia suggested in a recent blog titled, “The Acquisition Workforce: Are We Going Backwards?”, that:

As the meat grinder of sequestration continues to move forward, the initiatives to improve and develop the acquisition workforce will more than likely come to a grinding halt, and move capabilities backwards at a time where forward movement is badly needed.

If these types of statements are true, then what do we do about it?

At GovLoop, our response to these situations is to learn what we can from our community, then create resources that respond to your stated needs…which is what we’re striving to do with our latest survey:

Acquisition Survey: What Are Your Challenges
and How Would You Improve Acquisitions?

(Full Link: http://www.surveygizmo.com/s3/1211308/Acquisition-Guide-Survey)

We’d appreciate it if you could share your anonymous insights in this 5-minute survey so that we can create tools and resources designed to help you do your job better and improve your organizational processes. Feel free to discuss this topic in the comments below as well.

Thank you in advance for your input!