Is it better for government to have multiple contracts run by multiple organizations — or is it better to have one big government contract shop which can then drive down costs.
Tom Sharpe, the commissioner of GSA’s Federal Acquisition Service, clearly believes that it is the latter — and that GSA’s Federal Acquisition Service is just the place.
I got to moderate a panel hosted by the Association of Federal Information Resource Managers featuring Shape and the FAS leadership. During that session, Sharpe introduced the Federal Acquisition Marketplace, which he sees as a place where GSA provides unbiased advice — even if it comes from somewhere other than GSA; offers better contracts; and offers a wide spectrum of services.
Sharpe presented a video describing the Federal Acquisition Marketplace:
You can also see the slides he used during the presentation that further describes the Federal Acquisition Marketplace:
GSA’s big challenge is building trust. My argument is that multiple contracts enable innovation. The big problem right now is there is no cost for going alone. That needs to change, it seems. Maybe all contracts are governmentwide contracts — to be honest, the idea of specific GWACs seems antiquated to me and more of a difference without real meaning. Why not make all contracts GWACs and require that agencies who create their own contracts collect the additional data as GSA, NASA’s SEWP and NIH do… thus creating a cost incentive for playing together in the existing sandbox. If one comes up with a better idea, AWESOME — and they will be rewarded with additional business.
Some other coverage of the event:
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GSA unveils unified acquisition strategy [Federal Computer Week]
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GSA predicts new initiatives will light the path toward better governmentwide acquisition [Federal News Radio]
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