This is the final part of a four-part interview series with Section 809 Panel’s Chair, Dave Drabkin who talks with Integrity about the urgent and important need to improve Defense (and Federal) Acquisition. To read prior parts of this series, please click here for part 1, here for part 2 and here for part 3. …
Continue reading “Making the FAR Sing to Execute Work Quickly”
This is part 3 of a four-part interview series with Section 809 Panel’s Chair, Dave Drabkin who talks with Integrity about the urgent and important need to improve Defense (and Federal) Acquisition. To read part 1 and/or part 2, please click here for part 1 and here for part 2. Dave, when you presented the …
Continue reading “No Need to Wait (Practical Ways to Improve Acquisition Fast)”
Section 809 Panel’s Chair, Dave Drabkin talks acquisition innovation with Integrity in an exclusive four-part interview series about the urgent and important need to improve Defense (and Federal) Acquisition. The four-part series will feature discussion around: the recent completion of the Section 809 Panel’s work, including any twists and turns along the way from inception …
Continue reading “Innovation in Acquisition: A Clarion Call”
The original version of this blog was posted Aug. 5, 2014, written by Patricia Miller. Now, four years later, one of Integrity’s program managers, Dan Altobelli, revisits the ever-relevant topic. Read on for some industry standards from Patricia, and some updated must-dos from Dan. Even though it’s the dog days of summer in the “real world,” it’s …
Continue reading “Blog Revisit: Crossing the Acquisition Package Finish Line”
In Part I of my blog, I discussed the need to be able to measure performance to ensure the product performs as required and processes are functioning properly to correct prior deficiencies. I teed up the challenges associated with measuring performance in a service environment with the simple example of a restaurant dining experience. The issue …
Continue reading “What Is Quality and How Is It Achieved In a Service Environment – Part Two”
“Quality” may be one of the more over-used and least-thought-about words in our business vernacular. We’ve gone through cycles where we used different terms to characterize our attempts to “do” quality better. Remember Total Quality Management? How about the focus on ISO 9000? And more recently, “Six Sigma,” “Lean,” and “Agile” have emerged as concepts …
Continue reading “What Is Quality and How Is It Achieved In a Service Environment? – Part One”
Facing an aging workforce, the question of how to train the next generation of acquisition professionals is a challenge that federal leaders and industry managers have yet to solve. The need for training is great, but budgets and time are often limited. Senior government procurement executives and practitioners say agencies have cut training dollars even …
Continue reading “Acquisition Workforce Training – Rethink Your Approach”
In this time of tight budgets and potential loss of global technological superiority, the need for innovation is greater than ever. As Frank Kendall, Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics shared with an audience of defense industry leaders recently, “We have to focus more on innovation, and we have to get better capability …
Continue reading “3 Tools Worth Reading to Spur Innovative Federal IT Acquisition”
Your team may have spent hours and hours considering the program management, risk management and quality assurance issues involved in letting a new government contract. But have you pulled the key information about how that contract will be managed into a single plan? A Contract Management Plan (CMP) is one of the primary tools the …
Continue reading “With A Great Contract Management Plan, The Sky is the Limit”
You manage or are part of a project and decide to add additional features or functionality to the product or service you provide. You think it will please the customer and make the team look good. But what if it slows the project, adds costs or isn’t what’s needed? There is a proper and an …
