Being able to efficiently and effectively diagnose the health of an organization’s portfolio of contracts takes time and persistence. Earned Value Management (EVM), a project management technique for measuring project performance and progress, makes it possible. However, those in the federal sector, including EVM experts, need to do more to communicate its value for increased …
Continue reading “EVM – Communicating its value to the “big A” acquisition community”
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”
Imagine working in a high stress environment where contract support for a mission critical program may expire at the end of the month and there is no backup plan. Your organization had plans to re-compete the contract earlier in the fiscal year, but the procurement package or requisition was not developed on time. Several documents …
Continue reading “Procurement: Meeting the PALT in Four Simple Steps (UPDATE)”
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”
If you want to make your contract management more efficient and see greater returns on your investment of time and effort, standardization could be the solution you’re looking for. Contract management systems and technologies, standardized contract language, templates, best practices, and lessons learned can yield positive, measurable results in effectively and efficiently crafting, administering and …
Continue reading “Seven Steps to Implement Standardization in Contract Management”
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 digital age, we depend on our computers and devices for so much that we need to be constantly proactive to protect against cyber threats and attacks. Multiple studies show that government, corporations, and individuals are being increasingly targeted. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for example, said federal cybersecurity incidents were up …
Employing best practices in Task Order Solicitation Management processes can help Government respond to constant challenges throughout the acquisition life cycle, particularly the acquisition planning phase. The primary reason for using a coordinated effort to apply best practices among Government Program Managers, Contracting Officers, program officials, and industry stakeholders is to increase the probability of …
Continue reading “Successful Task Order Management – Start Early!”
There is an old saying, “the second act is the best” because it delves deeper into the meat of a story, including challenges and the rising actions in response to them. So it may be with the story of Government performance management. Federal Managers have seen many plot twists impacting governance since the early 90’s when …
Continue reading “Performance Management Act II – Overcoming Challenges”
