No one wants to wake up one morning and find that the federal business in which they invested is no longer possible because new rules they were “too busy” to notice were enacted.  Federal contractors grow their business based on a series of business assumptions, at least some of which had to do with the regulatory framework in place at the time.  News flash:  Those regulations don’t stay the same over time.  No matter how busy a company is, someone must be responsible for tracking legislative and regulatory changes that can significantly impact your government business.  Industry must take the time to look up from its current project to see what’s coming.  This point was underscored this week at the ACT IAC Imagination Nation conference.  Federal speaker after federal speaker practically begged industry to comment on new rules impacting supply chain management, cybersecurity, sustainability and more.  Indeed, there are a host of new rules in the development process that could increase company costs, restrict competition, and make it more difficult to sell to federal clients.  While industry can’t stop all of these, that doesn’t mean they can’t slow down some or change the content of others that would truly not be in the best interests of contractors or their government customers.  Never assume that your government partner understands the business impact of new rules.  Government agencies have their own set of priorities and they rely on industry to offer their perspective.  Taking an active part in shaping the government procurement market used to be part and parcel of what responsible government contractors did.  Somewhere along the way, though, too many stopped looking and just added the cost of rules to their business operations or, in the case of commercial suppliers, just left the market.  When your government customer asks you to take the time necessary to comment on rules, treat that as a business request like you would if it were an RFP or RFQ.  You have nothing to lose but the business you’ve built.  By the way, there are people out there who can help with this.