In case you missed it, the Department of Labor’s Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) has made complying with Affirmative Action Plan (AAP) filings a major focus area over the past several months. A new portal has been created through which covered contractors are required to submit their plans for government review. GSA sent out an Read more
Experienced contractors will often check with their contracting officer to ensure that some piece of work or business practice is acceptable. The reasoning is that the CO’s word is the official word on a matter involving a government contract. While this is a good general practice, more than one company has found itself in trouble, even though “the CO said it was ok.” There are multiple lessons contractors can learn from this. One is that CO’s are people, Read more
Welcome to the 4th quarter of the fiscal year. While some may say, “Let’s get ready to rumble”, hopefully most business will go smoothly. Here are three steps contractors should take now as we enter the most important part of the federal year.
1. Review Your Pipeline: Most companies start with a large pipeline of potential projects and then narrow them down over the course of the quarter as some get pushed into next year and others seem increasingly destined for other companies. Now is a great time to review your Read more
Small business proteges will now have to provide at least one example of their own past experience when teaming with a large mentor to make an offer for GSA’s POLARIS contract. The change was included in the updated RFP issued June 30th and was made in response to an earlier protest that the original language enabled all past performance to be provided by the large business partner. Now, such companies will be limited to providing three examples of their past performance. The change may seem like the agency continues to favor large Read more
Federal agencies everywhere are seeking to improve their customer experience (CX) performance. The Technology Modernization Fund recently allocated $100 million to several agencies to upgrade their technologies to better serve customers. While most actions in this area are targeted at improving the experience of taxpayers who interface with agencies, contractors, too, should consider themselves customers and encourage their federal counterparts to treat them as such. The classification of contractor-as-customer may best be understood at agencies like GSA that award contracts through which customers reach Read more