Yesterday, the Office of Management and Budget released the Annual Report on the Federal Acquisition Workforce (FY2007) announcing a 7% increase in acquisition related employees (1,826 individuals) over the last six years. This report is provided to assist public-sector managers in anticipating human capital related trends and issues. The reality is, in the short term, the acquisition workforce is growing but not as quickly as the volume of dollars spent (see Chart #1 below).

Chart #1

Source: OMB, FIA report, INPUT Analysis

When we apply this information to the shift in acquisition methodology, questions arise regarding U.S citizen's "bang for the buck." Current trends in how the federal government procures include:

• The technology community has seen a 20% decrease in open market competition over the last five years
• This 20% decrease represents a shift of those dollars to task order vehicles, moving from 13% of total spending in 2002 to approximately 33% in FY2006
• GSA Schedule utilization within the technology sector has remained flat at approximately 18% of total spending over the last five-years

The rational heard from public sector administrators for this shift includes; faster acquisitions, decrease in the level-of-effort to procure specific goods/services, increased utilization of lower-cost economies of scale buys as well as more streamlined competition capability. All of these facts, taken together, beg the questions:

1. With a larger workforce today coupled with a more streamlined procurement process, are these vehicles offering the tax payers a more efficient use of the citizen dollar to set-up, administer and use?
2. Is the lack of pre-solicitation visibility to how federal funds are being utilized actually producing the cost saving?

Additional Information can be found in FCW's Article: Report: Acquisition workforce increases