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Tools used to track active contracts

DHS and GSA apparently have success with PRISM. DoD is starting to use it as well. You might have your technical experts contact DHS for advice.

By formerfed · Friday at 08:35 PM1 day
Tools used to track active contracts

I'm curious to know whether anyone has experience using PRISM for workload tracking. My office is in the process of converting from our trusty Excel-based trackers to PRISM, and it's not going well -- big gaps in the data we need, wonky presentation, and extreme latency.
Anyone have a similar or different experience with PRISM?

By FrankJon · Friday at 06:30 PM1 day
Tools used to track active contracts

To answer the question: Yes. We have all these fancy tools and filling them in daily/weekly/monthly becomes a significant part of the job. Then no one ever looks at the tools themselves, so you get one-off data calls that are already answered by looking in the tool. Then a persistent comment at your weekly or monthly staff meeting is to update the information in the tool. All of this to give management a feeling that they are managing something.

Back in my SES days, I really tried hard to find the information myself before asking a staff member for it. The amount of work (and sometimes panic) that comes with a data call is massive. There is so much information already at your finger tips that you rarely need to ask if you try to know where to look. Even something basic like usaspending.gov will give you basic information on the project, vendor, obligation, POP, and outlays.
(As an aside, I read a long article about Skunk Works yesterday. They were able to field an SR-71 prototype in fewer than 200 days. Amazing.)

By KeithB18 · Friday at 03:58 PM1 day
Should 8(a) Set-Aside Program Be Terminated or Refined?

I am already done with this view. Watched a report from a national outlet who proclaimed the audit was with regard to the "8(a) loan program" of SBA. Others get it I realize but all the same I think general interest and knowledge equals the small impact of the program on Federal acquisition.
A link follows of an example of sort. It is from 2018. And I would offer without further research that such an analysis has undoubtedly been performed since the inception of the Program yet the Program still survives. https://dair.nps.edu/bitstream/123456789/1602/1/SYM-AM-18-087.pdf
So maybe as a business development program questionable in creating firms that are sustainable. But then again I have the experience of knowing a person whose business was a part of the program and whose business no longer exists but the individual was successful otherwise. Maybe the measure is one akin to a college degree. A business development program that gives support in developing knowledge, skills and abilities and all, after a businesses demise, is applied otherwise. Like a person that got a degree in accounting and wanted to be a CPA and is now a successful cattle rancher. With the next question being - Is the 8(a) Program investment good anyways?
As I already noted rhetorical questions when it comes to the current chaos.

By C Culham · Thursday at 07:03 PM2 days
Should 8(a) Set-Aside Program Be Terminated or Refined?

This comment reminded me of a great thing we did a long time ago. This was when no dollar ceiling limit existed for 8(a) sole source. This was also when agencies needed to require a delegation of procurement authority from GSA to purchase IT hardware.
My agency, CBP, needed to buy a mainframe computer system, acquire space for a data center, and recruit a large number of employees to operate everything. We were faced with at least a three year timeframe to do it all. We got the idea to have an 8(a) accomplish it all through a contract for facility management operations. The contractor would conduct a competitive procurement for the mainframe, acquire space, and operate everything for us using their own employees. We simply paid for it all as a service contract.
It turned out everything was up and running in one year and below budget.

By formerfed · Thursday at 06:37 PM2 days

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Tools used to track active contracts

Tools used to track active contracts

Tools used to track active contracts

Should 8(a) Set-Aside Program Be Terminated or Refined?

Should 8(a) Set-Aside Program Be Terminated or Refined?

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