GSA Professional Service Key Initiatives and Updates
On Federal News Radio’s “Off the Shelf” program, earlier this month, Tiffany Hixon, the Professional Services Category Executive at the General Services Administration (GSA) Federal Acquisition Service (FAS), shared her vision on the upcoming changes to the FAS management of it’s professional services platforms and some of the challenges faced in providing better professional services and supplies to both Federal agencies and customers.
A More Methodical Approach
Ms. Hixon serves as the Regional Commissioner for Region 10 at FAS, and heads the Professional Services at GSA. She recommends a more methodical approach for changes to the GSA Professional Services schedules, so that industry players coming from diverse categories can best price, purchase and acquire contracts. These changes include:
- Improving the enterprise level organization
- Increasing Industry outreach by having more discussions with stakeholders
- Consolidating information across platforms for customers and contract holders
Additionally, she suggests that Professional Services such as MOBIS, FABS and OASIS, may be organized under the auspices of one group to streamline their management at an enterprise level. And to achieve this, she highlights some major policy initiatives such as reviews of pricing contracts, standardization of labor categories, overhaul of workload management, and collection of prices paid data.
She also talks about developing a “virtual hallway” where acquisition professionals can find all the information they need in one online space (such as, best practices information, how to price and scope projects, SOW examples, etc.). Some of the challenges associated with these changes include:
- What works best for FAS Contracting Officers so they can track awards using one professional services schedule?
- How to best update the SIN structure under the new consolidated schedule?
- What should and should not be included in the consolidated schedule?
- How to best address any gaps in services?
Industry Outreach
Look for GSA to schedule their first customer round table discussions to continue collecting feedback and for further discussions with industry associations and customer agencies as their structural overhaul evolves.
About BH Sky
BH Sky Associates, based in Princeton, New Jersey, and Washington, D.C., helps clients identify, negotiate, secure, market and manage procurement opportunities and government contracts at all levels. It is New Jersey’s only company specializing in GSA/VA Schedule Contracts and Government Market Intelligence. BH Sky offers professional consulting services to small and mid-size companies in a wide range of industries seeking to do business at all levels of government. For more information, view our videos or contact us directly by phone 866.468.7420 or email.