Air Force considers contracting shuffle

The Air Force soon may be the first Defense Department organization to closely

ally its business managers with its front-line deal-makers under a plan

that would integrate the operations of the service's two leading information

technology organizations.

Discussions began last month about how to integrate the daily operations

of the Standard Systems Group, the Air Force's premier buyer of IT products

and services, and ACCWAY, an organization within the Air Combat Command

that has focused on re-engineering the entire IT life-cycle process.

The goal, according to officials, is to devise a system that leverages

the buying power of SSG with the management expertise of ACCWAY.

SSG charges a fee for the use of its contracts and uses the fees to

fund other activities within the organization. Its goal, therefore, is to

negotiate the best deals on behalf of its customers in the Air Force. SSG

offers more than 65,000 products.

SSG is one of DOD's Working Capital Fund organizations. Working Capital

Funds, or revolving funds, are special accounts into which money is deposited

for expenditure without regard to fiscal-year limitations. Congress must

authorize agencies to establish this type of fund.

But studying the potential impact of IT products on the business processes

of organizations has never been a part of SSG's charter. Instead, SSG's

mission has been to negotiate great deals at significant discounts by leveraging

the buying power of a large organization.

However, not every product that is made available to an Air Force IT

manager will necessarily work or benefit a particular enterprise, according

to an Air Force source, who wished not to be named. "We realize the need

to provide customers maximum choice of IT products, which the CIT-PAD is

continuing to do very well," the source said. "However, a crucial area that

must be addressed is the need to provide customers the assurance that what

they buy will work on the enterprise when they receive it." ACCWAY provides

that assurance, the source said.

Glenn Taylor, director of SSG's Commercial Information Technology Product

Area Directorate (CIT-PAD), said SSG tries to work closely with ACCWAY,

but more needs to be done. That process started last month when Air Force

CIO Lt. Gen. William Donahue held a meeting with SSG and ACC officials,

Taylor said.

"They've tried to re-engineer their business practices to reduce the

total cost of ownership of IT from requirements through disposal," Taylor

said. But ACCWAY does not offer the range of products that SSG does and

goes through SSG to buy most of its technology.

Some observers question the philosophy of Working Capital Fund initiatives

that give little thought to what products are needed by a department struggling

to define effective business processes.

A Pentagon source who wished not to be named said the secretary of the

Air Force staff is reviewing an SSG policy proposal that would make going

through SSG directly for IT products and services mandatory for 95 percent

of requirements. "That's not the right thing for the Air Force or for the

government," he said.

Although he does not see a need for an organization to acquire things

just for the sake of acquisition, Bob Guerra, president of Robert J. Guerra

and Associates, said SSG has helped drive people to use standards-based

products, and programs such as the Enterprise Software Inititative have

helped reduce costs at DOD.

Chip Mather, senior vice president of Acquisition Solutions Inc., a

federal procurement consulting company, said greater integration of SSG

and ACCWAY is a good idea. "It's not the PC, it's the integration of the

PC" that makes the difference, Mather said. "You need more centralization

and more skill," he said, referring to what acquisition professionals are

calling "centers of excellence" for contracting. "IT has to be bought on

a business case."

The business case is what ACCWAY offers the Air Force IT community,

according to the Air Force source. "Process re-engineering needs to take

place where the process is," he said. "You can't do it from 1,000 miles

away."