Doan to speak Tuesday at conference

Lurita Doan, the new administrator of the General Services Administration, will speak Tuesday at the Coalition for Government Procurement’s Spring Conference. The coalition received her confirmation today.

“Apparently, they felt like this was good opportunity for her,” said Larry Allen, executive vice president of the coalition.

The coalition has 362 large and small businesses as members, many of which are major GSA contractors. Allen expects the news of Doan’s appearance will lead to a last-minute increase in the number of registrations for the conference in McLean, Va.

President Bush nominated Doan on April 6.The Senate confirmed her as administrator May 26, and she was sworn in May 31.

Doan reiterated her objectives as GSA’s leader at her Senate confirmation hearing as well as in a speech she gave at her oath-of-office ceremony.

She has said she will focus on:

“Together, we will restore GSA’s leadership as the premier contracting and service provider," she said at the swearing-in ceremony. "To be the best, we are going to need to improve all of our services and better understand and anticipate the requirements of our customers. But we can do it."

Doan’s interest in improving the GSA schedule contract system is important to many Coalition members who rely on schedule contracts for much of their revenue, Allen said.

“GSA can provide purchasing services quantifiably better, faster and save taxpayer’s dollars," she said at the confirmation. "GSA must do a better job of proving this and enable government agencies to refocus scarce management and contracting resources on their core issues."

Allen said it was easy to convince Doan to speak at the conference.

"I asked," he said.