The Digital Service teams being created throughout the government have already proven their ability to fix pertinent technical issues as agencies deliver citizen services using IT. However, those teams have been focused on delivering technical solutions and are rarely equipped to navigate the complex procurement process of the federal government.
In order to bolster the workforce in this particular area, the Office of Management and Budget and its Office of Federal Procurement Policy are offering a prize of up to $320,000 to anyone who can develop a training program focused on contracting for digital service needs.
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“The goal of this prize competition is to develop a Digital Service Contracting Professional Training and Development Program for the federal government, which will be used to add a digital service core-plus specialization for contracting professionals under the Federal Acquisition Certification in Contracting (FAC-C) Program issued by OFPP,” according to the official challenge announcement.
The challenge will roll out in three phases, beginning with submission of white papers describing an applicant’s unique training method and how it would be applied to contracting for digital services.
Three finalists from that pool will move on to Phase II, which includes a $20,000 award to begin designing a demo product. The demos will be field tested during one-hour mock training sessions and judged by a panel of federal senior leaders.
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The winner of Phase II will continue to the third and final stage. In the final mile, the winning proposal will be eligible for up to $250,000 to develop a pilot training program, with an additional $50,000 available if the program is ultimately successful and meets all of the government’s needs.
The winning training program will teach contracting officials four primary skills:
- Understand and procure digital services and supplies utilizing concepts such as those described in the Digital Services Playbook and the TechFAR (e.g, DevOps, UX, Design Services, Agile Software Development, Open Source, Cloud, Iaas, SaaS and PaaS);
- Appropriately measure the success of these contracts based on industry standards;
- Accurately describe and define the value received; and
- Encourage the use of commercial practices and innovative approaches (e.g. modular contracting, broad agency announcements, challenges and prizes) to ensure procurements can capture flexible and rapidly changing technology advancements.
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“The optimal comprehensive training and development program, intended for federal contracting professionals — specifically contracting officers and contract specialists — will enable them to understand and apply strategic thinking, industry best practices, market place conditions and appropriate acquisition strategies to the procurement of digital supplies and services,” the objective states. “An ideal training and development program will be no longer than six months in total and may include strategies such as rotational assignments, mentoring, in-classroom training and detail assignments woven into an innovative approach to accomplish the stated objectives.”
A detailed explanation of each phase and its requirements is available on Challenge.gov.
White papers for Phase I will be accepted through June 23.
