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Showing results for 'Meaning of Target and Desired in Solicitations'.
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👍 BTW, for all: What DOGE taught us about AI and federal workersNextgov.comWhat DOGE taught us about AI and federal workersCOMMENTARY | Mass layoffs have left thousands of federal workers unemployed and struggling to find their footing as AI accelerates disruption across the public sector.Also: When AI Forgets the Middle: A Hidden Risk for Proposal Ev...What Stanford research and David Timm's webinar tell us about why AI in source selection is harder than it looks ⏱️10–11 min read | 3 copyable AI prompts included I sat in on the Greg and Camille BaroAnd: Prompt Productivity: Using AI in Government Contract WorkExplore how government agencies are leveraging AI to boost efficiency in contracting processes, streamline workflows and redefine productivity in the public sector.And: The Transformative Power of AI in USG Procurementhttps://udayton.edu/law/government-contracting/articles/transforming-government-procurement-ai.php And:
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After reading today's Wall Street Journal and some other publications about the impact AI is having on white collar jobs, I have a question: Is there anything that a "procurement professional" (NCMA's beloved term) do that cannot be done faster and as well or better by AI? I've been experimenting, and the news is not good. The news is grim. How to live long and prosper. Any ideas?
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Thanks for the book recommendation, Vern: (The AI Prompt Playbook: Master AI Prompt Engineering with 140 Ready-to-Use Templates for ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini & Copilot (2026), by James Caldwell.) My copy will be here in two days.
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@Voyager This thread isn't about mastery of negotiation. Why don't you start one? Why haven't you done it already? In the very first post in this thread I asked: I haven't seen one yet. My own ideas are to (1) develop a deep understanding and appreciation of AI, (2) keep up with developments, and (3) become skilled at using it effectively. I've already provided one book title. Here's another: The AI Prompt Playbook: Master AI Prompt Engineering with 140 Ready-to-Use Templates for ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini & Copilot (2026), by James Caldwell. There's also the 2025-2026 GHATGPT Anthology by Ryan Lee, and a host of others. Well, good! So, how will you use AI to help you achieve mastery in negotiation? Have you thought about that? Any imaginative ideas? Survivors and victors use the tools available to them to adapt, improvise, and overcome when facing a challenge, and by all accounts, AI is a powerful tool. Have you bought the book I mentioned earlier in this thread? I asked AI: "Can you use AI to improve your negotiation skills?" Here is what it said: It referred me to the following Harvard University Law School Program on Negotiation daily blog link about how AI is Transforming Negotiation--"From Agent to Advisor: How AI Is Transforming Negotiation." PON - Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law SchoolFrom Agent to Advisor: How AI Is Transforming NegotiationAt the Program on Negotiation’s 2025 AI Negotiation Summit, negotiation and computer science experts from around the world described how AI tools can empower us to negotiate more effectively for ourseBut you knew about that, right? You came here to tell the rest of us. Right? Not just to complain about my fatalism. Right? See... If I were still working for the government I would be one of the 1102s who will live long and prosper. So would people like Don Mansfield and Matthew Fleharty and some others here. My fatalism is grounded in the realization that not everyone will be up to the challenge. Tell us about Harvard's program when you get a chance. Start a thread. Heck, start a business.
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Does anyone really think our duties of negotiation are just one big math problem into which no one puts enough effort? I doubt that you do. So why not think and discuss the mastery of negotiation more in this thread? Wifcon as a whole, if it were more secure, could have one big forum for discussing negotiations, but it doesn't; instead, it has a "contract award process" forum. Give that processing to the AIs, I say, and let us specialize instead. Negotiation is both where the career field excels for the American taxpayer and where the human mind teaches AI, through the mind's experiential learning and through its unique ability to correlate seemingly disparate concepts. AI LLMs can only learn what past humans have correlated and done, you see - human minds are on the cutting edge here. Negotiation is also where the AI can assist in the math and the rote tasks of documentation to free up the humans for abstract thinking. I don't know if your fatalism was "about the regulations" or if it was placed somewhere besides negotiations in the "contract award process", @Vern Edwards, but I have hope that I will yet become a master at the original federal job title I had: Contract Negotiator. The (uniquely human) competitive spirit that drives me to seek the best deal reasonably and graciously to both parties is what will drive me to that mastery.
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This thread began by citing a Wall Street Journal article and I'm curious if anyone saw the WSJ piece late last week about OpenAI solving an Erdős problem. A couple of interesting takeaways quoted from the piece: Why did AI succeed where humans failed? The first explanation is that this particular solution happens to be highly counterintuitive. Most people who tackled this problem tried to prove Erdős’s conjecture, rather than disprove it. Only by defying conventional wisdom and experimenting with seemingly improbable strategies did the model find an unexpected path forward. The second is that humans specialize while AI synthesizes. While mathematicians tend to focus on their specific areas of expertise, AI models use their vast knowledge to spot connections that we couldn’t possibly see ourselves. In this case, that meant pulling from both algebraic number theory and discrete geometry, which have about as much in common as the marathon and pole vault. The third explanation is that AI has time, attention, patience, focus and the persistence to stick with methods that humans might abandon—and the solution to this Erdős problem demanded it. “It’s the kind of idea that you try for a bit, it doesn’t work, and you think maybe you were just too hopeful,” said Mark Sellke, a Harvard statistician at OpenAI. “So you give up and move on.” AI doesn’t move on. It keeps plugging away without taking breaks to eat, sleep, answer emails, pick the kids up from school and watch the Knicks. And it can think coherently for so long that even an abridged version of the model’s “chain of thought” ran more than 75,000 words—the length of the first “Harry Potter” book. After reading it, a former OpenAI researcher did some back-of-the-envelope math and estimated it took less than 32 hours and $1,000 in tokens, a bargain for a result of this caliber. The researchers wouldn’t confirm the exact amount of time and compute, but described the costs as “really nothing crazy at all.”
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The story, "A Famous Math Problem Stumped Humans for 80 Years. AI Just Cracked It," was in the May 29 issue of the WSJ. According to the story: It is well-documented that it can take an agency a year or longer to award a simple contract, even without a bid protest.
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AI is going to take over most of the daily work of GS-1102s, and it is becoming faster, more capable, and more reliable with each passing day. AI will even be able to negotiate. Statutes and regulations will be revised accordingly. The age in which people wrote essays about "the role of the contracting officer" ended at least a decade ago. Even before now, that "role" had become greatly diminished from what it was when I started out. The 1102 career-field is going to be radically changed within the next few years. Far fewer of them will be needed. Why pay humans to cut and paste? There will be fewer opportunities for advancement, and many executives will be very glad to have fewer pain-in-the-neck humans to train and manage. PALT and bid protests will be greatly reduced, along with agency personnel costs. The same will be true of all paperwork jobs. (Lawyers are very worried.) Faux "contracting officers'"will remain for a while to provide token human review and oversight, but only those who are masters and who figure out how to use AI effectively will survive and prosper, and even they may not for long. My work, too, will go away, and so will this website. It's too bad, because I had a lot of great fun doing, teaching, and writing about contracting. But Capitalism is all about creative destruction. It's always looking to eliminate workers. That's been one of the keys to its continued success. And the Silicon Valley capitalists are the most relentless strivers in history in that regard. They're even cutting workers in their own companies. Why hire human coders when AI can write great code? So for GS-1102s, while it's not dark yet, it's getting there. (Dylan). Faster than they may realize. I would not be shocked if this presidential administration were to issue an OMB directive or even an executive order to that effect before it leaves office. In fact, I will be astonished if they don't. If you doubt any of this, read Co-Intelligence: Living and Working with AI (2024), by Ethan Mollick, a professor at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. If you want to extend you time a while, learn to write good AI prompts. Lots of books out there about how to do that. Don Mansfield tried to convince me of all this several years ago while we were riding to Politics & Prose Bookstore in a D.C. taxi, but I wouldn't hear it. I am now convinced. It's a done deal. There will be no appeal. I nostalgically wish I were wrong, but I'm not.
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I see from an 8 year old thread where I WAS aware of the GSA method used for (“construction manager”) CM@Risk construction contracts, where GSA was providing and responsible for the design. It uses a fixed-price incentive with successive targets FPI(ST) contract method, because the contractor doesn’t have control over the design development (maturity of the design) or design changes during design by the government. The “target price” equals the “ceiling price” as the guaranteed maximum price (GMP). For design-build projects, the contractor isn’t a construction manager at risk. The design-builder has sole responsibility for both design and construction. It is responsible to develop the design and responsible for the adequacy of the design. Therefore government provides and is responsible for the scope and design criteria. Therefore, it could be feasible for design-build to use FPI with Fixed Target rather than successive targets. The GMP is based upon the Target price equaling the Ceiling price. _____________________________ To answer Verns question above about what the naysayers said, I found the eight year old thread about the debate. I doubt that many or anyone would read it through. But I can summarize a couple of objections raised about using the method. For other than GSA’s CM@Risk procedures, the FPI method had never used a GMP based upon the target price. The typical FPI contracts were extremely over complicated. wifcon.com/discussion/index.php?/forums/topic/4083-must-a-fixed-price-incentive-contract-include-separate-target-and-ceiling-prices/page/3/ I don’t want to keep debating plus am no longer involved in the Design-Build Institute of America (DBIA) quest to implement GMP for federal design-build contracts under the regulations without seeking statutory revisions. General Zhukov said: “RFO :This update [to FAR Part 16] represents a deliberate shift from a restrictive to a permissive framework, empowering contracting officers to use novel and innovative contract structures ..." I meant to express pleasure that the RFO rewrite appeared to loosen restrictions on using contract types and methods other than those specific procedures described in the legacy FAR part 16.
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Even if we don’t want to admit it, we all simply click “accept” on all those different terms and conditions for software, despite not actually reading the actual terms. GAO in a recent decision reminded agencies and contractors to not let that habit happen when you read the terms of a procurement. In that recent GAO decision, there was a long history of protests, which resulted in an amendment to the solicitation. At first glance, the amendment and proposal revision restrictions tied to it may have made sense, but upon protest, GAO found the limitations on proposal revisions were improper, due to the amendment impacting more than the one factor which was open for revisions. Owl International Inc., B-423281.4 (April 24, 2026) has quite the procedural history, and contains three different protest grounds. There were multiple protests and corrective actions around the solicitation taken prior to this protest, but this specific protest focused on an amendment made by the Navy. The amendment made by the Navy to this solicitation removed FAR 52.222-46 (we discussed that clause here) from the solicitation and provided for limited proposal revisions to only the price portion of proposals. After having an agency level protest regarding this amendment and proposal revision limitation denied, Owl filed this protest at GAO. Owl alleged: (1) that removing that FAR provision from the solicitation was improper; (2) that if its removal was proper then limitations on proposal revisions was improper; and (3) that the solicitation was defective due to ambiguities. GAO sustained only on the second ground, which is that the proposal revisions allowed by the Navy were far too limited. We will focus on that protest ground here as it provides a good lesson for contractors. FAR 52.222-46 mainly focuses on compensation for “Professional Employees.” That provision states, among other things: “The compensation levels proposed should reflect a clear understanding of work to be performed and should indicate the capability of the proposed compensation structure to obtain and keep suitably qualified personnel to meet mission objectives. The salary rates or ranges must take into account differences in skills, the complexity of various disciplines, and professional job difficulty.” So, basically, this FAR provision focuses on compensation and whether prices are too low, but could call for technical and performance elements to be considered. It is tempting to say that this FAR provision would only effect price, but as the FAR implicates technical performance elements and the solicitation at issue called for compensation evaluations to interact with technical evaluations, Owl argued that this term’s removal necessitated revisions to both price and technical portions of the proposals. GAO agreed. When removing FAR 52.222-46 from the Solicitation, the Navy told offerors that they would only be permitted to revise their cost/price proposal. But as shown, the FAR itself actually may call for interaction with technical elements. Owl argued that the FAR and solicitation terms “directed offerors to focus resources . . . in order to maintain a stable professional workforce” and led to them proposing certain features in their technical proposal which furthered workforce stability. Owl explained that if that FAR wasn’t present in the solicitation, its technical approach would have changed, and thus all offerors should have been allowed to update their technical proposal along with the price proposal. GAO explained that under the solicitation: “FAR provision 52.222-46 directs offerors to submit with their proposals a total compensation plan . . . which the agency would evaluate to determine whether the offeror had proposed professional compensation that showed sound management and understanding of the contract requirements, whether the professional compensation would affect recruiting and retention, whether it was both realistic and consistent, and whether the proposed compensation levels were lower than those under the incumbent contract, and determine whether, ultimately, the agency will receive uninterrupted high-quality work.” Basically, that FAR provision and the solicitation’s structure made it to where that FAR provision hit on both technical and price elements of proposals. GAO went on to clarify (emphasis added): “In effect, the change allows an offeror additional options to propose a technical approach that the firm believes would make its proposal more competitive. An offeror could change aspects of its proposed professional compensation or staffing approach to be materially different from those used under the incumbent contract if the offeror believes doing so will achieve a more favorable technical evaluation and still provide a workforce with required professional and technical skills. While it is possible that an offeror would make no changes in response, Owl has submitted credible claims in arguing that, if permitted, it would have considered making several specific technical proposal revisions for that purpose.” Due to this, the Navy should have allowed revisions to both the price proposal and the technical proposal. GAO did clarify that, in the past, FAR 52.222-46’s removal did not always require an agency to allow technical proposal revisions, especially when the solicitation continues to provide for price realism evaluation. But while this solicitation had price realism in certain situations, it also had certain terms stating additional levels of evaluation, such as rates being fully burdened and the Navy would “evaluate the proposed scheduled labor rates for reasonableness and material balance.” If you do a deep read of this case, it can get quite technical as to the solicitation’s specifics and why GAO sustained the protest. But at its core, it has a clear message: if there is an amendment to a solicitation and proposal revisions, make sure the revisions match up with the extent of the impact of the amendment. In Owl, the Navy removed a term which on its face seemed focused on simply price, so they only allowed revisions to price. But Owl and the GAO noted that this FAR term’s removal from the solicitation had effects that reached other elements of a proposal which could not be revised under the Navy’s amendment. Thus, make sure you don’t just gloss over amendments to solicitations when they come out. Take the time to consider what impact an amendment could make on proposals. There could be grounds for a protest (for more on solicitation term protests, check out our blog here), or reason to reach out to your contracting officer for clarification. Of course, when trying to navigate the tricky waters of the FAR, solicitations, and protests, don’t hesitate to reach out to federal contracting lawyers, like us, for assistance before a protest deadline or opportunity passes you by. Questions about this post? Email us. Need legal assistance? Call us at 785-200-8919. Looking for the latest government contracting legal news? Sign up for our free monthly newsletter, and follow us on LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook The post GAO Recommends Practicing Mindfulness When Solicitation Terms Cover Multiple Evaluation Factors first appeared on SmallGovCon - Government Contracts Law Blog.View the full article
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More with less and time savings seems to be the end result right now as I read your entire post. So my question is what about quality and success? Or in other words are the acquisitions being measured beyond the PALT as to their success such as less modifications, disputes, timely completion, etc?
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If you had asked me this 2 years ago, I would have recommended that they read and study various regs and literature. Now, I am not so sure. I'd have them brush up on PM skills along with detailed IT skills. AI is pushing the requirement for knowledge of the FAR to the machines, who will do a lot of the thinking and processing. It's more about knowing the inputs than maybe even caring about the outputs.
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It's really sad that when asked to think deeply about a list of important questions, your first instinct was to ask AI to respond to the questions. AI is causing brain atrophy. I'm not exaggerating. - there have been studies to show that regular ChatGPT users have less brain activity than people who don't use it. The fatalism aspect of just accepting AI will be an important part of everything moving forward is a problem and needs to be pushed back on.
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One thing I can say is that AI won't "take" 1102 jobs outright. Instead, it will be a slow drip on the backend. Agencies simply won't make many new hires and attrition will shrink the current procurement workforce as older employees roll off. It may come to the point where those conducting procurement actions will have more knowledge of IT processes, than procurement processes. The procurement brains will be related to systems and the humans running said systems will need to know more about IT and inputs than FAR 15. I can see the 1102 series being drastically changed to requirement more technical engineering backgrounds. I've said it before and I will say it again - AI is changing the procurement world by the week. What once took days to draft a specific memo or document, now takes minutes at most (and the quality is usually damn good and improving by the hour). AI is going to be something beyond just a tool in the box, or a crutch to have. It will be making full-scale system-wide decisions in short order. When a division procuring say, IT supplies once had 23 people....will eventually only need 8. So much more will be done with so fewer people. Doubt it at your own peril, but I am seeing firsthand what it can do in procurement shops.
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@Motorcity What do you think people should do who are early-career or mid-career?
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In October 2025, the SBA suspended an 8(a) Program contractor called ATI Government Solutions, LLC (ATI) after suspension under the FAR. ATI appealed the 8(a) suspension, and the decision shows that SBA must still support its actions with adequate evidence, and reasonable argument linked to that evidence. OHA remanded the suspension matter for more documentation from SBA. In ATI Gov’t Sols., LLC, SBA No. BDPT-728 (May 18, 2026), OHA considered the suspension of ATI. SBA had begun an investigation into ATI back in October of 2025. On October 21, 2025, SBA’s Suspension and Debarment Official (SDO) had suspended ATI under FAR 9.407 based on the statements of a contract manager that, among other things “ATI uses its 8(a) status to act as a ‘pass-through’ for other businesses that would otherwise be ineligible for 8(a) awards” and “ATI routinely does not meet the limitations on subcontracting requirements on its 8(a) contracts.” FAR 9.407 deals with suspension of contractors across the executive branch, rather than just through the 8(a) Program, based on “adequate evidence, pending the completion of an investigation or legal proceedings, when it has been determined that immediate action is necessary to protect the Government’s interest.” FAR 9.407-1. One example is fraud in connection with obtaining or performing contracts. FAR 9.407-2. SBA’s SDO also questioned if “ATI may have made false statements to SBA and other government agencies” and “these statements also call into question ATI’s 8(a) eligibility, whether ATI meets the required performance of work and distribution of profits on all 8(a) contracts, and whether ATI complies with SBA’s Mentor-Protégé program.” “The SDO found that immediate need existed to suspend ATI and the individuals and that it was not in the Government’s best interest to do business with ATI and the individuals.” On October 23, 2025, the SBA, in a parallel move, suspended ATI from the 8(a) Program under 13 C.F.R. § 124.305. This was based on multiple reasons, including: ATI acts as a “pass-through” in connection with “other businesses that would otherwise be ineligible for 8(a) awards”; “ATI routinely does not meet the limitations on subcontracting requirements on its 8(a) contracts”. SBA “concluded that as a result of these statements, ATI may have falsely obtained 8(a) certification and 8(a) contract awards.” On appeal, ATI argued that SBA based its suspension on inadequate evidence, “based solely on uncorroborated and unverified hearsay statements allegedly made, and later recanted, on a hidden camera by a former short-term employee with no personal knowledge of Petitioner’s compliance with 8(a) Program requirements or the applicable terms and regulation in 8(a)) government contracts.” OHA requested that SBA file “a refutation of all material facts and arguments that SBA believes are in dispute” and an Administrative Record with all relevant documents. In response, SBA submitted “one document, a copy of the October 21, 2025, letter suspending Petitioner and the individuals under FAR 9.407.” In summary, SBA argued that ATI had been suspended under “FAR 9.407-2(a)(3) and ineligible for contract awards. A FAR suspension is adequate evidence for an 8(a) BD program suspension.” OHA considered whether SBA had properly submitted the Administrative Record to support the 8(a) suspension, and concluded it had not. SBA argued that submitting the FAR suspension letter was sufficient. However, OHA examined the SBA suspension letter and found it wanting. OHA noted: The Suspension at issue does not mention the October 21st FAR suspension at all, let alone rely upon it as the reason for the Suspension. The Suspension states clearly that the reason for the Suspension is the statements made by Petitioner’s employee. However, the Agency Response here does not mention these statements and makes no effort whatever to substantiate them or to rely upon them as reasons for the Suspension. The Agency has thus stated on appeal a completely different justification for its action than that given at the time it was issued OHA held that “The reasons for the suspension are absent from the Administrative Record as presented by the Agency here. Therefore, I must REMAND this case to SBA for a new submission providing a new, sufficiently complete administrative record to conduct a meaningful review.” The record must include all documents that the SBA relied on, including videos. The ATI decision demonstrates that OHA will look closely at SBA’s decisions with regards to actions like suspension of companies under the 8(a) Program. SBA must base its actions on adequate evidence, and argument linked to that evidence. We will continue to monitor this decision as it reflects on both the SBA, the 8(a) Program, and how the federal government must justify its actions. Questions about this post? Email us. Need legal assistance? Call us at 785-200-8919. Looking for the latest government contracting legal news? Sign up for our free monthly newsletter, and follow us on LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook The post Back to the Drawing Board: SBA OHA Overturns Suspension of 8(a) Contractor first appeared on SmallGovCon - Government Contracts Law Blog.View the full article
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I often repeat myself. What the EO overshadows and the continuing discussion points to in my view is that neither the EO, nor the RFO fulfills "Promoting Efficiency, Accountability, and Performance in Federal Contracting". What will is lazer focus on maintaining a quality and adequately staffed acquistion workforce. My conclusion is supported in part by the discussion of GMP contracts. While they can be successful they can and do result in litigation. Vern mentioned this of sorts in noting the history of construction contracts as a whole. A great GMP contract is only as good as the negotiation and resulting administration of it. New statutes, legislation and regulation will do nothing to enhance Federal contracting unless it deals directly with the eroding acquisition workforce.
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No. Not to comprehend in depth. Not only new 1102s, but many contracting officers, as well. Regulations (and government contracts based on them) are a species of legal writing that one must have proper education to properly interpret and fully understand. The government does not give its 1102s that kind of education. They must seek it on their own by reading books and cases. Even then, they may need the help of well-trained attorneys. But regulatory interpretation can be learned. See, e.g., Inside Regulatory Interpretation by Christopher J. Walker, attached. And see Administrative Law, 7th ed., by Funk and Seamon, 7B, Interpretation of Rules. Inside Regulatory Interpretation.pdf
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Well, I was talking about acquisition efficiency, not quality. And I had in mind a very specific example when I wrote that -- my agency was in the process of seeking a class deviation for contract type when we moved from OldFAR to NewFAR. Now we don't need a deviation. With that stated, I wouldn't die on this hill defending NewFAR. I think NewFAR is more or less a net neutral from an efficiency perspective. In fact, but for the dubious process OMB took to implement it (which Don has called out), I'd say the most remarkable part of NewFAR is the lack of impact it will have on most agencies and practitioners.
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Here is how the American Institute of Architects (AIA) describes the Guaranteed Maximum Price contract: Now, what else might we call that arrangement? Learn - ACD OperationsGuaranteed Maximum Price (GMP) Contracts: A Complete Guid...Everything you need to know about Guaranteed Maximum Price (GMP) contracts—how they work, owner and contractor risks, savings provisions, and relevant AIA documents.In the attached article from The Nash & Cibinic Report, published in 2018, I said: For centuries, contracting parties have fought over who must pay for what? What we call "contract types" are the products of those conflicts. CONTRACT TYPES There Are More Things In Heaven And Earth Judge Than Are Dreamt Of In The FAR.pdf
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Thanks, Vern. The basic problem in our discussion eight years ago was the result of certain government organizations not accepting a contract type (or any for that matter) that wasn’t specifically described in FAR part 16. As it turns out, my proposed Guaranteed Maximum Price (GMP) contracting method was already being used by GSA more than eight years ago for certain Construction Manager at Risk (CM@risk) programs . For GSA, the government would provide and be responsible for the design, which would be developed and finalized after hiring the CM@risk. In my scenario, for Design-build programs, the design-build contractor provides and is responsible for the design of the project after award. The GMP contracting method that I described is essentially the same as one approach that the Design-Build industry uses for many non-government programs and is promoted by the DBIA. The DBIA asked me, as a member of the DBIA’s Government Design-Build Programs Committee, to show how GMP could be used in appropriate circumstances for federal government design-build contracting.
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Don't give the RFO so much credit. The old FAR wasn't that restrictive. Contracting officers have long been able to come up with novel contractual arrangements. Think of the award fee incentive, which the Navy invented in 1962, long before it was expressly authorized in the ASPR. The Navy also invented the FPI(F) incentive arrangement. Think of the award fee contract with rollover. Think of the CPIF contract with negative fee. Think of the award term incentive. Think of task order contracts, which I used for R&D in an Air Force weapon system program office long before the Federal Acquisition Streamlining Act (FASA). Almost all contract types other than FFP and CPFF were field experiments before they were officially recognized. Acquisition practitioners should study the history of their field. For a wide-ranging history of experiment and development in contract types and pricing during and after World War II see Miller, Pricing of Military Procurements, Yale University Press, 1949. (Out of print, but available in some university libraires and at the Library of Congress. I bought a used copy years ago.) If you really want to understand today's policies and the recent Executive Order, read Government War Contracts by J. Franklin Crowell, Oxford University Press (1920), about what happened during WWI. (Out of print, but available used at Amazon.com.) If all you know about government contract types is what you've read in FAR Part 16, then your education has been limited and underfed. The literature about them is massive. For those who would like to be in charge of policy one day, you gotta read more or you'll just produce more stupid policies. "Full and open" competition? One of the costliest policies ever imposed in terms of both lead time and litigation. And I have not seen any evidence that it reduces costs and improves quality.
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(On)? If yes then that is my point. It takes more "manpower" to administer other than FFP contracts no matter who provides it. The EO in my view is an attempt to solve an unfolding dilemma of a shrinking workforce that supports and conducts contract admin. Whether a CO, DCMA or those in the world "of other duties as assigned.".
