Build an Innovative Procurement Workforce

Build an Innovative Procurement Workforce

Background

No matter how good a policy may be on paper, it will not be effective
without wellmotivated, competent people to implement it. Finding,
training, and retaining these people will allow the federal government
to move the procurement culture from one of doggedly following rules and
procedures to one that encourages the use of more discretion through
guiding principles. By law, the Administrator, Office of Federal
Procurement Policy (OFPP), can foster and promote professionalism of the
governmentwide procurement workforce through the Federal Acquisition
Institute located in the General Services Administration (GSA).1

The core procurement workforce of general business, purchasing, and
contracting personnel has increased by 25,000 since 1980, from 42,000 in
that year to 67,000 in 1992. While the procurement workforce has grown,
average governmentwide productivity has declined. Contract expenditures
per contract specialist were $9.4 million in 1980 (in 1992 dollars), but
only $6.3 million in 1992.  This is only an approximate measure of
performance. However, it is indicative of an increasingly complex
procurement process. The core procurement workforce is only a small
proportion of the total of 142,000 that also includes people working in
supply depots and other logistics functions. The total procurement
workforce exceeds 6 percent of the total federal workforce!2

It is important to consider both the quantity and quality of the
procurement workforce. Following are highlights from more than a decade
of data on federal contract specialists.3

-- Roughly twothirds of all hires for the contracting profession have
come from internal placement or promotion of personnel from clerical,
technical, and other such fields. By comparison, few have been recruited
from sources external to the government (e.g., recent college
graduates).

-- Throughout the 1980's, 10 percent of the contract specialists on
average left the profession every year. In the 1990's, however, turnover
slowed to a loss rate of just 7 percent.

-- Because of the relatively high past turnover of 10 percent and the
large net growth in the profession, a number of contract specialists are
relatively inexperienced. As of September 1992, 47 percent of the
contracting workforce had less than seven years of experience in their
jobs.

-- Only 53 percent of the contract specialists have graduated from a
college or university with a bachelor's or postgraduate degree. Sixty
percent of these college graduates majored in business, law, or public
administration.

Given this data, the longterm challenge facing procurement executives is
to take the large number of relatively inexperienced personnel and equip
them with the professional skills and knowledge necessary to act
competently as agents for the government in their contractual dealings
with the private sector.

Need for Change

     Improving the procurement process requires improving the workforce.
One of the consequences of a procurement system dominated by rigid rules
versus guidelines is that most procurement people are experts in
contractingthat is, processinstead of buying, which connotes market and
product expertise. The change in overall policy from rigid rules to
guidelinesfrom centralized to decentralized authoritywill require a
major shift in the procurement skills mix. A better trained, more
capable workforce will give improved support to line managers. Steps
must therefore be taken to authorize a comprehensive, governmentwide
program of procurement workforce improvement to identify, develop, and
retain highquality personnel. This program is needed to meet the
staffing requirements in procurement organizations, encourage employees
who desire a procurement career to develop their decisionmaking and
customer service skills and abilities, and stimulate employees to engage
in selfdevelopment activities.

The performance of the procurement workforce continues to be questioned.
A recent Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) report concludes that
while the quality of the workforce is generally good, it is not keeping
pace with the demands placed upon it by an increasingly complex
procurement process. The report notes that supervisors believe employees
need to innovate more.  Finally, the MSPB report recommends that
procurement officials receive additional training to ensure that they
are fully competent.4

The Secretary of Defense was recently given authority by Congress to
specially manage the defense acquisition workforce.5 Included in this
legislation were specific criteria for ensuring a standard of education
and experience for people entering the contracting field as well as
other acquisition occupations.  Highly qualified procurement personnel
are needed in civilian agencies, as well as in defense agencies. In the
words of a General Accounting Office study of contract administration in
civilian agencies, "The contracting deficiencies that we identified
generally resulted from people failing to properly carry out their
responsibilities, rather than from a need for additional rules and
regulations governing what should be done when writing or administering
contracts."6

Endnotes

1. See Office of Federal Procurement Policy Act (41 U.S.C.  405).

2. Data based on Fiscal Year 1992 provided by Office of Management and
Budget, Office of Federal Procurement Policy. The 142,000 figure
excludes 20,000 supervisors.

3. General Services Administration, Federal Acquisition Institute,
Federal Acquisition Workforce Fiscal Year 1991 (Washington, D.C.,
September 1992).

4. U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board, "Workforce Quality and Federal
ProcurementAn Assessment," July 1992.

5. Title XII of Public Law 101510, Defense Authorization Act, added a
new Chapter 87 on Defense Acquisition Workforce Improvement to Title 10
U.S.C. to establish policies and procedures for the effective and
uniform management of the workforce in the Department of Defense.

6. U.S. General Accounting Office, Civilian Agency Procurement:
Improvements Needed in Contract Administration, GGD89109 (Washington,
D.C.: U.S. General Accounting Office, September 1989), pp. 3334.