Preface

From afar, the federal government may seem pervasive but unreachable. Opportunities appear to abound. Government websites post solicitations for procurements the size of a small nation’s gross domestic product; articles proclaim that the government spends millions of dollars every second of every day. Surely, many technology executives wonder in frustration, why can’t their company get just a few minutes’ worth?

That vision of the federal government as a shimmering pool of money is indeed an illusion. But, when one fantasy gets shattered by reality, many executives construct a new one: the federal government as impenetrable labyrinth. Many companies stay hopelessly lost for years within such a maze of ignorance.

What both fantasies share is a disconnect from the reality of how and why the federal government buys information technology. Explaining both matters is why we wrote this book. Our hope is that we can raise the level of discourse between government and industry—and shave years off the learning curve of those seeking to play a meaningful role in this highly regulated market.

At the start of writing, we had our own illusions. Two people, we thought, who had spent most their professional lives studying and selling to the federal government could finish this project in less than a year. It took us close to three.

The reason is that we were determined to do our best to not let ambiguities creep in, to keep picking at generalizations until we could decompose them into certainties. Some things we thought we knew required additional research to understand fully, and in some cases, the more we researched a topic the more the ambiguity grew; sometimes there just is no certainty.

Also, no matter how complex things got, our objective was to lay out the mechanics and mores of the federal IT market in an accessible way. Just because something is complicated doesn’t mean it can’t be sorted through and understood.

Based on what we learned along the way, we hope this book will find an audience not just with the contractor IT community but within the government IT community. Like us, there may be federal IT professionals whose knowledge can be deepened or refreshed.

We organized the book to give in the first two chapters a big picture about what the government is about and how its processes work—to answer the why and give an overarching description of the how. Starting in Chapter 3, we get technical; most of this book is dedicated to explaining the how in detail. Why the government buys is often directly related to how it buys, so the more you know more about the latter, the more successful you’ll be.

Chapters 3 through 9 focus on topics that are fundamental to understanding the federal IT market. Chapters 10 and 11 cover two specialized topics: General Services Administration schedules contracts and small business contracting and subcontracting. Chapter 12 delves into the federal budget process from a practical standpoint. Where the money comes from also affects how it’s spent.

In the course of writing, we spoke with many individuals deeply immersed in the federal IT market; we have scattered their insights liberally throughout. We conducted nearly all interviews on the basis of nonattribution and as a result, some of what our interviewees said looks like it comes from us. Without our sources’ help, this would be a much less useful book. We hope the final product is worthy of their time; any defects are wholly ours.

A disclaimer: Please do not consider anything in this book to be legal advice. Each situation involves a unique set of facts that must be weighed by someone familiar with the nuances and their interpretations. In addition, this book must necessarily be a snapshot in time. The federal procurement system, although built on a bedrock of principles, isn’t static. In some places we have noted that the facts are valid “as of this writing” and leave it to future editions to note the outcome of a proposed change. Those editions, too, will have to make note of matters yet undecided—there will never come a point when federal acquisition isn’t undergoing some reform.

The things the federal government does on a day-to-day basis are important, and it can’t do them without the private sector. The government is genuinely open to new companies that share that belief, propose ideas and solutions that offer real value, and seek to become partners in its technology efforts. We hope you find that reading this book is a step in that direction.

Dave Perera
Steve Charles
September 2012