Recent criticisms of the acquisition process have leveled their focus on contracting officers—with many of the often-heard reproaches: Contracting officers are too bureaucratic; too rule-bound; too process-driven. They lack mission focus. 

For all those involved in affecting the acquisition process, and others who join in the criticism, these opinions (and others like it) seem to be obvious "facts," without need of in-depth research or analysis, which draw a simple conclusion—tighten the line on the contracting officers' functions and you'll "improve" the acquisition process. As with all other acquisition improvement initiatives, these proposed "solutions" will produce more legislation, regulation, policy, and the ever-popular solution of increased training.

This all seems almost too easy, and to a degree, one can see how it almost makes sense. In any given acquisition, the contracting officer is the one with specific authority in ultimate circumstances surrounding government contracting. As FAR 1.602-2 states:

Contracting officers are responsible for ensuring performance of all necessary actions for effective contracting, ensuring compliance with the terms of the contract, and safeguarding the interests of the United States in its contractual relationships. In order to perform these responsibilities, contracting officers should be allowed wide latitude to exercise business judgment. 

The logic in this argument revolves around the premise that, since contracting officers are granted such "wide latitude" in acquisitions, any delays or other failures in the acquisition process are the fault of contracting officers.

However, this suggests that successful, efficient, and expedient contract performance is the direct result of the role the contracting officer plays in the acquisition process. That is absolutely true—but such performance is not solely the direct result of the contracting officer's role. Acquisitions don't necessarily work like that. Whether understanding what specific product or service is needed, where it can be found, how it will be used, what technology must support it, how success will be measured, how success is defined, and what strategy is the best to utilize, the role of the contracting officer can become limited very quickly. Everything does not rest squarely on the contracting officer's shoulders—many others possess a multitude of responsibilities before and during all phases of any acquisition process. From program/project managers; technical, science, and logistics specialists; finance and budget experts; customers and users; engineers and IT experts; and especially senior organizational leadership—the success of any acquisition activity depends on the expertise of all of its parts, but particularly the leadership and functioning of the acquisition group as a whole. A supply chain is only as strong as its weakest link, and any weak links in the chain can result in failures. 

Each and every time responsibility (or blame) is affixed to the contracting officer when something goes wrong represents a missed opportunity to research what really did not work, which could lead to better insight into how to demonstrably "improve." No contracting officer has complete power to single-handedly delay, degrade, or (for that matter) "improve" program outcomes without plenty of help from those that should have or could have assisted in avoiding undesirable outcomes at any time and at any step in the process.  

If all stakeholders are affected by the effectiveness of acquisition, then all stakeholders must be invested in ensuring success. Blaming contracting officers should be interpreted as a lack of integrity—from the agency head that permits it all the way down to the surrounding cast of players that might have stepped in to prevent the failures in the first place, if only dedicated enough to the mission to do so.

A situation where a GS-13, 12, or less can be held responsible for major failures in delivering necessary products or services doesn't help change this view. Acquisition "takes a village." This starts with top leadership and includes all others overtly involved or subtly avoiding responsibility. If everyone avoids being part of the often dreaded designation of "acquisition workforce," who can credibly comment?  

In most agencies today, the acquisition workforce is virtually everyone! Nothing gets done in today's outsourced government without contracting, so every "link in the chain" must understand and adopt basic expertise in managing contracts and supporting all facets of pre- and post-award activities. The contracting officer is not the one who holds the chain—the contracting officer is nothing more than another link within it. 

Leadership, both at the top and in virtually all sub-tier organizations within the hierarchy, performs and is integral to effective acquisition. Therefore, let's admit that this is a team sport: Work together and stop the contracting officer blame game.

Michael P. Fischetti is the Executive Director of the National Contract Management Association. His earlier federal career includes time at the Defense and Energy departments, and the General Services Administration. 

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