Project 38: The Future Of Federal Contracting

How much stress on the system is created by the so-called “need for speed” with regard to advanced technology adoption and deployment in federal agencies?In this episode of Project 38, we pick up on the second half of Senior Staff Writer Ross Wilkers’ discussion with a pair of chief technology officers at federal systems integrators on the right methodologies to help government customers wanting to shrink timelines from years to months and sometimes weeks.Peder Jungck of BAE Systems Inc.’s intelligence and security sector and Cameron Chehreh of Dell Federal conceded that the shift does create stress on the system, but also explain ways to work through it.Wilkers closed the conversation by asking Jungck and Chehreh for their views on the global computer chip shortage that has disrupted substantially the entire economy, plus what that could mean for the federal technology landscape and the future global supply chain.

Eighteen months ago, Sagewind Capital began a series of deals that have led to the creation of the newest mid-tier company in the market – Axient. Led by CEO Patrick Murphy the company is poised for more deals as it pursues opportunities that require systems integration, digital engineering, software development and the development of complex systems.Murphy explains to Editor Nick Wakeman the strategy behind the acquisitions as well as the kind of contracts and customers the company will pursue going forward. The growth will come from more acquisitions as well as expanding the work it does with the Army, Air Force, NASA and Missile Defense Agency.As larger entity, Axient will now be chasing larger contracts as it also looks to close more acquisitions. Murphy predicts the next deal could come before the end of the years.

Whether in government or the commercial world, technology investments don't happens without having the right financial model in place and the right policy tools to manage those resources.This two-part episode of Project 38 has a pair of chief technology officers at federal systems integrators lend their insight and perspective to Senior Staff Writer Ross Wilkers on those matters and how they see a new budget environment impacting how agencies decide on their priorities.Peder Jungck of BAE Systems Inc.’s intelligence and security sector and Cameron Chehreh of Dell Federal see how those dynamics play out first-hand in their work with customers and also each other given their companies are industry partners.For part one, Jungck and Chehreh emphasized that key word of “partnership” and how the current situation of work remaining of a different cadence during the pandemic has put more emphasis on collaboration by everyone.

Federal contractors have long touted their need and desire to embrace new methods of working with customers and employees, some of which have been accelerated during the pandemic and only becoming clearer just as the end appears near.This episode of Project 38 focuses on some of those changes that are here to stay as seen by Kevin Greer and Kyle Tuberson, respectively vice president of consulting services at CGI Federal and public sector chief technology officer at ICF.At the core of this discussion was the relationship between technology and consulting, which challenges companies to offer agencies a blend of both the digital skills themselves and knowledge of how the tools have worked across multiple markets.None of that can happen without success on the workforce construction and development front, which Greer and Tuberson believe will and must look different in future to keep talented employees in the industry.

The last two years have seen a significant increase in the number of mergers and acquisitions taking place in the government market. Editor Nick Wakeman and Jean Stack of the investment bank Baird discuss what’s driving the deals and why the rampant pace is likely to continue.Stack is the co-manager of Baird's government and defense practice. She has a long history of helping buyers and sellers make their deals happen, and has an understanding what those transactions mean.In this episode, she says why the strong volume of activity will continue and how not everyone should be a seller.

It goes without saying that data is a buzzword all on its own even when disregarding other popular catchphrases that surround it these days.For this episode of Project 38, Qlik Federal’s leader Andrew Churchill describes to our Ross Wilkers how the conversation across the public sector ecosystem stretches beyond just knowing there’s too much data in the world to work with.That especially holds true for the federal government, which has specific methods that many of its agencies are legally required to use in storing their data. Churchill explains that data literacy and other new practices related to talent development are just as important in that equation as the technologies, namely cloud hosting.

Steve Kelman, who led the Office of Federal Procurement Policy during the Clinton Administration and is a current professor at the Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, has a reputation as a big thinker about management and government and why things work the way they do.In this conversation with Editor Nick Wakeman, Kelman shares his thoughts about Black Swans and Gray Rhinos -- those often traumatic events that we either didn’t see coming or we knew could happen but we failed to prepare for.​Critical to that preparation is cultivating the ability to break away from your standard ways of thinking and not falling into the trap of doing things in certain ways because that is how they have always been done. Status quo thinking is often what leaves us vulnerable when disaster inevitably strikes.

Washington Technology and FCW staffers offer their early views on President Biden’s address to Congress where he proposed trillions in spending to create jobs and address myriad issues around climate change, national security and the nation’s infrastructure.That wasn’t the only big news to hit this week. The U.S. Court of Federal Claims ruled that Amazon’s challenge of the JEDI cloud award to rival Microsoft can continue. FCW also published a special report highlighting the trends driving activity at the Defense Information Systems Agency, one of the larger IT buyers in the federal market.Washington Technology Editor Nick Wakeman and Senior Staff Writer Ross Wilkers are joined by FCW Executive Editor Adam Mazmanian and Senior Editor Lauren Williams discuss what these events mean and what’s coming next, including some topics that aren’t getting as much attention.

COVID-19 vaccinations are rolling out across the country and as that happens, federal agencies and many of their contractors are encouraging their employees to get inoculated.But can agencies require contractor employees to get vaccinated and how can they formalize that requirement? We get some answers in this episode from Al Krachman and Brooke Iley, partners at law firm Blank Rome who specialize in government contracts and labor who wrote this article on what such a requirement could look like.Much is still TBD, but Krachman and Iley told Washington Technology Senior Staff Writer Ross Wilkers that there is some precedence for such a requirement and an emerging view across industry that it will happen for COVID-19 vaccinations. Their advice is to both not be surprised and to start preparing for such requirements. 

In a crowded mergers and acquisitions environment, Bluestone Investment Partners has carved out its own niche by focusing on companies in the $15 million-to-$50 million revenue range. They often are just emerging from the small business set-aside arena and seek more resources to compete for full and open opportunities.John Allen, co-founder and managing partner of Bluestone Investment Partners, shares in this episode the philosophy and strategy that drives how the firm made its deals in recent years.Large and mid-size companies typically dominate M&A activity, but Allen explains to WT Editor Nick Wakeman there is no reason that a small business can participate as well -- with the right partner.

FCW Senior Editor Lauren Williams, our resident expert on the emerging new cybersecurity standards for contractors, stops by Project 38 to talk with Editor Nick Wakeman and Senior Staff Writer Ross Wilkers about the latest developments.The Defense Department is making steady progress on the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification despite ups and downs and potential delays. Williams also fills us in on the latest with the CMMC Accreditation Body, the industry group chartered by DOD to run the training and certification program. There has been some turnover with the all-volunteer board, but the chairman is vowing to accelerate the process of getting the system up and running.There also is news that the 15 pilot contracts that will be the first to require teams to have CMMC certification. The solicitations were supposed to already be out in the market, but now the expectation is later this year or early next.Williams, Wakeman and Wilkers share what they know and what might be next on the horizon for CMMC.(NOT

Washington Technology Editor Nick Wakeman and Senior Staff Writer Ross Wilkers see little slowing the pace of mergers and acquisitions in the federal market with buyers of all types continuing to make big deals. In this episode, they discuss several reasons for the strong M&A activity including the availability of credit and other financial resources, a customer who favors larger and more consolidated contract vehicles and ever-bigger task orders, and the continuing demand for capabilities that support digital transformation efforts. Wakeman and Wilkers review some of the major deals of 2020 and the big deals so far this year. Their prediction -- more is to come in 2021.

This episode of Project 38 brings together two minds that have different ways of looking at the government contracting landscape but they both represent a critical stakeholder: the investor. Representing investors that mainly focus on public companies is Jon Raviv, an equity research analyst for Citigroup. The private investor’s point-of-view comes courtesy of Mark Frantz, co-founder and general partner at growth stage investment firm Blue Delta Capital Partners. On the agenda of the discussion moderated by Senior Staff Writer Ross Wilkers: just how optimistic (or realistic) should we be about the market’s overall health amid renewed budget and deficit chatter whilst the pandemic continues, macroeconomic factors that must be considered in gauging how the sector is fairing, and of course the overall M&A deal landscape. (NOTE: This episode was recorded March 4. Since then, the latest stimulus package has been signed into law and extends the current CARES Act reimbursements for contractors through Sept. 30.

BlueHalo hit the market hard with six acquisitions in 2020 and as CEO Jonathan Moneymaker explains to Editor Nick Wakeman, this latest platform out of Arlington Capital Partners is pursuing opportunities around the transformation of modern warfare. BlueHalo's acquisition strategy has focused on capabilities around space superiority, directed energy, missile defense, C4ISR, cybersecurity and intelligence solutions. The goal is to create a mid-tier player that can have an impact on how the U.S. and its allies engage and deter near-peer adversaries. As Moneymaker explains, the strategy is multi-faceted and one to watch in the years ahead.

It’s been a year since Science Applications International Corp. made one of the biggest acquisitions of 2020 and this conversation between Editor Nick Wakeman and Bob Genter, SAIC's defense and civilian president, starts with the question: Was the Unisys Federal acquisition worth it? ​Then they dive deeper into market opportunities, impacts of COVID-19 and lessons learned how to prepare for and execute an acquisition. Whether or not you are in a pandemic. Genter shares how he sees the $1.2 billion Unisys Federal acquisition paying off for SAIC, how it has shaped the kind of work it can pursue and what might be next on the company’s target list for acquisitions.

Whether 2021 is the “Year Of The GWAC” remains to be seen, but government-wide acquisition contract vehicles will be high on the agenda for the companies pursuing them and the agencies that will be using them. In this episode of Project 38, Senior Staff Ross Wilkers goes to three leading market research and proposal specialists to get their views and insight into the overall GWAC landscape and what companies must take into account when pursuing them. For Part 1, Amber Hart and Lisa Shea Mundt from The Pulse of GovCon break down one hotly-anticipated vehicle in CIO-SP4 that will be ready for industry to bid on any day now and deliver some hard-hitting truths on how not all vehicles are created alike. Part 2 begins at 26:03 with Martin Hicks of Global Services and the focus of that conversation is on how the General Services Administration is proceeding with its own GWAC portfolio, and in one case making a second attempt at bringing small business IT companies into the fold.

Today’s market stands on the brink of great change and as SAIC's chief technology officer Charles Onstott explains to WT Editor Nick Wakeman, there are four mega-trends shaping those changes that companies need to embrace. These trends are driven by people and processes, but enabled by technology. Onstott says you have to weigh several items in order to take advantage of these mega-trends, including the outcomes your customer is looking for and the kind of skills you already have. You also have to be willing to change and adapt. As Onstott explains, looking in the mirror and understanding where you and then mapping that against where your customer is headed should be a regular part of the way you do business.

What if the whole exercise of making sense out of all the data in existence on the government contracting market is a matter of tradecraft? In this episode of Project 38, Brian Lindholm of FedSavvy Strategies answers that question and explains the idea of turning that exercise into a tradecraft. Lindholm and his colleagues at FedSavvy Strategies work with other contractors on just that: making sense of everything that is out there on themselves, their competitors and the market at-large. Competitive intelligence is a key cog in that machine of both growing and keeping their business. Knowing what is out there is only part of the battle, as Lindholm explains in this conversation. He also shares his views on how to build this skill set of knowing and acting into a company’s infrastructure for the long term. Item number two in this discussion is how to keep the business, or avoiding what he calls “incumbentitis.”

The impacts of COVID-19 coupled with emerging technologies translates to government customers having different expectations and being more open to new ways of addressing challenges. John Goodman, chief executive of Accenture Federal Services explains in this conversation with WT Editor Nick Wakeman what those challenges mean to his company and where he sees the market moving forward. Goodman's perspective is largely optimistic because while the customer needs are great, he sees the technology being there to address those needs. COVID-19 has also opened government agencies to new ways of doing business and pulled them away from traditional approaches that have slowed progress. You will hear Goodman share Accenture Federal’s strategy and what he sees as challenges and opportunities ahead.

The long-term impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic will include changed workplaces and government customers adjusting how they do business and their priorities. In this episode, Deloitte public sector leader Mike Canning shares his views on these trends with Editor Nick Wakeman. He expects the future will have a hybrid workforce, where location will no longer dictate who companies hire and how they serve the government customer. There also is a need for agencies to evolve the way they do business. As the nation recovers new priorities are emerging. According to Canning, one in particular is around public health and he sees that as a national security issue.