Skyway Wire
Beta.SAM.gov (https://beta.sam.gov/) – Three Little Words That Encompass a Big Change
If you are a current government contractor, then you know SAM (System for Award Management). SAM was created in 2012 and consolidated three former systems: Central Contractor Registration (CCR)...
Hiring the Talent that Will Help You Win – Part 1
Adding staff is one of the key challenges facing all companies that want to enjoy success in the government market. Adding staff is expensive and making the wrong decision about whom to hire and...
What Does ROI Mean to You?
What do you think when you hear ROI? Return on Investment is a financial term that measures the gain or loss on an investment relative to the amount of money invested. The term originated in the...
Fair and Reasonable Pricing
One of the requirements for a Contracting Officer to fulfill his duties is to determine that the price to be paid is fair and reasonable. Various parts of the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR)...
Resolving Payment Issues
The Federal Government can normally be relied upon to pay contractors on a timely basis. It’s the responsibility of the contractor to submit accurate and timely invoices to ensure prompt payment....
Factors in Price Analysis
Prior to awarding a contract, the Contracting Officer must determine that the price is fair and reasonable. A large part of that effort involves price analysis, one or more analysis techniques, and...
Organic vs. Manufactured Past Performance
On nearly every competitive (or even non-competitive acquisition strategy), there are three key evaluation areas: technical, price, and past performance. The importance of each of them is different...
National Stock Numbers
A couple of Skyway members have had questions about what a National Stock Number (NSN) is and how to get one. The NSN is a stock number that is assigned to items that are going to be stocked in...
Case Study: A Tale of Two CPARS
I freely admit that most of the time while I was a CO, I really didn’t pay much attention to CPARS ratings. While doing operational contracting work, the dollar value rarely exceeded the threshold...
Contracting Officer’s Authority and Discretion
The case I relate in this article is an illustration of the authority that is vested in a contracting officer and the discretion that the CO can exercise in the course of executing their duties,...
Proposal Storm Surge
It’s hurricane season here in Florida (Dorian is on its way to the East coast of Florida). Well, it’s hurricane season everywhere I suppose, we just seem to be more aware of it “down here.” My point...
The Proposal Is Submitted. Now what?
Proposals take a lot of time and effort to put together and submit, especially in the services world. Often, they require detailed written technical approaches on how you are going to perform the...
Organizational Conflicts of Interest
The US Government is a unique customer. To maintain the public’s confidence, the Government mandates at FAR 3.101-1 that its business be conducted “with complete impartiality and with preferential...
Pricing Is Too Important to Be Last
Regardless of the evaluation criteria, most awards are heavily based on price. New bidders in the government marketplace too often wait too long to begin working on their price proposals. It’s true...
There is No “One Way” To Do This
Recently some of the Skyway members commented that in the forum, there sometimes seemed to be conflicting answers from the former contracting officers who work for Skyway. I’ve found that, after...
Case Study: Blanket Purchase Agreements
In a previous article, I related my experiences in contracting for a hotel rooms cell phones, and rental cars in Jordan, in support of a military exercise being conducted there. To support that...