Early industry engagement reshapes government acquisition

This conversation is part of the Fed Pulse: Federal contractors to watch series.

The federal acquisition process used to follow a familiar script. Agencies defined requirements, wrote solicitations and asked industry to respond.

Some agencies still work that way, but more often, contractors are finding themselves invited into the discussion before all the answers are known. Instead of asking, “Can you meet these requirements?” agencies are spending more time asking, “Here’s the problem. What can you do about it?”

That shift moves engineering firms closer to the front end of the process, where mission needs are translated into technical solutions. For Jeff Stevens, president of ENSCO, that work starts well before anyone begins building a system.

“We first start by hearing what they need. A big part of the culture that we built is one that drives innovation. We fund small seed projects to go through proof of concepts and demonstrations. Ultimately, our objective is to be able to bring a solution to the end customer,” he said.

Bringing industry in sooner

Stevens said he has observed a growing willingness across government to look at available technology before committing to years of development around a fixed set of requirements.

“The government would typically put out a solicitation with a lot of requirements and invite everybody to bid to meet those requirements,” he said. “A big shift that we’re seeing is much more of an openness to bring technology companies to the table to talk about the problem and what might be available today to maybe not solve 100% of the problem, but to be able to solve 90 to 95% in a very short time frame.”

Stevens pointed to a recent Department of Transportation effort that brought together industry, academia and government around a longstanding safety problem. The goal was to test, evaluate and improve potential solutions on a timeline measured in months, not to spend years studying options.

Making bets earlier

The government has been trying to shorten the path between identifying a need and fielding a capability for years. That puts a premium on companies willing to invest before a procurement appears. If agencies want to move faster, contractors have less time to start from scratch. Stevens said ENSCO has invested in technology, laboratories and facilities with that reality in mind.

Of course, moving faster does not mean moving without guardrails. Engineers generally prefer fewer constraints. Government customers increasingly want more assurances. Stevens said meeting both expectations required technical changes and cultural adjustments.

“One of the strongest value propositions we provide to our customers is we’re an organization that always delivers,” he said. “We’ve built trust and longstanding partnerships. When we get the call, our customers know this organization is going to deliver, even when we ask them to do something that might be very technologically challenging or the first of its kind.”

Agencies are showing greater interest in solutions that can be tested, adapted and put to work quickly. That approach may save time, but it also shifts more uncertainty onto contractors. Companies operating at the front end of the acquisition cycle have to place bets on technologies and capabilities before they know whether a mission need will become a funded requirement. Waiting for certainty may mean arriving too late.

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