The curriculum that we have for our contracting func- tional professionals rides on a standard that we share with industry and tells us the key tasks that a contracting professional needs to master to succeed in either buyer or seller roles. We’re looking closely at version 4.0 of that Contract Management Standard—promulgated by the Na - tional Contract Management Association—to make sure it is consistent with what we’re doing with this RFO, but I do anticipate that most of the focus on our workforce will be to encourage and help them understand the constraints that they formerly had and that now have a little more latitude, and they can exercise greater discretion within the guid- ance we are offering. Q What do other acquisition professionals outside the contracting area, such as systems engineers and government quality assurance representatives, need to generally know about the RFO? A. When people think of the FAR and the DFARS, they usu- ally associate it with the contracting workforce, and that is true for the most part. And it’s associated with the industry, of course, through the clauses that we’re using from the regulation in our contracts. But certainly, the business of acquisition involves the other acquisition disciplines—en - gineers, program managers, logisticians, financial man - agers, and all the other functional disciplines. So, there are requirements in the regulation that apply to the entire system. And if the other functional disciplines see the re- duced burden on industry, that’s where I would expect to see most of their focus. That is what we’re asking contrac- tors to do in their contract clauses. Generally, Parts 1 through 51 of the FAR and the DFARS mainly speak to contracting officials and do not necessar - ily require activities of the other functional disciplines. But we’re embarking on a significant movement, and that’s why the DoW leadership has asked me to keep our acquisition executives—the new program acquisition executives [PAEs] across the various components—informed about what we’re doing. If for nothing else, we need to make sure that they are tracking this spirit of empowerment that we are offering our contracting workforce in allowing them to sup - port the PAEs in ways that make the most sense for their given requirements. Q Have you received feedback on how the RFO is viewed by our commercial acquisition partners? A. Yes. We received roughly 800 or so initial comments in RFO phase one, which is the unilateral issuance through
class deviations. The nature of that does not really afford the opportunity for notice and comment in the way that rulemaking traditionally does. However, we did provide an opportunity to receive inputs that was very helpful in for- mulating the proposed rules that we’re working on and will soon be issued. And so, each of our case managers included consideration of that feedback to help shape what we put in the proposed rules. Next, as we move into the second phase, we’ll traditionally accommodate the consideration of all the public comments about the proposed rules and adjudicate those as we finalize the rules. Q How and when will we know that the FAR overhaul has been successful? And are there pending statutory or other changes on the desk right now that could improve the process? A. That is on our minds as we are digging into this signifi - cant effort. Why are we doing this? What are the fruits of our labor going to be? Establishing a cause-and-effect nexus between the reduction of a particular regulatory requirement and the ability for the DoW to acquire war- fare capability quicker or in a more cost-efficient way will be a very difficult thing to measure. You can look at what we have built up in the regulation over the years as a bit
My primary message is to embrace this opportunity. As Mr. Duffey said in his open letter to industry, we’re at a significant inflection point. And I do anticipate we’ll have additional opportunities to work with the Congress to identify those areas where we can further repeal existing statutory requirements that aren’t necessary.
10 DEFENSE ACQUISITION MAGAZINE | MARCH – APRIL 2026
Made with FlippingBook - Online Brochure Maker