ARMY AL&T
From the Acquisition Support Center Director
Jan. 25, 2011, on the campus of the University of Alabama in Huntsville (UAHuntsville). This endeavor was a partnership among the U.S. Army Acquisition Support Center, U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC) Combined Arms Support Command, and UAHuntsville. The AACoE offers the Army Acquisition, Logistics, and Technology Workforce education and training in how to provide Soldiers with the latest capabilities to survive and win on the battlefield. The center also saves taxpayers’ money by merging two previous training sites, the Bevill Center at UAHuntsville and the Institute for Advanced Technology at the University of Texas at Austin.
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My vision for the AACoE is to work with our TRADOC partners and review requirements across the spectrum of professional development for the AL&T Workforce, as well as acquisition education and training for groups in other communities. At the AACoE, we will assess and develop those new to the acquisition community including military officers, NCOs, and civilian interns. There’s a great synergy when you have diverse populations doing things together. The
Contracting Community Highlights
fter more than a year in the making, the Army Acquisition Center of Excellence (AACoE) became reality on
intermingling of students from various backgrounds, in a real college campus setting such as UAHuntsville, will bring together different perspectives, enabling them to share lessons learned as well as cultural and professional experiences. This new center will forge a homogeneous capability at a campus that brings in diverse and disparate groups, including those from outside the acquisition community, to provide our warfighters with the capabilities they need, when they need them.
AACoE courses include Acquisition Basic, Intermediate Program Management, Intermediate Contracting, Contracting Laboratory, Acquisition Noncommissioned Officer Leaders, Contracting Officer’s Representative, and Functional Area 51 Intermediate Qualification. The center is a one-stop shop for forecasting our future workforce needs and providing world- class acquisition training and development for its students.
I am genuinely proud of the learning environment we have created at the AACoE. The new location allows us unprece- dented access to acquisition leadership representatives from the government, industry, and academia. As a result, we have not only efficient and centralized acquisition training, but extremely relevant training as well.
For more information, visit the AACoE page on the USAASC website at
http://asc.army.mil/ aacoe/
AACoE.cfm. You can also access the website using the QR symbol at left with your smartphone.
Craig A. Spisak Director, U.S. Army Acquisition Support Center I S
responsibility to procure the critical goods and services our forces need in the years ahead, but we will not have ever- increasing budgets to pay for them. We must therefore strive to achieve what economists call productivity growth: in simple terms, to do more without more.”
Converting Time and Materials Contracts for Better Buying Power
Kathie Potter
On Sept. 14, 2010, DOD leadership issued guidance to restore affordability and productivity in defense spending. According to the memorandum Better Buying Power: Guidance for Obtaining Efficiency and Productivity in Defense Spending by Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics Dr. Ashton B. Carter, “We have a continuing
76 APRIL –JUNE 2011
Carter’s subsequent Implementation Directive for Better Buying Power—Obtaining Greater Efficiency and Productivity in Defense Spending of Nov. 3, 2010, requires that immediate consideration be given to fixed-price-incentive contracts. For those of us who have relied heavily on time and materials (T&M) contracts, how do we convert to cost-plus-incentive-fee or firm-fixed-priced contracts? To address this question, consider the importance of these key areas: business reformation or cultural tendencies, contract cost impact, market research, and Performance Work Statements (PWSs).
Business Reformation If we are to effectively change the way we do business, we need to better define mission requirements and reduce overhead costs on our contracts.
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