FIRST IN CLASS
The skills I acquired from the MSL program have allowed me to advise more dynamically than I could previously.
In August 2020, I was one of eight people selected to participate in the Army’s first civilian cohort. Unlike other government- sponsored academic degree training programs (the Naval Postgraduate School, for example) where students can spend a portion of their duty week attending classes, MSL program coursework is completed solely on off-duty time. Meaning, employees must continue to work full time and take courses in the evening or on weekends. Despite the challenges balancing school, work and family, in May I was the first to complete the 24-credit-hour program.
REAL-LIFE CRITICAL THINKING Te MSL program went beyond advancing my ability to exam- ine government procurement rules and procedures in context with policy analysis. It also matured my critical thinking skills, improved my writing, and—perhaps more importantly— enlarged and diversified my professional network, which will pay dividends for many years to come.
Before, in my role as a contracting officer, my research rarely extended further than the Federal Acquisition Regulation and its supplements. I was trained in the profession to be able to answer the questions “What does the contract say?” and “What do the regulations say?” Although I still maintain that those are two essential questions, our habits should sometimes lead us beyond reviewing contracts and regulations. To better assess the cost, schedule or performance risk of deviating from typical procure- ment methods, it is important to also look to the originating statutes, and any Government Accountability Office or Court of Federal Claims decisions, too.
As I progressed through the MSL program, completing countless essay prompts throughout, I became able to more quickly and accurately spot concerns and identify questions I needed answered before taking a stance on an issue or making a recommendation. Tese essay prompts conditioned me to think through very fact- specific if-then situations and present options. Some examples included: Could my mock program manager use a certain color of money to refurbish his office? Or is a particular expenditure for my mock federal grant recipient allowable for reimbursement?
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Program managers often seek contracting professionals’ opin- ions—albeit credible opinions, not off-the-cuff guesses—about whether a particular course of action is permissible during the acquisition planning phase. Credible opinions incorporate legal precedents or trace to supporting information—statutes, regu- lations or policies—rather than pointing to a “because I said so” rationale.
In addition to providing opinions, contracting professionals are also often expected to solve disagreements in favor of a customer or contractor. For example, a typical day in the life of a contract- ing officer involves a contractor or customer contacting them about a dispute, and spewing off lots of facts, yet seemingly always withholding the ones that are most important or relevant.
Much as in real life, the MSL program’s essay prompts emulated these types of scenarios. Te professor cluttered the issue with non-relevant information and intentionally omitted details one would need in order to make a well-supported decision. Tis approach required me—the acquisition professional—to weed out what was relevant from the facts given, and what was not, then determine what questions I needed answered before I could opine on an issue.
Additionally, to further illustrate the similarities between the program and real life, for each essay prompt, most professors randomly assigned students to different roles. Tese were often attorney roles representing either the government or contractor client, but sometimes assignments included being in a contract- ing-officer, program-manager or contractor role. Students had to persuasively and sufficiently negotiate a position in favor of their client’s interests. Some scenarios seemed impossible to success- fully argue, given the facts, making them highly representative of everyday procurement-related situations involving, for exam- ple, schedule delays or ambiguous requirements or terms and conditions.
As there was no option to challenge an assigned role, you had no choice but to give it your best, most persuasive effort to prove why your client is right and theirs is wrong. In theory, that’s what
Army AL&T Magazine
Fall 2022
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