DOD Acquisition Work Force Insufficient
By Bettina H. Chavanne 
The Defense Department is facing critical gaps in its acquisition work force, potentially affecting its national security mission, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO).
Released March 25, GAO’s report assesses DOD’s ability to determine whether it has a sufficient acquisition work force, initiatives to improve and manage oversight of its existing work force and best practices that could help DOD make positive changes. In its analysis of key DOD studies, data from 66 major weapons systems program offices and interviews with officials from four program offices, GAO discovered numerous challenges facing the department.
The Pentagon does not collect or track information on contractor personnel, GAO found. Nor does it have enough information on why contractor personnel are used in certain situations. DOD also lacks key pieces of information on the use and skill sets of its contractors, which leaves the department unable to identify gaps in its acquisition work force.
GAO is recommending several fixes to the problem, including the collection of data on contractor personnel. DOD only partially concurred with that suggestion, agreeing that the information is necessary to improve acquisition work force planning, but warning that the process is a much larger and more intricate undertaking than GAO suggests.
In January 2009, DOD chartered the Defense Acquisition Workforce Joint Assessment Team (JAT), to improve identification of the acquisition work force, including contractor support. DOD is waiting on JAT’s recommendations before moving forward with any data collection programs.
In a Capitol Hill hearing March 26 on the nomination of Ashton Carter to be the next Pentagon acquisition chief, the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), lambasted DOD for failing to inventory the contractors and outsourcing related to the services for which DOD now spends a majority of its annual procurement funding. Congress had mandated a report from DOD on its services outsourcing, but the Pentagon has begged for more time, at least until 2011.
“That’s a real problem,” Levin said. “We have contracted out so much of the services needed that we can’t even inventory the services for years.”
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