Step Five: Monitoring
Contract Performance Monitoring/Quality Assurance
Recompete
It is imperative that a government involved in competitive sourcing establish and implement a contract quality assurance program. Quality control is a contractor's responsibility, but quality assurance is a government responsibility. The government must ensure that the contractor meets the required standards of quality and cost effectiveness.
Even if the government organization is selected to continue to provide the service, quality assurance monitoring is still required. This will help defuse negative feelings and comments by contractors who are not selected to provide the service. It will also afford the government organizations the opportunity to develop an incentive program for the work force, under which they can share in any further savings if they perform under the bid price.
Discussions about quality assurance methods are rarely included as part of step three contract solicitation or step four negotiations. This is unfortunate, because many disagreements between the organization and contractor could be avoided if there were clarity from the start about quality assurance issues. These discussions should also identify exactly who will perform the quality assurance functions for the contract. Often, unless the quality assurance is of a purely regulatory nature, such as with environmental programs, the government organization's internal staff may not be appropriately qualified to perform the quality assurance function.
- Most government quality assurance personnel have, by experience and training, become accustomed to process review in performing quality assurance on a contract. Very few have experience in performance-based quality assurance, as it is a relatively new concept for government. (1)
- Training may be required to ensure that agency quality assurance evaluators are impartial and objective. Where there has been true privatization or divestiture, displaced employees who are assigned quality assurance responsibility may be biased against the contractor.
- Government quality assurance evaluators may be unfamiliar with appropriate business practices. It is important to select quality assurance evaluators who are knowledgeable about good business practices in the private sector as well as in regulatory matters, or train them accordingly. On one recent occasion, a quality assurance wrote up a contractor for not having secured three bids, documented them in writing or at least retained written records of telephone conversations. These were for services from a quick copy business for overnight emergency printing!
Unfortunately, there is still a belief that a major role of government is that of an employment agency, and outsourcing and privatization are not always welcomed throughout the organization. Also government managers, for the most part, have little experience in project and contract management. Until the skill level in these areas change, it would behoove any government agency or contractor to pay close attention to the quality assurance portion of the arrangement.
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(1) Performance based contracting is the emerging trend --- asking contractors for an outcome instead of telling them all the steps they have to follow to get there. Hence, quality assurance is different also. This will require that government quality assurance personnel receive added training in business practices.
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