Career Opportunities In The Defense Acquisition Workforce

"Since the establishment of the Defense Acquisition Workforce Development Fund (DAWDF), the U.S. Air Force's Director of Acquisition Career Management (DACM) has received funds sufficient to pay for all initiatives that satisfy DAWDF criteria. Recognizing that this will not always be the case, DACM asked the RAND Corporation to develop a decision framework to help prioritize DAWDF initiatives and ensure that the funds are used effectively"--Back cover.

Congress passed DAWIA in 1990 to ensure effective and uniform education, training, and career development of members of the acquisition workforce. Accordingly, the act established DAU to provide training for the DOD acquisition workforce and charged DOD officials with designating acquisition positions, setting qualification requirements, and establishing policies and procedures for training the acquisition workforce. DOD, as part of implementing DAWIA, established career fields, such as program management (See table 1).

The Pres. has announced his intention to improve the acquisition process, particularly given the half a trillion dollars the fed. gov¿t. spent in FY 2009 on acquiring goods and services. The DoD spent $384 billion in FY 2009 on goods and services -- double what it spent in 2001. A high-quality workforce with the right competencies and skill sets will be critical to improving DoD acquisitions. This report determined the efficacy of DoD¿s certification training for its acquisition workforce. It assessed: (1) DoD¿s capability to provide certification training; (2) the extent that such training reaches members of the workforce; and (3) the extent that previous training recommendations have been implemented. Charts and tables. A print on demand publication.

GAO's continuing reviews of the acquisition workforce, focusing on the Department of Defense (DOD); the Departments of the Army, Navy, and Air Force; the Departments of Veterans Affairs, Energy, and Health and Human Services; the General Services Administration; and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, indicate that some of the government's largest procurement operations are not run efficiently. GAO found that requirements are not clearly defined, prices and alternatives are not fully considered, or contracts are not adequately overseen. The ongoing technological revolution requires a workforce with new knowledge, skills, and abilities, and the nature of acquisition is changing from routine simple buys toward more complex acquisitions and new business practices. DOD has adopted multidisciplinary and multifunctional definitions of their acquisition workforce, but the civilian agencies have not. DOD and the civilian agencies reviewed have developed specific training requirements for their acquisition workforce and mechanisms to track the training of acquisition personnel. All of the agencies reviewed said they had sufficient funding to provide current required core training for their acquisition workforce, but some expressed concerns about funding training for future requirements and career development, particularly because of budget cuts made recently at the Defense Acquisition University.