Edwards contracting team receives AFMC award

  • Published
  • By Airman 1st Class Julius Delos Reyes
  • 95th Air Base Wing Public Affairs
EDWARDS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. --  The Edwards Research Propulsion Sciences II team won the Air Force Materiel Command's 2006 Outstanding Contracting Team for Science and Technology recently.

The contracting team -- comprised of 15 personnel from six specialties -- is responsible for acquisition of basic and applied rocket and space propulsion research expertise for the Air Force Research Laboratory Propulsion Directorate Technology-West here.

The RPS II Team is a select group of contracting and technical personnel whose specific purpose was to put together a follow-on research proposal concerning advanced propulsion sciences, compete the award amongst industry leaders, evaluate proposals, and recommend award to the source selection authority from Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio.

"A key factor to the whole process is that the members who worked this source selection are also now responsible for overseeing the new contract," said Col. Douglas Constant, Air Force Flight Test Center Contracting Directorate commander. "Their in-depth knowledge of the requirements and contract will ensure the Air Force gets what we pay for."

Prior to their AFMC award, they were the AFFTC contracting team winner. AFMC contracting selects four outstanding contracting teams per year. The team was first submitted as an Air Force Research Lab nominee from Edwards and was selected as their team of the year from all of the Research activities within AFMC. Air Force Materiel Command officials then selected them as the science and technology team of fiscal 2006 -- an accomplishment, considering the team from Edwards competed against much larger research and development contracting activities within AFMC.

"The team's biggest accomplishment was completing a very complex acquisition in record time -- 80 days versus the norm of 120 days," Colonel Constant said. "This can only be done when both the customer and the contracting team are truly working together to make it happen. Half of the team consisted of dedicated scientists from AFRL who worked side-by-side with us from beginning to end. This award is shared with our counterparts on the 'hill.'"

During 2006, the team developed their past performances by defining relevance matrix, validating references, interviewing survey participants and researching all negative responses. Their technical team followed a mandated process ensuring consistent assessment of evaluation criteria across all proposals to understand alternate approaches.

The cost team tackled the job of comparing divergent systems armed with assistance from the Defense Contract Audit Agency. The team documented all processes, findings, ratings and recommendations to the Source Selection Authority.

They also included a modified Patent Rights clause in a request for proposal mitigating significant risk for future technology use, as well as being able to keep intellectual property and patent rights from affecting the transition of new technology.

To improve their system of business, they used oral presentations and questions-and-answers sessions eliminating written technical proposals. They also strategically selected advisors for ready access to source selection authority facilitating quick approvals. In doing so, they were able to reduce 33 percent of the cycle time from proposal receipt to preparations for awarding.

The team got an early start and performed the risk assessment two years prior to releasing their request for proposal. The risk assessment team was purposely made up of multi-functional experts who provided a broad spectrum of inputs resulting in an adequate time to scrub the statement of work and creation of useful evaluation criteria, Colonel Constant said.

"The RPS Team II serves as a role model to source selection teams that are created both at Edwards and within AFMC, especially in relation to teaming between the customers of contracting and contracting personnel," Colonel Constant said.