Many Government Execs Want Subcontracts Counted Toward Small Business Goals Many top federal acquisition executives favor counting subcontracts as well as prime contracts toward agencies’ small business procurement goals, according to a survey by the Professional Services Council, an industry group, and the consulting firm Grant Thornton. “Many interviewees advocated using total [prime and subcontract] dollars as a measurement of small business participation or crediting first-tier subcontractors rather than counting only prime contracts,” the report says. “This suggestion seems to be gaining currency among government procurement professionals, as it has among many others in industry.” The report is based on interviews with three dozen officials, including the top procurement executives at most large agencies. None of the respondents was quoted by name. “The real issue is subcontracting credit,” said one interviewee. The report found “substantial confusion about contract bundling and the associated rules and procedures…[B]undling remains one of the more misunderstood issues in the acquisition community.” While some of the government executives said GSA schedules are “an anti-bundling program because of their ease of use,” as one of them put it, others said schedules make it easier for a large company to take all phases of a project. Most of them said acquisition personnel need better training. The interviewees expressed little concern about the plight of mid-sized companies in federal procurement or about the importance of maintaining the U.S. industrial base, the report found. “It is clear that these concerns have not yet seriously permeated government’s thinking,” it said. The report, “Business as Unusual: Moving Targets and Shifting Risks,” is available at www.pscouncil.org/pdfs/2004PSCProcurementPolicySurvey.pdf.