transparency in contracting
DESCRIPTION
Intro to benefits of contract transparencyTRANSCRIPT
Transparency in Contracting
Transparency is young, but contracts transparency is an infant.
Outline
1. Confidence & Documentation2. Personal Privacy3. External Transparency4. Internal Transparency5. Early Results6. Potential Projects
Confidence & Documentation 1/4
• Confidence needed to handle public scrutiny• More documentation => more confidence
Confidence & Documentation 2/4
Contract transparency is documentation you don't have to actively manage.
Confidence & Documentation 3/4
The public passively manages procurement by talking to you,
suggesting, criticizing and spotlighting.
Confidence & Documentation 4/4
All actions are automatically recorded by programs such as wikis and Twitter.
Personal Privacy 1/1
• Less privacy at work• Don't freak• Improves acquisition in long-run• Price we pay
External Transparency 1/4
• Definition: General public seeing and participating in acquisition.
• Sometimes threat; normally not.
External Transparency 2/4
Legit reasons to no external transparency 1. National security2. Contractor proprietary information
External Transparency 3/4
Usual reasons for no external transparency • Fear of something new• Don't want to adapt
Less common reasons • The corrupt• The Incompetent
External Transparency 4/4
Examples • External wiki: Acquipedia
• Twitter for contracts:
o @GSA_FEDSIMo @DOD_ESI_Compass o @marydavieo @GovNewMedia
• Gov Directory for Twitter: GovTwit.com
Internal Transparency 1/2
• Definition: sharing information with coworkers, your agency, other fed agencies and contractors.
• Not open to the general public
Internal Transparency 2/2
Examples • Internal gov social networking sites
o FedSpace - coming soon for entire fed govo Spacebook - internal Facebook for NASAo milBook - part of larger milSuite
• Internal wikis
o Intellipedia - wiki for 16 agencies of US Intel Commo milWiki - part of milSuite
Early Results 1/5
Case Study: Better Buy Project • Better Buy Project• Better Buy Wiki• @BetterBuyProj
Early Results 2/5
“The BetterBuy pilot project was novel in that it asked industry and interested individuals to submit their responses to the RFI, through a publicly editable wiki. It was the most transparent and collaborative RFI conducted by the federal government to date”. - Kevin Merritt, CEO of Socrata.com
Early Results 3/5
Metrics as of April 12, 2010 • 150+ registered commentators• 370+ page edits• 46,000+ hits
Early Results 4/5
Notes from Procurement 2.0 Talk @ Gov 2.0 Expo • Industry doesn't want to tip hand too early• Wikis force ppl to work electronically• Self-documents changes (no more bazillion Word docs)• Getting word out• Slowed process but improved quality• Potential for market research to be done by others
Early Results 5/5
• Promising• Some challenges• Learning as we go
Potential Projects 1/1
1. Stickk.com for Contract Professionals*2. LOLCat FAR Translation Project**3. Twitter in synopses4. Trackable Defense Contracts
*From Nudge by Thaler and Sunstein**Inspired by Kathy Sierra's Creating Passion Citizens talk
