United States Government Accountability Office

GAO Testimony 

Before the Subcommittee on Technology, 

Information Policy, Intergovernmental Relations and 

Procurement Reform, Committee on Oversight and 

Government Reform, House of Representatives 

ACQUISITION 

WORKFORCE 

DOD’s Efforts to Rebuild 

Capacity Have Shown Some 

Progress 

Statement of John P. Hutton, Director 

Acquisition and Sourcing Management 

For Release on Delivery 

Expected at 1:30 p.m. EST 

Wednesday, November 16, 2011 

GAO-12-232T 
 United States Government Accountability Office 

Highlights of GAO-12-232T, a testimony 

before the Subcommittee on Technology, 

Information Policy, Intergovernmental 

Relations and Procurement Reform, 

Committee on Oversight and Government 

Reform, House of Representatives 

November 16, 2011 

ACQUISITION WORKFORCE 

DOD's Efforts to Rebuild Capacity Have Shown 

Some Progress 

T

Why GAO Did This Study 

The Department of Defense (DOD) is 

the government’s largest buying entity 

and has recognized that rebuilding the 

acquisition workforce is a strategic 

priority. The federal government’s 

current budget and long-term fiscal 

pressures underscore the importance 

of a capable and well-functioning 

workforce. GAO and others have long 

recognized that the size and 

capabilities of the workforce across the 

government warrant the attention of 

the Congress. 

This statement discusses (1) DOD’s 

progress in addressing challenges 

faced in rebuilding the capacity of the 

acquisition workforce, and (2) insights 

into the efforts by the Defense Contract 

Management Agency (DCMA) to 

rebuild its contract oversight capacity. 

This statement is drawn from our broad 

body of work on DOD contract 

management and acquisition workforce 

as well as a report issued earlier this 

month on DCMA’s efforts to rebuild 

capacity. We also obtained updated 

information from DOD with regard to its 

acquisition workforce competency 

assessments and workforce hiring. 

What GAO Recommends 

GAO is not making any new 

recommendations in this statement. 

GAO has previously made 

recommendations to DOD to help 

address DOD’s workforce challenges. 

DOD generally agreed with most of the 

recommendations and has efforts 

under way to implement them.

What GAO Found 

DOD has made some progress in rebuilding the capacity of the acquisition 

workforce. For example, DOD reported that it hired about 5,900 civilians into the 

acquisition workforce in fiscal year 2010 using the Defense Acquisition 

Development Workforce Fund or as a result of decisions to convert functions 

previously performed by a contractor to performance by government personnel. 

DOD’s plans for further growing the acquisition workforce remain uncertain 

because of budget issues. Building workforce skills and expertise is just as 

important, however, as increasing the size of the acquisition workforce. DOD also 

made progress in completing competency assessments, which identify the 

current skills and capabilities of the workforce and help identify areas that 

needed further management attention. DOD officials reported that DOD has 

completed three assessments, including contracting, life cycle logistics, and 

program management, and is drafting final reports for another six assessments. 

One area where DOD still faces challenges is determining the effectiveness of its 

training in improving acquisition outcomes. GAO recommended in 2010 that if 

DOD is to fully assess performance improvements, it needs to go beyond 

measuring the size of the workforce. DOD did not concur with the 

recommendation, stating that it believed existing metrics were sufficient to 

assess the impact of its training efforts on acquisition outcomes. GAO continues 

to believe DOD needs to develop additional metrics. Further, to help improve 

acquisition outcomes, GAO reported that DOD needed to assess the skills and 

competencies of and training provided to those people who have a role in 

acquisition but who are outside what DOD has formally defined as the acquisition 

workforce. GAO recommended that DOD establish criteria for identifying these 

personnel, assess the critical skills needed to perform their role in the acquisition 

process, and designate an organization that has the responsibility to track DOD’s 

progress in identifying, developing, and overseeing personnel outside the defined 

acquisition workforce. DOD concurred with these recommendations. 

The challenges DCMA is experiencing in rebuilding its capacity are illustrative of 

those faced by DOD. DCMA performs a critical role in helping to manage and 

oversee contractor performance. GAO’s November 2011 report found that DCMA 

is attempting to rebuild its workforce, making increased use of the Defense 

Acquisition Workforce Development Fund. For example, in fiscal year 2011, 

DCMA reported it hired 1,221 new employees under this authority, a substantial 

increase from 166 hired in fiscal year 2009. GAO also noted that by the late 

1990s, DCMA had lost the majority of its contract cost/price analysts, which, 

according to DCMA, meant many of its pricing-related contract administration 

responsibilities, such as negotiating forward-pricing rate agreements and 

establishing final indirect cost rates and billing rates, were no longer performed to 

the same level of discipline and consistency as in prior years. As a result, DCMA 

reported that DOD’s acquisitions were subjected to unacceptable levels of cost 

risks. Over the last 2 years, DCMA reports it has hired 279 new contract 

cost/price analysts and cost monitors (bringing the agency’s total number to 

about 400), extensively using the Defense Acquisition Workforce Development 

View GAO-12-232T. For more information, Fund to do so. 

contact John Hutton at (202) 512-4841 or 

huttonj@gao.gov. 
Page 1 GAO-12-232T 

Chairman Lankford, Ranking Member Connolly, and Members of the 

Subcommittee: 

I am pleased to be here today to discuss our recent work on acquisition 

workforce issues. GAO and others have long recognized that the size and 

capabilities of the workforce across the government warrant the attention 

of the Congress. The federal government’s current budget and long-term 

fiscal pressures underscore the importance of a capable and wellfunctioning workforce. 

Today I would like to focus in particular on the government’s largest 

buying entity and discuss our issued work on the challenges facing the 

Department of Defense’s (DOD) acquisition workforce.1 In our February 

2011 high-risk report, we noted that among the actions DOD needed to 

take to improve outcomes on the hundreds of billions of dollars spent 

annually on goods and services was to ensure that its acquisition 

workforce was adequately sized, trained, and equipped to meet the 

department’s needs.2 Our work has found that a lack of an adequate 

number of trained acquisition and contract oversight personnel 

contributed to unmet expectations and has placed DOD, at times, at risk 

of potentially paying more than necessary. 

Likewise, DOD has recognized that rebuilding its acquisition workforce is 

a strategic priority. According to the Office of the Under Secretary of 

Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics (USD/AT&L), to 

successfully accomplish the acquisition mission and ensure the best 

value for the expenditure of public resources, DOD will place greater 

emphasis on having a high-quality workforce with the right competencies 

and skill sets. To do so, DOD issued an acquisition workforce plan in April 

 1

 The Defense Acquisition Workforce Improvement Act recognized acquisition as a 

multidisciplinary career field for DOD comprised of 11 functional areas (Pub. L. No. 101-

510, § 1202(a) (1990) (codified, as amended, at 10 U.S.C. §1721 (a), (b)). The 11 

functional areas are—program management; systems planning research, development, 

engineering, and testing; procurement, including contracting; industrial property 

management; logistics; quality control and assurance; manufacturing and production; 

business, cost estimating and financial management, and auditing; education, training, 

and career development; construction; and joint development and production with other 

government agencies and foreign countries. Since the act was passed, DOD has 

expanded the original list of 11 functional areas to a total of 16 career fields/paths. 

2

 GAO, High-Risk Series: An Update, GAO-11-278 (Washington, D.C.: February 2011). 
2010 that identified planned workforce growth in support of the Secretary 

of Defense’s strategy to resize and rebalance the acquisition workforce. 

My statement today will address DOD acquisition workforce issues from 

two perspectives. First, I will provide an overview of DOD’s progress in 

addressing challenges faced in rebuilding the capacity of the acquisition 

workforce. I will then provide specific insights into the efforts of the 

Defense Contract Management Agency (DCMA) to rebuild its contract 

oversight capacity. This statement today is drawn from our broad body of 

work on DOD contract management and acquisition workforce, including 

work reflected in our February 2011 high-risk update as well as our 

October 2010 and September 2011 acquisition workforce reports.3

Additionally, we relied on our November 2011 report that assessed the 

progress and challenges facing DCMA.4 We also obtained updated 

information from DOD with regard to its acquisition workforce competency 

assessments and workforce hiring data. This work was prepared in 

accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. 

Those standards require that we plan and perform the audits to obtain 

sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our 

findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe that 

the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings and 

conclusions based on our audit objectives. 

 3 GAO-11-278; GAO, Defense Acquisition Workforce: DOD’s Training Program 

Demonstrates Many Attributes of Effectiveness, but Improvement Is Needed, GAO-11-22

(Washington D.C.: Oct. 28, 2010); and GAO, Defense Acquisition Workforce: Better 

Identification, Development, and Oversight Needed for Personnel Involved in Acquiring 

Services, GAO-11-892 (Washington, D.C.: Sept. 28, 2011). 

4

 GAO, Defense Contract Management Agency: Amid Ongoing Efforts to Rebuild 

Capacity, Several Factors Present Challenges in Meeting its Missions, GAO-12-83

(Washington, D.C.: Nov. 3, 2011). 

Page 2 GAO-12-232T 
DOD has made some progress in rebuilding the capacity of the civilian 

acquisition workforce and in completing competency assessments, which 

identify the current skills and capabilities of the workforce and help 

identify areas that needed further management attention. Included among 

the workforce issues facing DOD are (1) determining the right size of the 

acquisition workforce, (2) updating acquisition training based on ongoing 

competency assessments and measuring the effect of training on 

acquisition outcomes, and (3) identifying personnel outside the acquisition 

workforce who have a role in acquisition. 

DOD’s Progress in 

Addressing 

Challenges in 

Rebuilding the 

Capacity of the 

Acquisition Workforce 

Steps Taken to Increase 

the Size of the Acquisition 

Workforce 

In April 2009, the Secretary of Defense announced his intent to increase 

the size of the acquisition workforce, in part, to (1) help address concerns 

that DOD had become too reliant on contractors to support core functions 

and (2) rebuild the capacity and skill sets that had been eroded in the 

years that followed the downsizing of the workforce in the 1990s. DOD’s 

April 2010 acquisition workforce strategic plan identified an objective of 

increasing the civilian acquisition workforce, which totaled about 

118,000 civilians as of September 2009, by 20,000 personnel by fiscal 

year 2015. This growth would be accomplished both through the hiring of 

new personnel using funding provided through the Defense Acquisition 

Workforce Development Fund5 as well as through the “insourcing”—or 

conversion to government performance—of functions that were being 

performed by contractor personnel. Data provided by the USD/AT&L 

indicate that DOD hired about 5,900 individuals using the Defense 

Acquisition Workforce Defense Fund as well as through insourcing in 

fiscal year 2010. 

DOD officials also noted that a combination of other factors, including 

hiring by the military departments (excluding those hired using the 

Defense Acquisition Workforce Development Fund or that were the result 

of an insourcing decision), movement within DOD from one career field to 

another, or administrative changes, such as reclassifying existing 

positions as being within the acquisition workforce, increased the total 

reported number of civilians within the acquisition workforce by about 

 5

 The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008 established the Defense 

Acquisition Workforce Development Fund to provide additional funds for the recruitment, 

training, and retention of acquisition personnel of the Department of Defense. Pub. L. No. 

110-181 § 852; codified in 10 U.S.C. § 1705. 

Page 3 GAO-12-232T 
8,500. Overall, DOD officials reported that the civilian acquisition 

workforce was about 133,000 at the end of fiscal year 2010. 

The department’s plans for growing the acquisition workforce remain 

uncertain. In August 2010, the Secretary of Defense announced that the 

insourcing initiative was being halted, though DOD would continue to 

insource positions on a case-by-case basis. Further, because of 

anticipated future budget constraints, the Secretary of Defense 

announced in March 2011 a hiring freeze for DOD’s overall civilian 

workforce, but he indicated that the initiatives using the Defense 

Acquisition Workforce Development Fund would continue. DOD had 

planned to issue an updated strategic workforce plan for the acquisition 

workforce earlier this year but has not yet done so, in part, because of the 

uncertainty regarding future budgets. DOD officials indicated that the plan 

may not be released until April 2012. At this time, we do not know 

whether DOD’s updated plan will include information on the funding 

needed to achieve its acquisition workforce objectives. 

DOD Efforts to Identify 

Competencies and Update 

Acquisition Workforce 

Training 

Just as important as increasing the size of the acquisition workforce is 

building workforce skills and expertise. Our work has shown that federal 

agencies need to determine the occupations, skills, and competencies 

critical to achieving their missions and goals, as well as to identify any 

gaps between their current workforce and the workforce they will need in 

the future.6 By taking these steps, agencies would be in a better position 

to adjust to changes in technology, budget constraints, and other factors 

that alter the environment in which they operate. The DOD acquisition 

workforce is no exception. 

The Defense Acquisition Workforce Improvement Strategy outlines a 

competency assessment strategy for the acquisition workforce as a 

means to assess workforce capability using updated and validated 

enterprise-wide models, data and information. In September 2010 we 

 6

 GAO, Workforce Planning: Interior, EPA, and the Forest Service Should Strengthen 

Linkages to Their Strategic Plans and Improve Evaluation, GAO-10-413 (Washington 

D.C.: Mar. 31, 2010); GAO-11-278; GAO, Human Capital: Further Actions Needed to 

Enhance DOD’s Civilian Strategic Workforce Plan, GAO-10-814R (Washington, D.C.: 

Sept. 27, 2010); and GAO, Human Capital: A Guide for Assessing Strategic Training and 

Development Efforts in the Federal Government, GAO-04-546G (Washington, D.C.; Mar. 

2004). 

Page 4 GAO-12-232T 
reported DOD had completed only one of its planned 13 assessments.7

Over the past year, however, DOD has reported making progress in 

completing some of the remaining 12 assessments. For example, 

according to the Deputy Director of AT&L human capital initiatives, DOD 

has completed two additional competency assessments. Thus, 

competency assessments have now been completed in the areas of 

contracting, life-cycle logistics, and program management. DOD is 

drafting the final report for another six competency assessments. 

DOD officials have reported that they have used these competency 

assessments, in part, to help revise the training curriculum for its 

contracting career field. DOD’s contracting competency assessment 

found that there was inconsistency in fundamental contracting skills and 

in the source selection process and that more advanced training on 

pricing was needed. In March 2011, the Office of Defense Procurement 

and Acquisition Policy announced plans to revise the training standards 

for its contracting career field, effective October 1, 2011. According to 

DOD, the changes in the curriculum incorporated more emphasis on 

pricing, services contracting, and competition, among other things, and 

were based on the competency assessments and discussions with senior 

procurement executives and contracting leaders. Similarly, in August 

2011 DOD noted plans to make changes in its purchasing and 

industrial/contract property management curricula. 

One area where DOD still faces challenges is determining the 

effectiveness of its training in improving acquisition outcomes. We 

reported in 2010 that if DOD is to fully assess performance 

improvements, it needs to go beyond measuring the size of the 

workforce.8 We recommended that DOD establish milestones for the 

development of metrics to measure how acquisition certification training 

improves the proficiency and capability of the acquisition workforce, in 

order to demonstrate and track how training efforts contribute to improved 

acquisition workforce performance. DOD did not concur with the 

recommendation stating that it believed existing metrics were sufficient to 

assess the effect of its training efforts on acquisition outcomes. We 

continue to believe DOD needs to develop additional metrics. 

 7 GAO-10-814R. 

8 GAO-11-22. 

Page 5 GAO-12-232T 
To help improve acquisition outcomes, our September 2011 report noted 

that DOD needed to assess the skills and competencies of and training 

provided to those people outside what DOD has defined as the 

acquisition workforce.9 These people include those who may set 

requirements or serve as the contracting officer’s representatives to help 

manage and oversee contractor performance—functions that are key to 

acquisition outcomes. GAO found that personnel with acquisition-related 

responsibilities represented more than half of the 430 personnel involved 

with 29 services acquisition contracts reviewed. In this report, we also 

noted that several organizations have been tracking and managing the 

acquisition workforce, but no DOD organization has (1) systematically 

identified personnel outside of what has been defined as the acquisition 

workforce and the related competencies, or (2) been given responsibility 

for the identification, development and oversight of this group. DOD is not 

required to identify personnel outside the acquisition workforce and has 

not established a process to do so. As DOD officials noted, identifying this 

population is challenging, in part because it is a transient one dispersed 

across many DOD organizations. Additionally, these people come from a 

variety of career fields and are often involved in acquisitions as a 

secondary duty. DOD has taken action to identify part of this population—

such as requirements personnel for major weapon systems—but has not 

done this for all personnel with acquisition-related responsibilities outside 

the acquisition workforce. We also found that DOD has limited information 

to gauge the current and future demand for training this population or the 

effectiveness of the current training that is available. We recommended 

that DOD establish criteria for identifying these personnel, assess the 

critical skills needed to perform their roles in the acquisition process, and 

designate an organization that has the responsibility to track DOD’s 

progress in identifying, developing, and overseeing personnel outside the 

defined acquisition workforce. DOD concurred with the recommendations. 

The challenges DCMA is experiencing in rebuilding its capacity is 

illustrative of those faced by DOD. DCMA performs a critical role in 

helping to manage and oversee contractor performance. Specifically, it 

has responsibilities for providing contract administration services for 

DOD’s buying activities and working directly with defense contractors to 

help ensure that goods and services are delivered on time, at projected 

DOD Needs to Look 

Beyond the Formally 

Defined Acquisition 

Workforce 

Rebuilding DCMA’s 

Capacity 

 9 GAO-11-892. 

Page 6 GAO-12-232T 
cost, and meet performance requirements. In addition, as a designated 

combat support agency, DCMA is tasked with providing contract 

administration and support to combatant commanders during contingency 

operations. The preponderance of DCMA’s workforce is included in the 

defined acquisition workforce. 

In November 2011, we reported on how DCMA is positioning itself to 

meet its missions.10 We noted that DCMA has undergone an evolution to 

become the agency it is today. For example, DCMA’s workforce 

decreased from an estimate of about 24,000 in 1990 to a low of about 

9,300 in 2008. While senior DCMA officials said the workforce’s 

downsizing made sense for much of the 1990s, because there were 

efficiencies to be gained and its workload was generally decreasing, this 

changed in the early 2000s, when DCMA’s workload started to increase, 

but its workforce numbers continued to decline.11 As the workforce 

declined, however, the agency experienced significant erosion of 

expertise, such that it could not fulfill all of its oversight functions. 

Since 2008, DCMA has been rebuilding its workforce, and to do so, has 

made increasing use of the Defense Acquisition Workforce Development 

Fund. For example, in fiscal year 2011, DCMA reported it hired 1,221 new 

employees under this authority, a substantial increase from 166 hired in 

fiscal year 2009. These new employees include 3-year interns as well as 

journeymen, described by DCMA officials as individuals with extensive 

experience in a certain business area. Some contract management office 

leaders told us, however, they were not sure that they would have enough 

operations and maintenance-funded positions available to be able to 

retain the journeymen and interns they had originally hired using the 

Defense Acquisition Workforce Development Fund. DCMA leadership 

noted that the agency is requesting increased operations and 

maintenance funding to convert these positions in the future. 

As noted earlier, building workforce skills and expertise is just as 

important as increasing the size of the acquisition workforce. Our 

November 2011 report noted that by the late 1990s, DCMA had lost the 

majority of its contract cost/price analysts, which, according to DCMA, 

 10 GAO-12-83. 

11 DCMA measures its workload in terms of obligations the government has incurred, but 

not yet paid, also known as unliquidated obligations. 

Page 7 GAO-12-232T 
meant many of its pricing-related contract administration responsibilities, 

such as negotiating forward pricing rate agreements and establishing final 

indirect cost rates and billing rates, were no longer performed to the same 

level of discipline and consistency as in prior years. As a result, DCMA 

reported that DOD’s acquisitions were subjected to unacceptable levels of 

cost risks. In one recent example, a DCMA official told us about a case 

where an administrative contracting officer, lacking support from contract 

cost/price analysts had, for simplicity, incorrectly blended a contractor’s 

overhead rates rather than deriving separate rates for different areas 

(e.g., general and administrative, and manufacturing). 

Over the last 2 years, DCMA reports it has hired 279 new contract 

cost/price analysts and cost monitors (bringing the agency’s total number 

to about 400), extensively using the Defense Acquisition Workforce 

Development Fund to do so. Further, in 2009, DCMA created the Cost 

and Pricing Center, with a mission of developing and sustaining the 

agency’s expertise in pricing. DCMA officials said the center has helped 

to hire contract cost/price analysts for its contract management offices. It 

also develops and conducts training for the growing DCMA contract 

cost/price analyst workforce. 

DCMA also identified ongoing concerns with its ability to effectively carry 

out its quality assurance responsibilities because of workforce size and 

capability shortfalls, increasing the risk to the warfighter and the 

taxpayers.12 For example, DCMA reported an increase in customer 

complaints in the form of reported quality deficiencies in products. One 

action DCMA reports it is taking to address the issues related to its quality 

assurance capabilities is defining certification training for its quality 

assurance personnel. DCMA also reports it is moving toward 

standardizing position descriptions as a way to establish consistent 

expectations for its quality assurance workforce. DCMA has emphasized 

increasing the number of quality assurance personnel and estimates this 

will continue through 2016. 

 12 Relatedly, in 2008, we found that DOD’s quality specialists, including those at DCMA, 

had to scale back the amount of oversight they provided as a result of downsizing. GAO, 

Best Practices: Increased Focus on Requirements and Oversight Needed to Improve 

DOD’s Acquisition Environment and Weapon System Quality, GAO-08-294 (Washington, 

D.C.: Feb. 1, 2008). 

Page 8 GAO-12-232T 
Even with DCMA’s recent efforts to rebuild workforce capacity, the large 

percentage of retirement-eligible employees presents challenges. Over 

half of DCMA’s workforce is retirement eligible or qualified for early 

retirement incentives. For example, as of the end of fiscal year 2010, 

about 24 percent of the DCMA workforce was eligible to retire, and an 

additional 28 percent qualified for early retirement incentives. The large 

number of retirement- eligible employees continues to make DCMA 

vulnerable to the loss of valuable technical expertise and organizational 

knowledge. In part, DCMA plans to mitigate this risk through aggressive 

recruiting and knowledge management activities, such as bringing back 

retired annuitants to help raise the skill levels of the newer employees. 

In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, DOD has focused much needed attention to 

rebuild its acquisition workforce and has made some progress in terms of 

growing the workforce, identifying the skills and competencies it needs, 

and using such information to help update its training curriculum. More 

needs to be done, however, especially for those individuals who do not fit 

within the traditional definition of DOD’s acquisition workforce. The fiscal 

and budget challenges facing this nation and DOD underscore the need 

for DOD to strategically manage its workforce to ensure that they have 

the right skills, capabilities, and training to effectively acquire and manage 

the billions of dollars DOD spends on goods and services each year. 

These same fiscal and budget pressures may present DOD with 

additional challenges in meeting its acquisition workforce goals. Whether 

DOD achieves all of its previously planned growth and related workforce 

improvement initiatives remains uncertain, but what is certain is the 

department can ill-afford not to succeed in preparing its workforce to meet 

its future needs. 

Chairman Lankford, Ranking Member Connolly, and members of the 

Subcommittee, this concludes my prepared statement. I would be happy 

to respond to any questions you may have at this time. 

Concluding 

Observations 

For further information about this statement, please contact me at (202) 

512-4841 or huttonj@gao.gov. Contact points for our Offices of 

Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on the last page 

of this statement. Individuals who made key contributions to this 

statement include Penny Berrier, Assistant Director; Timothy DiNapoli; 

Laura Holliday; Victoria Klepacz; John Krump; and Janet McKelvey. 

Contacts and 

Acknowledgment 

(121023) Page 9 GAO-12-232T 
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