The General Services Administration awarded its governmentwide Seat Management Contract in July 1998. Since then, response has been tepid at best. Early adopters do exist. But because seat management has lacked a large and solid set of best practices and lessons learned, most agencies have taken a wait and see approach. At its core, seat management comprises elements that agencies have been comfortable with for years.
Agencies are old hands at outsourcing, especially when it comes to information technology.
They traditionally have cobbled together options from numerous service contracts and have made awards to a series of contractors. Seat management changes the traditional approach. Instead of picking one vendor for help desk support, another for asset management and a third hardware leasing partner, a seat management contract enables agencies to contract with one firm for all IT services. They only have to administer one contract. They will have all their service providers under one umbrella.