Government Projects 6

[askdg]

We are an established civil and marine engineering firm, primarly dealing with private developers. I have been tasked with finding the best way to break into government work, specifically federal. I have found plenty of complicated reports and numerous seminars, but only one "good" contact to date. Does anyone have any tips on how to proceed and/or any suggestions on which seminars are actually useful?

 

[HgTX]

Many government agencies have prequalified contractor & consultant lists. Contact your favorite agency, find out if they have a list, and if they do, find out how to get on it. They probably periodically send the contracts around for bid.

Hg

Eng-Tips policies: faq731-376

 

[RDK]

I don’t know about the US government but marketing to any new segment would generally follow the same procedure.

Analyze the market. How does it work? How does the prospective client make purchasing? How large is the market? How does the client make purchasing decisions? Are there any sub-niches in the market?

Analyze the competition. Who are they? How do they serve the market? Are there any areas of the market that they are overlooking?

Analyze yourself. Do you have a product that can be sold to the prospective client? Will it fit into your business plan /model? Do you have the capability or capacity to service the market?


Analyze the financial aspects. Will the prospective market be profitable? Will it be more profitable than other available market segments?

Finially figure out a plan of attack to exploit the opportunity.

A marketing analysis and plan is an iterative process, a quick and dirty look at the market to get a rough evaluation and then successive iterations to refine the analysis.

I would thing that government would buy on the basis of competitive proposals and would be very cost sensitive. The market size would be quite large but would be quite variable. Programs can rise and disappear quite quickly. The Canadian government fiscal year ends on 31 march every year and it spends about half its discretionally funds in the last three months of the year, this makes the market very variable and with tight artifical deadlines.

The other thing to realize about selling to the government is that they will often meet you to death. They can have meetings on everything with little or no regard for the bottom line, you can easily spend as much time in meetings as actually doing the work.

Also with government, a budget figure will often be a hard and fast limit. There will not be any money to go even $1 over budget. This you will have the quandary of having a large enough bid to cover a lot of contingencies but be bidding to a price sensitive client.

Finally a lot of government people simply do not have any sort of foggy clue how business actually works and also even though they many be engineers might have only a basic familiarity as to how engineering actually works. This comes from their being is a very closed environment where office politics and the political process plays a more important part of their life than making a profit.


Rick Kitson MBA P.Eng

Construction Project Management
From conception to completion

http://www.kitsonengineering.com

 

[mshimko]

1. Do your homework, find out what agencies need the support your company performs, find out who is doing it now.

2. Start marketing the gov't reps. They typically must go through competitive bids, but often they have large contract vehicles that were competively bid, and they then award smaller tasks non-competively under the larger contract.

3. Start marketing the current prime contractrs, convince them they need you on their team.

 

[Prepakt1]

Send me some information on your company .I might be able to help.I get lots of goverment enquiries .
Dave Ritchie
contact@intrusionprepakt.com

Intrusion Prepakt

http://www.marineconcrete.com

 

[askdg]

Thank you all. However, I was not specific enough. I am at the point where I am indeed trying to get on several lists. The problem is the actual application process, which is cumbersome. We have managed to connect with a government services contact who wants to meet, but because of the NY transit strike, we're on hold. If anyone has any info about helpful seminars in this regard, please let me know. Note to Intrusion Pepakt: I've passed on your website info to our marine division. Have a nice holiday!

 

[RDK]

Your experience goes to prove what I said about government people not understanding how business works.

Most private businesses make it easy to become registered as a supplier. Government makes it very hard. Private companies generally treat suppliers fairly; the government will heavily play favorites.

In private business the purchasing manager is rewarded if they can obtain services from a wide variety of firms at a reasonable price.

In government the purchasing managers want to limit the number of people on the list so that they are only dealing with known firms who will be able to do the work, with no chance of failure.

Private firms accept failures as part of the cost of doing business. Government workers avoid any and all risk at any cost; they simply estimate the cost of the work at a high enough level to be able to buy from a small number of firms who charge a significant risk premium.

For example I once submitted a proposal for the expansion of a water treatment plant. There were three different critical areas involved. I had three PhD’s in my proposal, each with very specific expertise in the area involved. One had actually written the national book in his area.

My proposal was rejected on the basis of lack of expertise. It was over $100,000 less than the proposal accepted from the same firm that did all the work for that municipality in the past.


Rick Kitson MBA P.Eng

Construction Project Management
From conception to completion

http://www.kitsonengineering.com

 

[JedClampett]

We do most of work (Water and Wastewater Treatment) for government entities. We've had a lot different experiences than RDK. We lose some for stupid reasons, but we win enough to stay busy.
You have to develop relationships well before the work is even planned. No one, private of government, is going to just give work to someone who just shows up. Developing these relationships is not a money maker, so you'll have to budget some business development. However, larger municipalities will sometimes try to distribute work so that they're not too dependent on one company, so there's always a chance you'll luck out there.
Federal government is a different animal. They publically advertise, but I think they already know who they'll give the work to. I wonder about how much politics is involved. If you get the work, they have no problem expanding the scope without compensation. I suspect that's why the Halliburtons and Bechtels do so much federal work. They can absorb some messed up projects and wait for big paydays. And maybe when you have friends in high places, you can even bail out the messed up projects. And people wonder why the dikes in New Orleans failed.

 

[ACtrafficengr]

RDK- why not ask why you were turned down for the water treatment plant? Consultants do that all the time with our projects.

Sometimes its the little things. A well qualified firm's proposal was sunk by a number of typos and other simple mistakes, including citing the wrong project. "Lack of attention to detail!" cried one of our reviewers, and gave them a poor score.

Maybe your credentials seemed too good. If a consultant cites experience with multiple $100M projects, is our little local bridge with an ADT of 90 going to get the attention we want it to get, or will it be given short shrift if schedules conflict?

We recieved 16 proposals for that tiny little 90 vpd bridge. When competition is that fierce, little things make a difference. We don't expect a thorough analysis of a project you may not get, but I like to see you did put some thought and time into it. Several firms proposed a detour route that has a bridge out. Needless to say, they didn't get the job.

But don't be afraid to ask why you weren't given the project. You may learn sonething that will help you be more competitive in the future.

------------------------------------------
"...students of traffic are beginning to realize the false economy of mechanically controlled traffic, and hand work by trained officers will again prevail."

Wm. Phelps Eno, ca. 1928

 

[RDK]

I did explore the issue but was given the government stonewall.

They basically said that they looked at everyone qualifications and issued the contracts in a fair and impartial manner and that they could/would not elaborate further.

These contracts although were for individual municipalities were tendered on their behalf by a federal government agency. They handled five different contracts of a similar nature and in every case they issued the contract to the consultant (different ones) who handled the bulk of that municipalities work.

I have no issue with the municipality dealing with those familiar with their needs. What I do have is an issue with spending an out of pocket several thousand for travel, etc plus two weeks to put together a team and a proposal when there was absolutely no chance of being successful in the proposal.

If they wanted to sole source the work then they should have had the courage and honesty to say so right up front and not have wasted the time of other people.


That's why I avoid government work.

Rick Kitson MBA P.Eng

Construction Project Management
From conception to completion

http://www.kitsonengineering.com

 

[JedClampett]

At the last company I worked for, we were running slow so I was looking in the Federal Register for future federal work. There was a pretty significant I & C project listed. Since our company had a large I & C group, I called the contact for the project listed. When I got hold of the guy, he wanted to know how I had heard of this project. I explained that it was in the Federal Register. He thought for a split second and then told me the project was cancelled. End of story.
Being somewhat cynical, I suspect that he had someone in mind and was trying to discourage anyone else from competing. There seems to be a little "club" of vendors they favor and games are played to assure that they get the work. RDK, if it makes you feel any better, they probably deserve each other.

 

[mshimko]

Out of curiosity, do you know what the evaluation-award criteria for the contracts were? This should be stated up-front in the solicitation, and if not can be obtained by asking the contracting official.

Depending on the award criteria (cost, best value, best technical, etc) you should be able to gleen a little into why "the other guy" got the award.

 

[RDK]

In my case there was a detailed qualification rating sheet and weights provided to the various factors.

All I got back was that they did not consider me qualified for the work. No explanation as to why the guys who actually wrote the federal guidelines on some issues were not qualified just a copy of the rating guide that had a big fat zero in a couple of columns and the explanation that “We followed the rating guide as you can well see and you were obviously not qualified because you got a zero in these columns. If you had been qualified then you would not have gotten a zero and your second envelop would have been opened.”

The other guy got the work because he was pre-selected in the first place and anything that I or anyone else did would not matter. The interesting thing is that some of the big firms were not qualified for some communities but awarded similar work in other communities.

Each community’s work was awarded to the consultant that was preferred by that community. It was the same consultant that the community used if they handled things themselves and not with the federal agency (and funding) involved.

I did complain to my MP and all he got was that the process was fair because the rating guide was followed etc…

The government proposal system is a farce.

That’s why I avoid government work. I’ll only take on government jobs on an hourly/daily basis as a sub consultant and not usually get involved in the proposal stage, unless it is as a paid proposal writer.

Rick Kitson MBA P.Eng

Construction Project Management
From conception to completion

http://www.kitsonengineering.com

 

[ACtrafficengr]

Honestly, we're not all like that. I work for a county DPW. Our state DOT pre-selects consultants and municipalities can choose a firm off that list, no questions asked. My department doesn't do that. We put out RFPs and we really try to be objective when evaluating proposals. In the current round, a firm that placed poorly last time looks like it may be one of the front-runners.

Maybe you just dealt with the wrong agencies. Please don't paint us all with a broad brush because of a few bad experiences!

------------------------------------------
"...students of traffic are beginning to realize the false economy of mechanically controlled traffic, and hand work by trained officers will again prevail."

Wm. Phelps Eno, ca. 1928

 

[mshimko]

Someone always wins; someone always loses.

If you really feel you were unfairly graded, you should take the gov't to court. It happens all the time.

Alternatively, just maybe you need to relook at your own company with a more critical eye....

 

[RDK]

Taking the government to court is not a realistic option.

The cost of simply getting the case before a judge would be more than the potential profits.

We don’t have punitive damages awards or allow contingent lawyer’s fees here either so I would be on a pay as you go plan with the lawyers and at most could only get back lost potential profits, costs would be up in the air here as well. I might get them and I might not.

The federal government’s lawyers are called the Department of Justice, they are the government lawyers. They could easily run my legal bill to serious money.


All the government would have to do is say it was a subjective assessment of what was admittedly a subjective system.

While it is easy to say lawsuit, you simply don’t bother for less that $100,000 (unless it is less than $6,000 and can go to small claims court where the rules and procedures are easier.)





Rick Kitson MBA P.Eng

Construction Project Management
From conception to completion

http://www.kitsonengineering.com

 

[mshimko]

Yes, Rick, BUT:

1. The DOJ lawyers are not the ones who would fight the lawsuit, its the lawyers employed by that government agency.

2. The government's lawyers, regardless of agency, seem to have one primary objective - avoid going to court. The government lawyers and contracting officials will do whatever they can to avoid going to court, especially since the lawsuit can sometimes put the contract award in question on hold. In my experience (on both side of the fence), neither side really wants to go to court, but the threat or hint of going to court will very likely at least get you the desired information.

 

[askdg]

Interesting thread. ACtrafficengr, can we work for you?

 

[cvg]

mshimko - taking your potential client to court is hardly an effective marketing strategy...

 

[boo1]

Consider careful review of the SOW and the project qualification. Write the presentation to meet the requirements, don't have generic data. You must meet the extact requirements (even if it's just on paper).

Contact the contracting activity and ask for the Small Business officer. Inquire about small business programs and training classes.