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Technical Evaluations by the program office are the foundation for negotiating a fair and reasonable modification to a sole-source contract. A primer for writing a solid, comprehensive, complete, and accurate technical evaluation with detailed analysis is presented in this article.
The technical evaluation of the contractor's proposal directly affects the outcome of the negotiation stage of the acquisition process. In my experience as a contracting officer, technical evaluations have been sorely lacking in content and credibility. This may be due to a lack of experienced personnel or availability of historical data. Regardless of the specific reasons, I believe it is truly time for us to focus, as a single acquisition community, on the technical evaluation of the contractor's proposal, and use this information wisely to realize the benefits of the services and supplies the government acquires daily.
The Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) requires that each contractor's proposal be analyzed in order to assure that the price being paid by the government for goods or services is fair and reasonable. The FAR 15.404-1(e) defines technical analysis as follows: "(1) The contracting officer may request that personnel having specialized knowledge, skills, experience, or capability in engineering, science, or management perform a technical analysis of the proposed types and quantities of materials, labor, processes, special tooling, facilities, the reasonableness of scrap and spoilage, and other associated factors set forth in the proposal(s) in order to determine the need for and reasonableness of the proposed resources, assuming reasonable economy and efficiency. (2) At a minimum, the technical analysis should examine the types and quantities of material proposed and the need for the types and quantities of labor hours and the labor mix. Any other data that may be pertinent to an assessment of the offerer's ability to accomplish the technical requirements or to the cost or price analysis of the service or product being proposed should also be included in the analysis."
THE TECHNICAL EVALUATION
The purpose of the technical evaluation is to determine whether the contractor's proposed expenditure of labor and resources relates to the performance promises and schedule objectives of the contract. The technical evaluation addresses the quantitative and qualitative aspects of the proposed direct charges to include direct labor, materials, subcontracts, interdivisional work, computer...