Greetings from the Texas Hill Country. It is a lovely Fall day in the year 2024. It is hard to believe that I have been retired from federal service for four years now. I guess it doesn’t seem that way because it has only been a year since I really stopped working. Because of the lessons I learned when I became certified in digital services, I was able to maintain my relationship with the Contracting world at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). Until very recently, I was called in to work on special projects. This has been very rewarding. I was able to keep up with all of the changes going on in the office and I was able to earn a little extra cash to help prepare for my real retirement. The money has been great. It has helped me to prepare for this day and now I don’t have to spend all of my children’s inheritance. But I digress. I want to discuss what I did with my DITAP certification.
But first, I want to take a minute to discuss how far I have come. I entered civil service in 1984, the same year the Federal Acquisition Regulation was introduced. I suppose I have always considered myself to be a pioneer of sorts. I was the first Contract Specialist at the Red River Army Depot to prepare a Justification and Approval in accordance with FAR Part 6. At that time only one Contract Specialist was allowed to procure Information Technology. It was not covered in the FAR. There was a special Army Supplement that provided guidance. I did not get to work with her but I was always very curious about the IT world and why procurements were considered special. As I moved on in my career, my bosses always had a knack for handing me the more difficult projects. And I feel like I did a good job meeting the challenges. And throughout my career I had to deal with negative people that did not want to enter into uncharted territories. But I have always dived right in. As the head of Contracting at the Corpus Christi Army Depot (CCAD), I was approached by the Business Office about writing a contract where CCAD would be paid for work performed for private industry. This was not in the job description of an 1102 Contract Specialist. But I liked the challenge and I liked the idea of strengthening CCAD’s future. Therefore, I moved forward with the program and developed some template contracts. I moved on before I could really see the program grow. I discovered later that higher headquarters found out about it and stopped Contracting from participating in the program. But moving on I came to the VA. This was a scary step. I was moving from a big fish, chief of Contracting, in a little pond, CCAD, to a little fish, Contract Specialist, in a big pond, VA. Here I would be introduced to the world of IT procurement. I became familiar with the GSA Government Wide Acquisition Contract (GWAC) vehicles as well as NASA Solutions for Enterprise Wide Procurement (SEWP). As exciting as this new world was, it was also frustrating. It was especially frustrating to deal with VA’s legacy systems such as the Financial Management System (FMS). The 1970s was alive and well at the VA.
Then I discovered the world of digital services. I started quite humbly by taking the DITAP class. I learned a lot but had little practical experience. And given that I only had 18 months left before retirement, I thought I would just keep my head down and wait for that pension. But then an opportunity arose. I was able to use the skills I learned in class and was assigned to a digital services contract. The experience was fantastic. But more importantly, after retirement, I was seen as a “go to” person for leading a digital services team.
I am happy to say that VA has come a long way. By putting in place the best practices of digital services VA has become the model for all of the Federal Agencies in modernizing our mission. That old 1970s technology has finally been scrapped. VA exists to serve the Veteran. But having modern, user friendly tools and applications are the best way to serve the Veteran. Because their systems are so modern and advanced, VA has been able to focus the workforce away from administrative tasks and back towards serving the Veteran. This is definitely a win-win situation. It is good for Veterans, good for VA employees, and good for the American taxpayer.
Digital IT Acquisition Professional (DITAP) Program Blog 