U.S. Office of Personnel Management - Ensuring the Federal Government has an effective civilian workforce

2006 Presidential Award for Management Excellence

Department of Transportation

Competitive Sourcing
Governmentwide Management Initiative

American businesses and citizens rely on the Department of Transportation to ensure the fast, safe, and efficient movement of people and goods within the borders of the United States, and at border entry points.  With millions of trips and billions of consumer goods transported annually by air, rail, road, waterway and pipeline, the activities of the Department are essential to our mobile society and economy. 

Under the President’s Management Agenda for Competitive Sourcing, agencies are required to identify projects and positions that are not inherently governmental.  This process allows work to be bid competitively by Federal employees and/or outside contractors.  History has shown competitive sourcing generates significant savings for the government, regardless of who is the winning bidder.
 
The Department of Transportation has made significant progress in executing its Competitive Sourcing initiative.  In addition to completing 23 streamlined and standard competitions, the Department is the first agency to achieve all 16 competitive sourcing PMA scorecard checkmarks set by the Office of Management and Budget.

Notably, the Department’s Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) recently completed a competitive sourcing for the new Automated Flight Service Station.  This new station will use state-of-the-art technology to replace labor intensive processes and provide more timely services to aviators.  The new Flight Service Station is estimated to save $2.2 billion and is costing almost $200 million less than the “most efficient organization” in-house bid. 

To monitor and verify the projected savings, the Department is implementing post-competition accountability procedures with independent validation.  The Flight Service Station competition currently stands as the single largest competitive sourcing project for a civilian agency.