Tuesday, January 6, 2009
Introducing the Insider
The Industry Defined
HUBZones: Anyone Can Play
Beyond Reproach: The Incumbent's Bind
Breaking Wave: Human Resources BPO
Cooperative Personnel Services: Differentiating Not a Problem
Adventures in Marketing
Policy & Regs: Can We Satisfy the Appetite for Cleared Personnel?
Right-click to download (112 KB, Acrobat PDF).
Posted on March 4
Note on distribution: In the typical month, subscribers can access the complegte pdf of the new issue on this site in the first week of the month by using their user IDs and passwords to enter the Subscribers Only section of this Web site. Hardcopies typically reach subscribers one week later.
To become a subscriber giving you access to the entire 6,000-word March 2007 issue and all back issues to January 2004, please activate the Subscribe button above to subscribe online.
Questioning and poking private equity firms has become a staple in the mainstream and business press. In the government services industry, the PE presence is slight—for a good reason that Charles Rossotti of the Carlyle Group identifies. But he thinks things are changing. In addition to discussing PE, Rossotti comments on other industry developments.
* * * *
As a sidebar to this interview, we present some comments on PE from an investment banker who specializes in government services firms.
Finally, we present a distillation of the good, the bad, and the ugly views of private equity, based on themes emanating from other industries. Yes, they're stereotypes, but we have little to go on when looking for more PE activity in government services. It would be interesting to run these compliments and criticisms of PE against your ideas for continuing to grow a robust government services business.
Someone told us recently that to dwell on oversight angst is a little like the cable media giving you Anna Nicole news all the time. But you're worrying too much about it. This review of Rep. Henry Waxman's recent hearing on DHS contracts may reduce your anxiety. Some behaviors are just in the Congressional oversight baseline; grin and bear it. (We've always thought that staying out of trouble or the appearance of same is the best antidote for oversight angst.)
To provide additional perspective on the oversight phenomenon, Alan Chvotkin gives us some clear definitions of what he considers constructive and destructive oversight.
We make a few judicious comments on an unusual but prominently featured article that doesn't meet the quality standards we expect from this source. There's also a comment on the breathless expose of SAIC that appeared in Vanity Fair.
We take a look at OMB's most recent high-risk IT project list. Then, we take the financial pulse of Bearingpoint, which appears to be climbing out of its calamitous period. Finally, we quote from the strongest, but well reasoned, attack on inspectors general that we've ever read.