Author: Unison

It is a time-tested question and debate among VHA Directors, ADs, and CFOs: Should Service Chiefs be accountable for tracking and managing annual financial performance? There is a predictable and emerging trend for delegating to Service Chiefs financial authority to be accountable for financial performance. For Stations that wish to move in this direction, it is critically important to understand the governance structure (to include processes, decision making authority, and tools) that must be in place to effectively administer a delegated model.

When you are ready to review your prime contractor’s subcontract flow downs, pay particular attention if the prime contractor is trying to flow the Alt1 version of the Government Property clause to your subcontract. A version of this clause assigns the risk to you even if the prime contractor might not be subject to the same requirement. FAR flow down clauses are important to both prime contractors and subcontractors but FAR regulations are unique to each subcontractor.

Is it too late to plan for FY23? With FY23 quickly approaching you have most likely already begun or completed your annual planning. As a tool to enhance and validate your ongoing plans, Unison, has identified 10 key planning questions to ask yourself. Medical Center Administrators can easily become consumed with the many demands of day-to-day operations and the challenges of the on-going impact of the COVID-19 pandemic that continues to affect your planning.

Contract professionals should closely examine their subcontractor FAR flow down clauses. While examining flow downs is important to prime contractors, it is also important to subcontractors to ensure that they can fully comply with Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) clauses and to determine if they conflict with general terms and conditions of the subcontract. The flow down clauses can have a considerable impact on obligations and risk. There are 5 primary reasons to always examine subcontractor FAR flow down clauses.

Proposal teams are generally very skilled at thoroughly reading the contents of solicitations. However, in a solicitation that contains 293 clauses and provisions, most of which are incorporated by reference, your team might not be able to ensure that their proposal follows all the solicitation’s instructions and requirements. Researching and analyzing FAR clauses in solicitations is time consuming and might yield inaccurate results but FAR clauses and agency specifications should not be ignored.