Kind of like ROTC...

On Thursday, Senator Susan Collins introduced a bill to help bolster the federal government's acquisition workforce. The Acquisition Workforce Improvement Act of 2009 would pay tuition, room, and board for a three-year work/study program at Washington, D.C. area universities. Coursework and on-the-job training would focus on federal acquisitions (naturally); a quick read of the bill reveals some similarities in scope to a program in Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. Recipients of the scholarship would focus on academics for one year, then spend the next two years studying and working at various federal agencies. Graduates would earn a Master's degree and be granted federal employment, whereupon they would incur a three-year federal service requirement.

All in all, this looks like a good first step in getting qualified professionals into the acquisition workforce. One risk to this type of program is investing that time and effort into developing a young professional who takes the Master's degree and valuable job experience and jumps ship as soon as possible. True, that's a risk that might be worth the investment, as a number of individuals would certainly choose a career in the acquisition workforce and assume senior leadership positions down the road. But this bill would stand to gain from incentivizing the federal career path. Perhaps the three years of study could count toward seniority and pension benefits. When the individual hits the three-year study / three-year work point, it might be a little easier to decide to "stay fed" with only another 14 to get a defined pension.

The initiative has merit and should find a relatively easy ride to passage. This "ROTC for civilians" would do well to focus needed attention to an area that consistently underperforms. However, this should be viewed as only one small step toward improving the system. The appropriations process, including earmarks, and baseline cost and schedule estimating have inherent weaknesses that no bright young professional can fix alone. But it's hard to argue the value of a program that will no doubt attract promising talent to this vital part of the federal workforce.