Preparing an effective solicitation represents the culmination of the considerable effort invested to understand the need, define outcomes, and formulate your acquisition strategy. Developing the solicitation ideally will draw on templates, strategies and samples which have proven successful in meeting similar requirements. The final solicitation must include all mandated clauses and provisions. However, agencies must carefully consider how provisions will affect the decision making of potential offerors.

Developing a solicitation requires careful attention to detail to articulate requirements accurately and in a manner that doesn't unnecessarily constrain solutions. The solicitation must tell competing vendors precisely what information in what form must be submitted in their proposals. Evaluation criteria and methodology must align with established requirements. All of these sections of the solicitation (and more) must "hang together" in a coherent whole to promote effective competition.

Unnecessarily expansive proposal requirements or onerous contract terms add risk and cost that may deter highly qualified offerors from competing. Including conflicting or alternative provisions may confuse offerors or lead to misinterpretation of requirements. Short response periods typically will limit competition to offerors who have invested time in advance to know the agency, its mission and the solicited requirements. Adapting leading practices from both the commercial and public sectors will encourage leading providers to compete.

As part of your acquisition strategy, you chose an acquisition approach from the "Contracting Officer's Toolkit" that best suits the broad parameters of your requirement -- whether it's contracting by negotiation, an FSS MAS schedule buy, orders against an existing FSS MAS BPA or GWAC (Government-wide Acquisition Contract), simplified acquisition, or other means. Each of these has its own standards and methods of competition that are appropriate for the contracting methodology, whether "full and open" for contracting by negotiation (perhaps with an multi-step advisory down select) or FSS MAS buys that encourage three or more competitors. And, for those two stage acquisition processes -- establishment of an FSS MAS BPA or a GWAC (stage one) and orders against those vehicles (stage two) -- competition can be planned for at each level.

Evaluating proposals and source selection require considerable effort on the part of the government. Thus, for reasons of economy and efficiency, solicitations ideally aim to narrow the pool of competitors to the most highly qualified contenders most likely to have a viable shot winning the award. The government benefits from solicitations that maximize the quality and intensity of competition, not just the number of competitors. Including firms in the competition that have no chance of winning the award wastes limited time and resources for both the Government and interested firms as well.

While solicitations should exclude a responsible offeror in only the rarest of situations, the FAR provides for and, indeed, encourages use of voluntary and, where appropriate, involuntary down select processes. Narrowing the competitive pool facilitates one on one due diligence sessions to give potential competitors a chance to get a deeper understanding of agency mission, needs and context. By promoting open communications with potential contractors, you increase the potential benefit to the agency, because the more contractors understand about your objectives, problems, and constraints, the more likely they are to provide a superior and executable solution.

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