"A primary challenge impacting the successful delivery of IT programs is the need to manage a broad set of stakeholder communities, including agency leaders, business process owners, IT, acquisition, financial management and legal. The typically siloed nature of government stakeholder communities is ill-suited for the multi-disciplinary and rapidly evolving needs of major IT program management processes."
-Vivek Kundra, Federal CIO, in his 25-point action plan to improve federal IT.
Since 2006, the Office of Federal Procurement Policy (OFPP) has released various Federal Acquisition Certification (FAC) Program requirements. These programs are designed to establish consistent competencies and standards for those performing acquisition-related work in civilian agencies. They focus on three key areas: education, training and experience.
Though the Federal Acquisition Institute (FAI) is responsible for certification program oversight and administration, it is up to each federal civilian agency to develop and implement these standard federal certification programs in accordance with OFPP policy mandates.
ESI has developed an online FAC Reference Center for individual government employees and agencies interested in a simplified approach toward meeting these various FAC Program requirements:
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FAC-P/PM — Federal Acquisition Certification in Program and Project Management
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FAC-C — Federal Acquisition Certification in Contracting
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FAC-COTR — Federal Acquisition Certification for Contracting Officer Technical Representatives