Terry Gerton Timely payments, rescinding stop work orders, and monitoring long-term impacts are top priorities as agencies restart operations. We’ll also look at key takeaways from PSC’s Vision Conference with CEO Jim Carroll. Jim, thanks for joining me.

Jim Carroll Terry, thank you so much for having me on.

Terry Gerton You are coming off two days of the PSC Vision Conference. Let’s start there. What were the biggest insights that you heard over those two days of discussions?

Jim Carroll Well, I’ll say three insights. One was it was a brutal way to start the Monday after Thanksgiving holiday … But, we had to accommodate the really great speakers on — including really some wonderful keynote speakers. Next year it will not be the Monday after Thanksgiving. So for all of our members, you know, for this event, we’re thankfully able to get a better date. But more importantly, as I mentioned, really was hearing from some of the leadership in the administration about, what is their projections for 2026 and how the money, as being appropriated by Congress, as the budget request and where they expect it to go. And so, one was just the amount of money, which is something worth talking about. The other thing and is really the use of AI and how the embrace of AI by the federal government is rapid, but it’s also a bit unknown. We’re moving forward in this space of the government using AI without everyone necessarily understanding all the implications. So I think so far those are the two big takeaways that we’ve been able to summarize. And, it’s a great event for our members and a few guests.

Terry Gerton What did you hear about this administration’s take on industry partnerships?

Jim Carroll You know, I think we have to sort of look back at DoD. I think DoD with Secretary Hegseth is a good example of that. As you recall, in November, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth met with our members and the folks that do defense contracting and said that they really do want to do a radical revolutionary overhaul of the FAR, and especially, in the sense of producing deliverables and measuring outcomes based on performance and getting this done right and how the military, how the branches within DoD have been tasked with coming up with orders … by mid-January, 60 days, in terms of how they think we can best streamline the process. And our hope is that this proposal really has legs. And we think it does. There’s support in Capitol Hill. There’s support in the administration. And of course, we — the leading trade association for companies that do business with the federal government — we’re completely supportive of most of these changes. There are things that we’ve been asking for for years that would really expedite the awards. Hopefully, with the grace of God, cut down on the number of appeals following an award, which seems to be a bit of an epidemic of companies now just expect there to be an appeal. And so we’re really very hopeful that this will stick and we’re optimistic that it will. And so that’s one of the major things, and then of course, as I mentioned, the amount of money in government services. And there was discussion about that … this week from the assistant secretary of war, that you know, there really is going to be an extraordinary amount of money, $850 billion at DOD with at least $180 billion toward services. And that’s what our very, and I’m proud to say, patriotic, companies that want to do the right thing for the war fighter and the taxpayer are eager to jump on board.

Terry Gerton Speaking with Jim Carroll, CEO of the Professional Services Council. Jim, tell us more about what you heard about the deployment of AI from the government agencies and within the contractor community.

Jim Carroll Yeah, so within the government we had speakers from across the government. As I said, Assistant Secretary of War, Michael Cadenazzi, who handles the industrial base policy, talked about an initial $180 billion, $200 billion in services, and how the use of AI and services can change and how there needs to be flexibility because of AI, that when some of these contracts call for a hundred seats to be filled, that there is enough flexibility that contractors can come back to the government and say, hey, we’re gonna use some, you know, AI, some other advanced technology. We can reduce the number of personnel from a hundred to eighty people. And in the past there’s been some resistance. Both the Department of War and some of the other departments, you know, really stressed that they want flexibility because of AI. I’ll say one thing that was interesting, and we’ve seen and heard this from members, is that there are a fair number of new companies who have never put in bids for government work that are using AI to not only write their proposals, but as I mentioned, also the use of AI to appeal. I mean, it just seems like it’s a press of the AI button, if you will, and an appeal is generated. And we need to get away from that, you know, for valid, justifiable awards, let’s move forward and deliver good results. And so we’re very optimistic. The recognition that AI has some limitations to it, but that it can deliver fast results is something that will be very interesting to see in 2026.

Terry Gerton Jim, one of the things that you and I have talked about, we’ve talked about it with a lot of contracting folks on the show is the uncertainty about the federal government workload for contractors. I’m wondering what you heard from your members over the course of this conference, especially as we’re sitting right now just post-shutdown and possibly pre-shutdown in January. What what are you hearing and what is PSC’s advice?

Jim Carroll Terry, don’t jinx us. No more government shutdowns. No, we’re tracking January 30th very closely. We had very senior meetings in the White House in the West Wing with a couple different meetings because of the shutdown to talk about the impact that it is having on results and the impact it is having on protecting the homeland. And so, what we told them in addition to the impacts is when the government gets up and running, because shutdowns end. This was a record-breaking one, but shutdowns do end. And as soon as they end, you know, it’s to tell the individuals in the departments, immediately start processing these invoices, get these payments out the door. You know, there are a fair number of companies, especially in the small to mid-size, that really did not have stable cash flow. They really were hurting. We saw some layoffs or at least, you know, sidelining of key employees, and it really presented a huge financial strain on the companies, which flows down to the employees, which flows down to the communities. And so that’s what we asked for. We asked, in addition, that the momentum on getting contracts, new contracts out the door, be, you know, jump-started as fast as possible. Historically, it takes quite a while after a shutdown for things to resume sort of a normalcy. And, we don’t have time for that. In addition to the financial impact, truly the impact on national security. The world is facing new and dangerous threats that seem to be magnifying every day. And our contractors are able to deliver world-class results and protection. And unless they get up and running immediately, you know, those threats are very real.

Terry Gerton Are you seeing that kind of activity coming out of the government agencies now a couple of weeks on from shutdown?

Jim Carroll You know, we’re actually pleasantly surprised. And I hate to say that word surprised, but in the past, it does seem to be a bit of a lag. Our message seems to be delivered. We’re getting payments out quickly. Maybe not all and not every department, but it seems to be beating historic records in in terms of getting payments out. Obviously, some companies are still hurting, you know, waiting to get paid for work that they performed. But we’re happy so far. But Terry, I can’t believe you brought up January 30th of next year. You know, is this a lull between shutdowns? I hope not. I hope that they’re able to resolve, you know, some of the significant issues, healthcare, things like that. But as we’ve talked about, there’s not a lot of workdays up on Capitol Hill, and we just cannot have another shutdown.

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Interview transcript:

 

Stephanie Kostro It is the end of the calendar year, beginning of the government fiscal year. And this is the time of year when a lot of companies take a step back and evaluate their business strategy and their planning for the next few years. We see a lot folks having off-sites in December or in January to do some of this strategic planning and I’ll be frank with you, I think a lot people will be happy to see 2025 end. And they will celebrate the new year in all sorts of ways, just because of what they’ve been through this year. If your listeners can harken back to earlier this year, the efficiency initiatives really did a number on a lot of the business plans that had been developed among government contracting companies. Some of them had massive de-scoping of their contracts. Some of them had contract terminations. Some, particularly those who worked for agencies like U.S. Agency for International Development, and the Department of Education, some at Health and Human Services really saw a diminution of their planned objectives for throughout the year. And so as we go into the December and January planning cycle for these companies, what they’re really looking for are signs from the government that there is work coming as they start to think through what calendar ’26 looks like. And they start to do their resource planning for personnel and for bid teams to put together proposals. That’s really what they are looking for. And I will have to say, Terry, earlier this year. PSC, the Professional Services Council, we represent services and solutions providers. And typically every year we put together something called our business forecast, which looks at our scorecard, which looks at all of the web-based procurement forecasts put out by agencies. And we would look at tens of agencies and their forecasts and we would rate them based on 15 key attributes, which we developed in industry, about what is useful for those forecasts. This year in 2025, we made the decision that instead of putting out our seventh annual forecast, we skipped this year. The forecasts just weren’t there, and they’re still not there.

Terry Gerton So how is it that agencies put those forecasts out, and what do they base it on? And I guess the third part of that question is, why aren’t they there?

Stephanie Kostro This was a mandate from, among others, from the Office of Federal Procurement Policy, which is a White House office that said, hey, agencies, to the extent that you can, put out forecasts on your websites. And it was really to help drive new companies to join the federal marketplace and to keep those companies that are part of the GovCon community interested. If you could look at a website and say, okay, there is an opportunity coming up in Q1, Q2, Q3, and let’s build towards that opportunity. What happened earlier this year is a lot of those websites went dark. I think it was because as part of the efficiency initiative, it was no longer a useful tool because things were moving very, very quickly. What I find interesting though, is that those websites are still dark. They’re still not there. And so I’m not entirely sure how our government contracting community can put together a reliable business strategy for 2026 and beyond in the absence of that information.

Terry Gerton Well, some estimates are that the contracting workforce itself has been reduced by over 25%. Are we just missing the people who used to do this?

Stephanie Kostro I think that’s part of it, Terry. We’re missing some of the folks who took that deferred resignation or the “fork in the road” option. Some of them did the voluntary early retirement programs. I would also say in many agencies, and I’ll use the phrase “OSDBU”, but I’ll actually speak out the acronym here, the Office of Small and Disadvantaged Business Utilization. Those were usually the offices that had the lead on publishing these websites, and those offices have sort of been dismantled in some agencies. They are certainly de-emphasized in a lot of the agencies. And so it might be … they’re missing the people, that is true, but it’s also they’re also missing the offices that have the lead on putting together these forecasts. And it really is a shame because, you know, the business community uses these forecasts in so many different ways. It helps them do, I mentioned the business planning, but helps them figure out who they want to partner with, who’s going to be their subcontractors or their suppliers, their vendors, etc. This is a real gap in understanding of what the federal marketplace can offer companies. And I do think it will have effects on whether commercial companies want to get involved in government work. They just don’t know what the opportunities are.

Terry Gerton I’m speaking with Stephanie Kostro, president of the Professional Services Council. Stephanie, one more question on this. I mean, GSA has gone through a lot of work to centralize procurement and forecasting. Would you expect that GSA will take this over perhaps and share their forecast?

Stephanie Kostro I love that you asked this question, Terry, because as I mentioned the last time we put out our forecast, it was in 2024 and we had actually at PSC highlighted GSA as a model for putting out these forecasts. We mentioned that GSA has something called their Acquisition Gateway, which sets a high bar for government business forecasting and it encourages the migration to the GSA tool for other departments. So Department of Labor, Department of Justice, they were using the GSA Acquisitions Gateway. So I think this is a fantastic opportunity to go back to that gateway and have GSA take the lead.

Terry Gerton Speaking of forecasts, PSC’s got a big session coming up starting on December 1st. Your vision federal market forecast. Tell us about that.

Stephanie Kostro I love that our entire segment here is devoted to forecasting, because the procurement dork in me is celebrating here. So PSC has this conference and it’s actually run by our foundation, which is our 501c3 nonprofit affiliate dedicated to education. And so it is a year-long process where we have so many teams come together. There are 21 different study teams, they focus on things like Health and Human Services, or Customs and Border Protection as part of the Homeland Security team. And this year of agency discussions, they speak to think tank folks, they speak procurement officials within the government, and it culminates in this conference and it’s happening in person on December 1st. It’s a virtual day for December 2nd and 3rd. It is where these 21 different study teams present their findings. So it’s not just tied to a web-based procurement forecast, but rather these discussions that they’re having with officials. We had over 400 volunteers as part of this process, and I’m just very excited. It is a great opportunity to really hear what’s going on in the procurement world, not just for opportunities, but what the dynamics look like, what impact inflation is having, etc. And to be honest, what impact these efficiency initiatives have had on the federal marketplace. So I highly recommend this conference. Again, it’s December 1st through the 3rd, and December 1 is the only in-person day here in Arlington.

Terry Gerton It sounds like in the absence of the agency forecast that we were talking about at the beginning of our conversation, this may be a great opportunity for contractors, those who are considering government work, to find out from inside sources what’s going on.

Stephanie Kostro It’s a perfect opportunity to get some business intelligence. It’s also a great networking opportunity because we do have government folks come to this conference as well to hear about what other agencies are doing. And so I highly commend it to folks who are listening, but I’m certainly going to be there and soaking up all of the knowledge that I can. I’m particularly looking forward to the Defense Services presentation in light of the Secretary of War Hegseth and his arsenal of freedom speech that he gave about transforming the processes for requirements and acquisition. I’m really looking forward to that. And I always look forward sort of to the top-line and the IT modernization teams as well. So if I were going to recommend three sessions, those are the top three. But they’re all very, very interesting and I’m looking forward to it.

Terry Gerton So how do people who want to attend find out about it and register?

Stephanie Kostro They can go to PSCouncil.org, and you can also search for Vision Federal Market Forecast and the sessions will pop up. There is a fee, obviously, for this, but it is open to the public. It is a widely attended gathering which allows government folks to attend. That is how they can connect with this conference.

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Interview transcript: 

Terry Gerton You, I’m sure, paid very close attention to Secretary Hegseth’s speech last Friday on the arsenals of democracy. What was your takeaway?

Stephanie Kostro Thanks so much for asking, Terry. And not only was I listening with bated breath, I was actually in the room. And for any Hamilton fans out there, it was the room where it happened. There were roughly 250 folks in an auditorium on Fort McNair when Secretary of War Hegseth rolled out his ideas for transforming acquisition. And there was a lot to be said, Terry, he spoke for well over an hour, nonstop, no questions, just kept going. I would say it’s fair to characterize the audience as a rapt. We were waiting for everything he had to say. There were three main topics he wanted to talk about. One was reforming or transforming the requirements process. The second was transforming the acquisition process. And the third was reforming foreign sales processes, and that’s including both foreign military sales and direct commercial sales. So all of that were key topics for everyone in that room.

Terry Gerton Well, let’s take those one by one and the requirements topic, of course, came up first. He talked about the end of the JCIDS and a realignment of the JROC. What did you take away?

Stephanie Kostro So the requirements process has long been an issue of great concern to industry, as well as from my time as a congressional committee staffer on House Armed Services Committee, talking about by the time you go through the several years to validate a requirement, it may actually be obsolete by the end time you roll out of that process. And so the idea of transforming the requirements process has been long anticipated. And I really appreciate what the secretary said regarding being flexible. Going for combining the requirements process with the acquisitions process so that it’s modular, that it does leverage available commercial technologies and products, that it really looks forward to getting a faster delivery times and getting weapons both developed and then deployed and in the hands of the warfighters who need them. So that was very much appreciated. No one, I think, will cry over the demise of JCIDS, but the question becomes, what rises to replace it. And, of course, the under secretary of war for acquisition and sustainment owes guidance on this issue to be released 45 days from the date of that directive, and then the military services have to come up with plans of action within 60 days. So the next two months are going to be very, very busy.

Terry Gerton All right. Part two was a reform of the acquisition process itself. The headline here is the elimination of PEOs and the replacement of them with program acquisition executives, right?

Stephanie Kostro PAEs, that is correct. So I think the other piece of this that goes hand in hand with requirements transformation is the reform and the transformation of the war fighting acquisition system, as they call it now, not the defense acquisition system. And it really focuses on the war-fighting piece of it. I think what I took away, and he said this a few times, Secretary Hegseth, and I’m going to quote him here, they want to increase acquisition risk in order to reduce operational risk. And for me that means putting flexibility in the hands of contracting officers and those in the programs to pursue modular, multi-source solutions throughout the development of a requirement, or rather the development, of a capability. And then actually to get it into the hands of the warfighter. They want to reward and incentivize speed and performance over bureaucratic processes. And that is music to a lot of industry’s ears.

Terry Gerton So a big part of that speed increases buying commercial first. Secretary Hegseth said they are willing to settle for 85% functionality and work toward 100%.

Stephanie Kostro So that was, I think, an interesting turn of phrase for him, mostly because he did say a few times to increase acquisition risk to reduce operational risk. And of course, you’re going to have to have a balance there of what is that 85% and what 15% are you going to be missing? And so I think as they move forward with embracing modularity, fostering competition and pursuing multi-source procurement, that you do want to move fast to contract. He also did mention not over-relying on the testing element. And so we’ve seen that in previous memos, particularly back in May, where Secretary Hegseth signed some memos about operational test and evaluation and streamlining that process in those offices. And so what I also found interesting is talking about putting contracting officers within the program offices too, so they can sit alongside the requirements developers and the folks who are responsible for fielding the capability, so they get a better sense of what the requirements are and how to incorporate those into contracts, leveraging commercial technologies as much as they are available.

Terry Gerton I’m speaking with Stephanie Kostro. She’s the president of the Professional Services Council. Stephanie, let’s touch on topic number three quickly, the foreign military sales reform.

Stephanie Kostro Part of this reform, or they keep saying transformation, not reformation, so I’ll key into that, transforming what military sales looks like. We’ve had lots of conversations, and I was at the Pentagon, in particularly the European office, talking with our allies and partners about how they could access U.S. solutions, and it always was a multi-year process to go from all of that pre-work where we talk about requirements to a letter of offer and acceptance at the end of it, and actually delivering the materials. It’s multi-year and it is so frustrating, particularly when companies want to compete with non-U.S. companies who don’t have the layers of bureaucracy. And so I look at the reorganization that the secretary laid out, that is to move the Defense Security Corporation Agency and the Defense Technology Security Administration, so I’ll say DSCA and DITSA, which is how we call them, over to the acquisition undersecretary. I think those are smart moves if in fact you want to speed up the fielding of compatible and interoperable equipment with our friends and allies. That said, I think it’s important to note that we need to incentivize folks in order to speed those situations up. And one thing that works really well, and it’s something that PSC has talked about in the past, is if you’re going to have an assistant secretary in a military service responsible for acquisition, and each of the military services has that individual, you need to put into their performance metrics foreign sales. They need to be measured on how well they are doing on that front as well. And that is something that I will be talking to the Pentagon folks and our CEO at PSC, Jim Carroll, will be taking to his Pentagon friends as well regarding how to actually incentivize this behavior.

Terry Gerton So this speech on Friday was the tip of the iceberg, much remains to follow in terms of detail, right? What will you be watching for there?

Stephanie Kostro I will be watching for the number of times and the depth of availability of Department of War individuals to speak with industry. This needs to be a collaboration. When you’re talking about speeding up requirements and speeding up contracting and speeding up foreign sales, you really need to talk to the industry that will be responsible for that. One thing that I did take away from the speech on Friday was an openness for profit. And I say that because a lot of times industry gets demonized for making a profit. But what happens is when you have profits, you can actually turn them back into the company and then make investments in future opportunities. And so if companies are allowed to make a profit, then they can have more money to invest in their companies and their technologies and actually move the ball forward faster. And so as we go through this, I will be looking at opportunities not only to comment formally through written comments, whether that’s through the Federal Register or the System of Acquisition Management, or SAM.gov, but also having round tables. We’ve offered to Department of War individuals, we at PSC are happy to schedule and facilitate a round table to have industry speak candidly with their government partners about how to make this happen faster, better and more efficiently.

Terry Gerton So you’d say that the speech was pretty well received by the folks in the room, then.

Stephanie Kostro I would say it was very well received as a rhetorical device. The proof is always in the pudding. The devil is always in the details. I think as we move forward, there will be more enthusiasm. Enthusiasm will grow, but it really depends on what those reports look like, that guidance from the undersecretary in 45 days, the military service plans of actions in 60 days, and how much input it reflects from industry. I think there is generally a recognition across the board, industry, executive branch and Congress, that something needs to change here. And in fact, a lot of what was in the speech reflected things that are under negotiation in the National Defense Authorization Act conference right now. And I think we are all rowing in the same direction. And I hope we stay doing that.

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Interview transcript:

Terry Gerton: Despite being close to the record length of a partial government shutdown, but in the middle of that, PSC has recently written a letter to members of Congress. Tell us a little bit about that. Who did you write to first?

Jim Carroll: Yeah, we really believe that in order for there to get a resolution and get the government up and running, there needs to be a bipartisan bicameral solution. And that’s what we did. Our letter was addressed to all four leaders, two in each chamber, to try to express not just the normal sort of, ‘This is really hurting us.’ But to explain the impact of mission, the very real concern that what we are going to see are critical issues with mission success as this goes on. And that’s what we were trying to convey in the letter and with some important meetings this week.

Terry Gerton: Jim, has PSC written letters like this in the past or is this something new?

Jim Carroll: We’ve certainly written letters in the past and tried to address significant issues, whether it is a lapse in appropriations or a couple of other issues that are really need the resolution of the entire Congress. But what we’re doing now is PSC is very proactive. We lean into issues. And so with this, we have followed up with significant meetings on the Hill and a very significant meeting at the White House. And so it’s not just a letter, we’re in the fight.

Terry Gerton: Jim, are there particular stories or cases that you are finding really resonate with the key leaders you’re speaking to?

Jim Carroll: I mean, I think the fact that our industry represents close to a trillion dollars in revenue, a million employees across the U.S. But really, it’s the idea that everything, as I said, from some of the DoD platform readiness to the NASA program and the work that’s being done on Artemis II, the launch preparations there. At the FAA, it’s the civilian pilot training that is being impacted. That could have long-term impacts and as Secretary Duffy said a few days ago, this could have safety implications at the rate we’re going. And so those are some of the impacts that we’re having when we bring those subjects up.

Terry Gerton: And what is PSC’s ask in these meetings? What do you want these leaders to do and do you feel like you’re getting traction with them?

Jim Carroll: To go in reverse order, I do think we’re getting traction. And I think again, the idea is not just to reopen the government. Everyone wants that. But what we’re also asking is recognition that once the government reopens and God willing, it’s maybe today, maybe this week and God knows hopefully soon, is that we need the contract officers to have the ability to move very quickly on getting payments out the door, to getting contracts awarded and that’s the best way to overcome some of the lag that is destined to happen. And of course, we do believe that our federal contractors need this reimbursement as well. They’re innocent, just like the federal government workers are innocent and not involved in this and they should not be denied the appropriate salaries that federal government workers will, God willing, get. And so that’s what we’re trying to convey. We also, of course, want Jayden Daniels to get better soon from the horrific injury last weekend. But we’re not making much progress on that.

Terry Gerton: I’m not sure that’s anything Congress can help you with.

Jim Carroll: Maybe not, Terry.

Terry Gerton: I’m speaking with Jim Carroll. He’s the executive director of the Professional Services Council. So Jim, also in the midst of this appropriation lapse, we’ll use that language, you all held a defense conference. How did that go? Did you get much participation and kind of what was the mood?

Jim Carroll: First off, it was a great defense conference. We had over 150 attendees. It was one of the largest attended events on the defense side that we have had. And despite some government workers not able to participate, we had a lot of former government workers who just left in January of this year, come back and talk about their experiences and really sort of explain how best to work in this new world, not only of what might be a Revolutionary FAR, but really on the mission. What’s happening in AI and what is happening with this new technology, we had multiple members of Congress come and again, bipartisan, the people, the members of Congress who we sincerely work with are those who understand the value that our members bring and it’s not based on politics. I will say Congressman Walkinshaw right here from the Northern Virginia area where so many of our members are located, he was really complimentary of the industry and some of the Republican members that came to. I know for Congressman Walkinshaw, who we’ve been speaking with quite a bit lately, he said something that I think really explains what we do. And he said, ‘If you want to succeed, you have to have good people and good technology.’ And I think sums up that what we’re doing is we’re bringing really good people and good technology, I would say great people and great technology, and that’s how we are able to remain a strong USA.

Terry Gerton: Was there anything about the conversations at the conference that surprised you?

Jim Carroll: I think a calmness, to be honest. I think I calmness with everyone sort of recognizing that this shutdown will end, that people, the larger companies are trying to move people around to contracts that are fully funded and do things like that. But even those sort of medium-sized companies are calm and knowing that this is a storm that they can ride out. That’s our message that we’re fighting. This, you know, some of the small companies who are almost exclusive DoD or maybe I should say exclusive to the federal government, because there was the DoD contract, pretty much exclusive DoD, they’re hurting and they’re worried. But there’s not a sense of panic. And Terry, maybe that’s reflection that this has been such a new world for the last 10, now 11 months that they are used to holding tight and they’re resilient. And so I was very pleased that they were able to understand and rely on us and their fellow members. We’re so much stronger when we’re together that we’re fighting for the reimbursement and a quick start.

Terry Gerton: Was there any consensus around the future of the defense sector and the defense industrial base?

Jim Carroll: Everyone does believe that the next three years and a few months, there will continue to be an emphasis on DoD and DHS. One of the issues is, we know that we’ve discussed, was not only how AI is going to continue to change the landscape, but the power demands for AI are going to be a very real issue for everyone, including people who have nothing to do with the government where there’s so much of a energy requirement for these data centers, especially as we get into AI, what will the impact be on the civilian population? We’ve heard things such a possible rolling brownouts in some parts of the U.S. as this pull continues of energy. There were some conversations, obviously, about the use of modular nuclear reactors, small ones that would pop up around the country and the use of those to fund the technology from an energy perspective. And so that was a fascinating discussion as well and just sort of a thought-provoking for the future.

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