ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS - PFM - SSN QA 7.23.24 (Final).docx

19AQMM-24-SS-CACST

Solicitation Number: 19AQMM-24-SS-CACST Agency: U.S. Department of State

QUESTIONS & ANSWERS

Question 1. In regards to the Portfolio Financial Management RFI (19AQMM-24-SS-CACST) posted on SAM, will the Government please clarify if the work to be performed is to be conducted at the contractor’s facility? If yes, please provide the number of FTE’s anticipated to support this effort.

Answer: As noted at the top of the Sources Sought, the work will primarily be performed at the Contractor’s facility, which shall be located within a 30-mile radius of State Annex 17 (SA-17), located at 600 19th St NW, Washington DC. However, as the tasks and activities related to this work require recurring or ad hoc in-person interaction with numerous stakeholders, the Government will make every effort to make space available at SA-17 to ensure performance requirements are met. The number of FTE’s will be determined by the offeror based on the scope of work.

Question 2. Could you please advise if this is a new requirement or is there a current vendor providing these services and if so, could you please identify the vendor and current contract #?

Answer: This is an existing requirement with services currently provided by a vendor.

Question 3. The location at the top says, “Contractor’s Facility must be within a 30-mile radius of 600 19th Street NW Washington, DC,” In our experience, we have done similar work primarily remote with some in person meetings and travel involved. Will this 30-mile radius requirement be in the solicitation?

Answer: As noted at the top of the Sources Sought, the work will primarily be performed at the Contractor’s facility, which shall be located within a 30-mile radius of State Annex 17 (SA-17), located at 600 19th St NW, Washington DC. However, as the tasks and activities related to this work require recurring or ad hoc in-person interaction with numerous stakeholders, the Government will make every effort to make space available at SA-17 to ensure performance requirements are met. Yes, the place of performance requirement will be included in the solicitation.

Question 4. Is there an outline or chart available of existing systems/budgets that are included in the CST Portfolio? Example, 1 portfolio, 5 agencies, each agency has 10 departments, each department has 10 separate budgets. This would amount to 500 budgets that would need to be supported.

Answer: No outline or chart is available. The CA IT portfolio includes 4 major investments (Modernization, Service Production Systems, Enterprise Infrastructure and Operations, and Cybersecurity). Those investments comprise approximately 90 systems and services. CA/CST formulates and executes its own budget and manages multiple contracts for professional services and licensing agreements.

Question 5. Is there a software system that currently compiles all budget data, or will the contractor need to research and recommend financial software systems?

Answer: The Government currently leverages a variety of tools to manage its budget and budget data. The Government would look to the contractor to establish a comprehensive automated budget planning solution that allows for detailed budget planning, analysis, and reporting for budget execution that is supported by and integrates with CST’s acquisition planning processes; and a comprehensive budget formulation solution that allows for detailed development, analysis, and reporting of the formulation budget estimates, which can be used as the basis to build budget justifications, with narratives supported by the detailed formulation budget estimates.

Question 6. Is the Strategic Plan currently underway that needs to be integrated with Financial Management or does the Strategic Plan need further development?

Answer: A draft CA/CST Strategic Plan FY24-26 was developed in 2023 but is pending clearance by the CA CIO before publication. However, CA/CST does continue to operate against these 4 strategic goals: 1-Data Centricity; 2-Cyber Effectiveness; 3-Modern Technology; and 4-Workplace Growth. An official Functional Bureau CA Strategy FY22-26 does exist.

Question 7. What is the format of the training; In-person or virtual?

Answer: Training takes a variety of forms. Typically, in-person training is reserved for leadership coaching or when the curriculum is highly interactive. Otherwise, virtual training is acceptable.

Question 8. Will there be a need to build training into an existing Learning Management System, PowerPoint format, or another method of delivery?

Answer: Government personnel (Civil Service and Foreign Service) use the Foreign Service Institute (FSI) training platform. So, the contractor would not build training modules into that platform. Instead, the delivery method will depend on the target audience, purpose, objectives, frequency, and complexity of the training.

Question 9. Do any training materials currently exist and what additional training materials are required to be built? Examples are module design documents, instructor manual, student materials, etc.

Answer: A variety of training materials produced by the current contractor already exist. The type of materials produced will depend on the training subject matter and audience. For example, if the audience is CA/CST leadership, the material may take the form of briefing materials. or training on a new tool or process, a user guide, SOP, or quick reference guide may need to be developed.

Question 10. Has the decision to transition from MS Project to JIRA final, or would another platform such as Asana, ServiceNow, or Monday.com be considered?

Answer: CST has transitioned from ELM/EWM to JIRA to maintain epics, features, and user stories in support of our iterative development work. We are still leveraging MS Project to create and maintain schedules.

Question 11. Can the Government clarify if there are font type/size requirements for the responses?

Answer: Documents should be written in Time New Roman (font type) with 12-pitch.

Question 12. “Submissions should include responses to the following categories: Company Profile, Recent/Relevant Experience and Questions for Industry”. There are details listed for Company Profile and Questions for Industry in the sources sought– please clarify that Recent/Relevant Experience should be its own section in the response.

Answer: Please submit this information on the Sources Sought form since the information should be apart of your Capability Statement.