Attachment 1 - SOW Handshake.pdf

STATEMENT OF WORK

Handshake Talent Engagement Suite

Requirement No.: 270227

1. BACKGROUND

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), Office of Human Capital (OHC), Division of Strategic and Customer Relations (DSCR) is responsible for executing targeted recruitment and outreach efforts to attract qualified candidates to CMS. To support this mission, CMS has utilized the Handshake platform to engage students and early career talent at colleges and universities across the United States.

Handshake is the leading early talent recruiting platform connecting employers with students and recent graduates from over 1,500 colleges and universities and a network of 25 million students and alumni. Handshake qualifies as a Sole Source vendor within Federal Government agencies, providing CMS with unique access to early career talent pipelines not available through other platforms. The platform directly supports the Federal Merit Hiring Plan, 2025, which calls for integrating modern technology to support recruitment, building strong early career talent pipelines, and targeting recruitment at state, land-grant, religious, and community colleges.

2. OBJECTIVE

The objective of this requirement is to procure continued access to the Handshake Talent Engagement Suite to support CMS/OHC's targeted recruitment and outreach mission, including the ability to post positions, engage candidates, and fill hard-to-fill roles across the agency.

3. SCOPE OF WORK

The contractor shall provide CMS/OHC with access to the Handshake Talent Engagement Suite

– Reduced Scope package, which includes the following:

3.1 Account Owner

The contractor shall provide one (1) Account Owner seat for CMS/OHC administrative management of the platform.

3.2 Recruiter Sourcers

The contractor shall provide access for three (3) CMS Recruiter Sourcer licenses. Each license provides authorized CMS recruiters with the ability to:

• Post job announcements and review applications

• Conduct targeted sourcing by filtering talent based on skills, engagement, interests, and more

• Manage candidates through unlimited talent matches, nurturing, and applicant review

• Send unlimited 1:1, bulk, and scaled messages to the Handshake network of 18M+ students

• Attend unlimited fairs and host events across multiple schools

• Utilize School Explorer to determine school prioritization with live data

3.3 Federal Expert Assist

The contractor shall provide Federal Expert Assist support, which includes:

• Ongoing 1:1 training and tactical office hours to support CMS recruiters

• Guidance on best practices for federal recruiting on the Handshake platform

• Support for developing and executing engagement campaigns

• Dedicated bandwidth to boost recruiting efforts and accelerate onboarding

3.4 Insights Dashboard

The contractor shall provide access to the Handshake Insights Dashboard, which includes:

• Executive overview with high-level snapshot of recruitment inputs and outcomes

• Engagement channel deep dives covering brand health, job discovery and promotion, messaging outreach and engagement, and events and campus activation

• School insights to inform school ROI and strategic opportunity

• Peer benchmarking against relevant employer groups

• Real-time dashboards and actionable optimization recommendations

3.5 Promotions Budget Credit

The contractor shall provide a Promotions Budget credit of $37,500 per year to be used within the Handshake Promotions module. This credit shall be used to:

• Elevate priority job postings to best-fit qualified candidates based on skills, interests, and behavior signals

• Support targeted outreach for hard-to-fill positions

• Increase visibility of CMS recruitment campaigns

Note: The Promotions Budget is a platform credit and does not carry independent monetary value outside of the Handshake platform.

3.6 Dedicated Customer Success Manager

The contractor shall assign a Dedicated Customer Success Manager to CMS/OHC who will:

• Serve as the primary point of contact for account management

• Monitor platform usage and provide regular performance reporting

• Provide recommendations to maximize recruitment outcomes

4. PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE

Period Start Date End Date

Base Year (FY 2027) September 25, 2026 September 24, 2027

Option Year 1 (FY 2028) September 25, 2027 September 24, 2028

Option Year 2 (FY 2029) September 25, 2028 September 24, 2029

Option Year 3 (FY 2030) September 25, 2029 September 24, 2030

Option Year 4 (FY 2031) September 25, 2030 September 24, 2031

5. PLACE OF PERFORMANCE

Services will be performed virtually. CMS/OHC is located at: 7500 Security Boulevard Baltimore, MD 21244

6. DELIVERABLES

Deliverable Description Frequency

Platform Access Access to Handshake Talent Engagement Suite for 1 Account Owner + 3 Recruiter Sourcers Continuous

Federal Expert Assist 1:1 training and tactical office hours As needed / ongoing

Insights Dashboard Real-time recruiting performance data and benchmarking Continuous

Promotions Credit $37,500 annual platform credit for targeted job postings Annual

Deliverable Description Frequency

Performance Reporting Platform usage and recruitment outcome reports Quarterly

Customer Success Check-ins Account management and strategy sessions Monthly