Handshake Justification REDACTED 12102024.pdf
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- Attached to
- Justification and Approval for Handshake Premium Federal contract opportunity
- Solicitation number
- 47HAA025Q0005
- Issued by
- General Services Administration
About this file
This document is a Justification for Other than Full and Open Competition (JOFOC) for GSA's Office of Human Resources Management to award a sole-source contract to Handshake for Premium subscription services. The contract will be a firm-fixed price agreement for five years (one 12-month base period plus four 12-month option periods), providing 30 licenses for Handshake Premium products including Talent Engagement Suite, Federal Expert Assist, Insights, Event Manager, and Branding capabilities.
The justification establishes Handshake as the only viable vendor due to their unique market position and capabilities, including access to over 200 minority-serving institutions and a talent pool of over 12 million college students. Market research via an RFI (RFQ1720544) from 8/21/2024 to 8/28/2024 yielded six responses, none of which could provide the required services. The document notes that 27 other federal agencies currently use Handshake Premium, and recent comparable awards to DOT, CDC, and USDA showed price differences ranging from -19.6% to -32.8%. The procurement will be publicized on Contract Opportunities for 15 days before issuing a solicitation. GSA requires these premium features to enhance their recruitment capabilities beyond the limited free version currently in use.
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Handshake, with its early focus on entry level hiring of students in colleges, holds the market share on digital job site access to college entry-level talent around the U.S. Their free partnership with college career centers around the country has allowed them to create a talent pool of over 12 million users of the 19 million college students in the U.S.
The free version of Handshake allows us to proactively post jobs to digital career center job boards, with the permission of the universities. Though this level of access provides a reasonable means of passive recruitment, many of the most important capabilities of Handshake remain inaccessible without HandShake Premium. These features include:
Ability to build pools of applicants, based on specific criteria including:
● Veterans
● Geographic area
● Specific college major
● Years till graduation
● Academic performance (for some Handshake partner schools)
● Public service propensity
Advanced analytics to identify target universities for specific recruitment efforts. For example:
● Specific degree programs that feed hard to fill job series for direct sourcing
● Minority Serving Institutions most likely to produce graduates with federal service propensity
● To feed quality candidates into special programs like the Acquisition Talent Development (ATD)
Program and specific Pathways Internships
● Direct message those students identified
● Specific analytics to allow us to better refine our recruitment efforts
Event Manager - Handshake Premium has an event manager feature that would allow us to host virtual events on Handshake
Improved employer landing page and branding with additional features to help us stand out compared to the 750,000 other employers on Handshake.
Simultaneous Recruitment Event Posting - Unlike job posting on Handshake, advertising events like virtual information sessions can only be posted to one school at a time. Handshake Premium allows for event posting to many schools at once.
At this time, 27 federal agencies, many of which we directly compete with for talent, utilize Handshake Premium. They include agencies that are less than half GSA’s size with much smaller budgets. This information is publicly available via the vendor's website The agencies using Handshake Premium are :
OPM
EPA
FBI
ODNI
DIA
CISA
HHS
Federal Bureau of Prisons
Small Business Administration
NASA
NSA
FDIC
Federal Reserve Dept. of Treasury US Army Recruiting US Navy Recruiting
Dept. of Labor PMF Program
CDC
CMS
State Department Secret Service
DHS
File details come from the government source that posted it. Updated .