Watch the Deep Dive of this post
GSA’s Procurement Revolution: Consolidation and the FAR Overhaul Explained
The federal acquisition landscape is undergoing its most significant transformation in decades. The General Services Administration (GSA) is spearheading a complex effort to modernize the system, driven by two powerful executive orders (EOs) that aim to accelerate processes, reduce costs, and empower the acquisition workforce.
GSA is committed to productive industry relationships, viewing stakeholder and industry engagement as a vital part of its success in ensuring a more effective acquisition system.
EO 1: Consolidating Procurement for Maximum Savings
The first major directive is the Executive Order titled “Eliminating Waste and Saving Taxpayer Dollars by Consolidating Procurement,” issued in March. This EO dramatically expands GSA’s role by focusing on consolidating the procurement of common goods and services.
The core premise is that empowering GSA—the agency designed to conduct procurement—will eliminate waste and duplication, allowing other agencies to focus entirely on their core missions.
Key Impacts of Consolidation:
- GWAC Consolidation: The EO directs the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to name GSA as the executive agent for all Government-Wide Acquisition Contracts (GWACs). Currently, three agencies hold these designations: GSA, NASA, and the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Once designated, GSA will be placed in charge of all existing GWACs, including those from NASA and NIH, and tasked with rationalizing these major contract vehicles, some of which account for billions of dollars in annual obligations.
- Category Management: This initiative reinforces the federal government’s approach to buying as an organized entity, rather than thousands of individual buyers. GSA currently leads six of the ten major categories of common commercial spending, including IT, Professional Services, and Facilities and Construction. Consolidation seeks to maximize savings by expanding the percentage of common spending that flows through GSA’s Category Management-approved “best-in-class” contracts.
This consolidation effort means GSA will be doing business differently and shifting resources toward consolidated procurement. This large-scale change will necessarily impact industry partners, influencing go-to-market strategies, pricing, and bid/no-bid decisions.
EO 2: The Revolutionary FAR Overhaul
The second thunderbolt for the acquisition system is the Revolutionary FAR Overhaul (RFO), mandated by Executive Order 14275, “Restoring Common Sense to Federal Procurement,” issued in April 2025.
The RFO acknowledges that the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) is too large and complicated, which discourages companies from contracting with the U.S. government. The mandate is to simplify and rewrite the FAR by stripping it of non-statutory requirements and retaining only what is essential to sound procurement.
A New Acquisition Guidebook:
The FAR Council is implementing the rewrite through a rapid process using deviations before formal rulemaking takes place. The outcome will be Strategic Acquisition Guidance (SAG), which consists of two key parts:
- A Skinnied-Down FAR: The revised FAR will remain regulatory and will contain statutory language plus the basic necessities of federal contracting. Contrary to some speculation, GSA confirms it is not aiming for a 100-page FAR. The goal is to preserve the best aspects of the FAR, such as common clauses, a shared rule book, and safeguards against waste, fraud, and abuse.
- Non-Regulatory Resources: To complement the new FAR, GSA is developing non-regulatory resources, including:
- Practitioner Albums: Learning assets aligned with each FAR deviation to help the acquisition workforce understand changes, summarizing what was removed from the regulatory text and where that guidance may have moved.
- FAR Companion Guides: Designed to operationalize the new FAR and strengthen the adoption of best practices.
- Category Buying Guides: Resources intended to help the workforce efficiently navigate buying pathways aligned with category management.
This overhaul is set to empower contracting officers by removing hundreds of “shall” statements that dictate process, granting them more discretion to accomplish objectives.
Participation is Imperative
The success of both the consolidation mandate and the FAR rewrite hinges on active partnership with industry. GSA recognizes the need to grow and expand the industrial base, particularly by lowering barriers to entry for innovative small businesses.
Industry partners must understand that GSA will be asking for ideas, expertise, and suggestions on how practices drive costs and how those practices can be changed.
The central, indispensable resource for monitoring these changes, accessing documents, and submitting input is Acquisition.gov. The website features dedicated Revolutionary FAR Overhaul pages where stakeholders can find model deviations, agency deviations (like GSA’s), and the Practitioner Albums. Feedback mechanisms are available for each FAR part deviation, typically open for 45 days.
As the federal government embarks on this collective journey to implement faster acquisition suitable for the modern era, thoughtful engagement from industry is essential.
Tags: GSA, federal acquisition, FAR Overhaul, contract consolidation, GWACs, category management, procurement, small business, acquisition.gov, strategic acquisition guidance, marketus