Building Better Service Requirements: 2-Day Workshop
This course is for the people who define what the government is buying before anyone writes it down — the requiring-activity and program staff, contracting officers, contract specialists, CORs, and technical experts who shape service requirements.
Most service contracts that go wrong didn't fail in the writing — they failed in the thinking. The requirement was vague. Or it claimed to be performance-based but described tasks instead of outcomes. Or it used the wrong document type, or asked for something no one could actually measure, or was copied from last year without anyone asking whether last year got it right. By the time that requirement reaches a performance work statement, an evaluation, or a contractor's invoice, the damage is already baked in — and no amount of careful drafting later will undo it. This course works the part everyone skips: getting the requirement right before a word of it is written.
Over two days, participants learn to turn a fuzzy mission need into a clear, defensible requirement. We work through translating what a customer says they want into what they actually need; deciding whether performance-based acquisition is the right approach in the first place; separating the outcomes the government must require from the methods it should leave to the contractor; defining what "good" looks like in terms someone can actually measure and survey; and surfacing the assumptions, constraints, and dependencies that quietly sink a requirement when they go unspoken. Using the requirements-analysis discipline behind the government's Requirements Roadmap, participants take a real requirement apart and rebuild it — sharper, measurable, and ready to write.
The payoff shows up everywhere downstream. A well-defined requirement makes the PWS easier to write, the evaluation easier to run, the surveillance easier to perform, and the contractor easier to hold to account. Get the requirement right, and the rest of the acquisition gets easier. Get it wrong, and everything after it inherits the problem.
This course is taught by Melinda Milheim, JD, who spent her federal career in the acquisition workforce. She served as a Contract Specialist and Contracting Officer's Representative for the U.S. Navy and the Department of Health and Human Services / Indian Health Service, where she worked on more than $7.7 billion in federal contracts — mostly services contracts, spanning RDT&E, engineering, medical, and major weapon-system programs. She draws on that experience, along with her law degree and MBA studies, to teach the why behind the how — so participants leave with sharper judgment, not just a process to follow. An award-winning DAU/WarU (DAWIA and FAI) instructor, she has taught more than 1,000 federal acquisition workforce students across 20-plus agencies.
Best for: Anyone who shapes a service requirement before it becomes a contract — requiring-activity and program staff, contracting officers, contract specialists, contracting officer's representatives, and the technical experts and end users who know the work but haven't been trained to define it. Valuable across defense and civilian agencies alike.
Format: Two-day workshop, delivered in person or virtually and tailored to your organization's priorities. Eligible attendees earn 8 CLPs per day. A note on CLPs: This workshop earns continuous learning points (CLPs) that both defense (DAWIA) and civilian (FAC-C, FAC-COR, and FAC-P/PM) acquisition professionals can apply toward the continuous learning required to maintain certification. Because agencies set their own rules on what qualifies for CLP credit, check with your Acquisition Career Manager (ACM) or component training office to confirm how it applies to your plan.
Pricing is set per engagement. Contact Phoenix Canyon to request a quote.
This course is for the people who define what the government is buying before anyone writes it down — the requiring-activity and program staff, contracting officers, contract specialists, CORs, and technical experts who shape service requirements.
Most service contracts that go wrong didn't fail in the writing — they failed in the thinking. The requirement was vague. Or it claimed to be performance-based but described tasks instead of outcomes. Or it used the wrong document type, or asked for something no one could actually measure, or was copied from last year without anyone asking whether last year got it right. By the time that requirement reaches a performance work statement, an evaluation, or a contractor's invoice, the damage is already baked in — and no amount of careful drafting later will undo it. This course works the part everyone skips: getting the requirement right before a word of it is written.
Over two days, participants learn to turn a fuzzy mission need into a clear, defensible requirement. We work through translating what a customer says they want into what they actually need; deciding whether performance-based acquisition is the right approach in the first place; separating the outcomes the government must require from the methods it should leave to the contractor; defining what "good" looks like in terms someone can actually measure and survey; and surfacing the assumptions, constraints, and dependencies that quietly sink a requirement when they go unspoken. Using the requirements-analysis discipline behind the government's Requirements Roadmap, participants take a real requirement apart and rebuild it — sharper, measurable, and ready to write.
The payoff shows up everywhere downstream. A well-defined requirement makes the PWS easier to write, the evaluation easier to run, the surveillance easier to perform, and the contractor easier to hold to account. Get the requirement right, and the rest of the acquisition gets easier. Get it wrong, and everything after it inherits the problem.
This course is taught by Melinda Milheim, JD, who spent her federal career in the acquisition workforce. She served as a Contract Specialist and Contracting Officer's Representative for the U.S. Navy and the Department of Health and Human Services / Indian Health Service, where she worked on more than $7.7 billion in federal contracts — mostly services contracts, spanning RDT&E, engineering, medical, and major weapon-system programs. She draws on that experience, along with her law degree and MBA studies, to teach the why behind the how — so participants leave with sharper judgment, not just a process to follow. An award-winning DAU/WarU (DAWIA and FAI) instructor, she has taught more than 1,000 federal acquisition workforce students across 20-plus agencies.
Best for: Anyone who shapes a service requirement before it becomes a contract — requiring-activity and program staff, contracting officers, contract specialists, contracting officer's representatives, and the technical experts and end users who know the work but haven't been trained to define it. Valuable across defense and civilian agencies alike.
Format: Two-day workshop, delivered in person or virtually and tailored to your organization's priorities. Eligible attendees earn 8 CLPs per day. A note on CLPs: This workshop earns continuous learning points (CLPs) that both defense (DAWIA) and civilian (FAC-C, FAC-COR, and FAC-P/PM) acquisition professionals can apply toward the continuous learning required to maintain certification. Because agencies set their own rules on what qualifies for CLP credit, check with your Acquisition Career Manager (ACM) or component training office to confirm how it applies to your plan.
Pricing is set per engagement. Contact Phoenix Canyon to request a quote.