What's worse than overpaying millions for a few routers? Overpaying billions. At the federal level, specifically to prevent such things from occurring, there's

What's worse than overpaying millions for a few routers? Overpaying billions. At the federal level, specifically to prevent such things from occurring, there's this huge byzantine procurement process. A process that is literally worth tens of billions of dollars to game. So if you have product foo and want to see a zillion copies of it to the feds instead of some freeware or cheaper solution? 1) Convince somebody on the inside of the procurement system that yours is the best product, 2) they write up the specification so that no other products will qualify (many times just copying directly from your brochure) even though it's technically an "open" bid, and 3) have somebody with lots of procurement knowledge help guide the paperwork through the system. At the end of the day, it's all just paperwork, no matter how much money is involved. And that's just what I've observed in IT. I'm guessing IT is the worst, since all the products somewhat look alike. But I'm not sure. Quite frankly, its way too depressing to think about much. BTW, the best way to do #1 is simply hire people retiring out of the procurement system. Yep, there are laws against direct hires, so you hire somebody from DoD to help shepherd a Commerce Department contract, or a DHS procurement expert to help with a DoD job, and so forth. If you do this correctly, the poor schmucks left handling the paperwork will be so happy that you can offer extensive support in making sure everything is done correctly that this is another huge plus in favor of your getting the bid.