NASA's effort to combat knowledge loss amid workforce reductions accelerates strategic reforms

NASA is facing a familiar but sharpened problem: as retirements and workforce reductions accelerate across the federal government, the agency risks losing years of hard-earned institutional knowledge at the very moment its procurement work is becoming more demanding.

Marvin Horne, NASA’s deputy senior procurement executive, said the challenge is not simply filling vacancies. The deeper issue is replacing the judgement that comes only from decades of handling complex source ev...

aluations, contract structures, negotiations and the often-informal collaboration needed between programme and procurement teams.

NASA is responding with a broad effort to strengthen its acquisition workforce through more extensive training, better sharing of expertise and a stronger emphasis on strategic judgement. The aim is to help contracting officers and acquisition specialists keep pace with a procurement environment that is growing more intricate, while still protecting the agency’s interests and supporting mission delivery and safety.

That need is especially pressing as NASA pushes ahead with ambitious exploration goals, including the return of astronauts to the Moon by 2028. Horne said staff need the right knowledge and tools to structure contracts and vehicles that can support the agency’s objectives in a period of rapid change.

One element of NASA’s approach is to bring acquisition staff into projects earlier. Horne argued that early involvement helps contracting professionals understand not just what is being purchased, but why, giving them a better platform for decision-making across the life of a programme or contract. He also urged a shift away from a purely compliance-driven culture towards one that manages risk more intelligently.

Across the agency’s 10 sites, NASA is also trying to reduce duplication and lighten the burden on contracting staff by standardising decisions, pre-approving acquisition strategies, expanding the use of templates and making greater use of enterprise-wide contract vehicles. Shared pricing support, common source-selection materials and agency-wide contracts are all part of that push.

The agency is pairing those structural changes with communication efforts, including large virtual gatherings, local meetings and guidance materials designed to spread lessons learned and best practice more widely. The idea is to make stronger acquisition methods less dependent on a few high-performing teams and more routine across the agency.

Horne said the Revolutionary FAR Overhaul could reinforce that direction by stripping out non-statutory procedures and giving contracting professionals more speed and flexibility. In his view, that matters particularly in the kind of fluid, high-stakes environments NASA often faces.

NASA’s emphasis on training is not new. The agency’s APPEL knowledge programme, which grew out of reforms launched after the Challenger disaster, reflects a long-standing effort to pair formal instruction with practical learning and lessons learned. Its procurement support structures, including training for contracting officers and representatives, also point to the importance NASA places on developing acquisition expertise from within.

The broader workforce picture is changing too. In January 2026, NASA and the University of Texas System announced an expanded research and workforce development partnership, while Administrator Jared Isaacman has also outlined new hiring and conversion pathways intended to close capability gaps and strengthen core competencies. Together, those initiatives suggest an agency trying to rebuild depth at a time when experience is walking out of the door.

For Horne, the moment is both difficult and unusually important. The challenge is to preserve the discipline of the acquisition system while making it faster, smarter and more adaptable. For NASA, he implied, that may be one of the most consequential organisational shifts in years.

Source: Noah Wire Services