NITAAC’s Coen heading to new role at GSA

Rob Coen, the director of the National Institutes of Health’s IT Acquisition and Assessment Center (NITAAC), will join GSA’s Federal Systems Integration and...

Jason Miller@jmillerWFED

August 3, 2016 4:53 am

2 min read

Rob Coen, the director of the National Institutes of Health’s IT Acquisition and Assessment Center (NITAAC), is moving to a new job.

Coen decided to leave NITAAC after seven-plus years to take a new position at the General Services Administration’s Federal Systems Integration and Management Center (FedSIM).

“It’s been a great run at NIH and I think this program is in the best position it’s ever been in and I was looking to move on to new adventures,” Coen said in an interview with Federal News Radio. “I’m really a person who likes to get in to a job where I can turn something around and make it grow, and then move on. I think I’ve done that here.”

Rob Coen will leave as the director of NITAAC on Aug. 22.

Chris Hamm, the director of FedSIM, said Coen will lead one of the new sectors as part of the Federal Acquisition Service’s impending reorganization.

FedSIM currently has three sectors: civilian, defense and enterprise services, which is mostly the OASIS governmentwide acquisition contract.

Hamm said once the FAS reorganization is approved, FedSIM will expand to four sectors and likely add a fifth a few months later.

“NITAAC has done a great job with customer outreach and creating a web platform or portal for its CIO-SP3 contract, and I look forward to implementing some of those best practices and Rob will help expand our civilian business,” Hamm said.

Coen said he will start at FedSIM on Aug. 22. He said he’s unsure who will replace him even on an acting basis at NITAAC.

Bridget Gauer is the deputy director of NITAAC and is a logical replacement, at least temporarily.

Coen’s impact on NITAAC has been impressive, said Mark Amtower, CEO of Amtower and Company, a government marketing firm.

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“When Rob took over NITAAC six-plus years ago, the contracts collectively were doing less than a quarter billion in revenue. Electronic Commodity Store (ECS) contract was a chronic underperformer and the name recognition for the contracts inside government was near non-existent,” Amtower said. “Under Rob’s leadership, NITAAC contracts did nearly $5 billion in fiscal 2015 and are poised to surpass that in 2016. Customer service at NITAAC is first rate and the electronic government ordering system (e-GOS) dashboard provides both buyers and sellers granular purchasing information. For government buyers and CIOs, this makes NITAAC contracts attractive when trying to comply with Federal IT Acquisition Reform Act (FITARA).”

Under Coen’s leadership, NITAAC awarded several large GWACs, including the CIO-Commodities and Solutions (CIO-CS), CIO-SP3 and focused those contracts to meet federal cybersecurity requirements.

Before coming to NITAAC, Coen spent more than 14 years at the Small Business Administration.