Win the work, then keep it.
The award is not the finish line. Some firms do not lose a federal contract at the bid. They lose it afterward, to missed deliverables and deadlines, an overlooked clause, a cost overrun, a subcontractor who slipped, or a funding ceiling nobody was watching. Do not be one of them. We provide you not just with thorough proposal writing services but also an experienced contract administration bench that does the analysis, recommends the course of action, and prepares the deliverables, for a fraction of what building one in-house team would cost, and we write the proposal that wins you the next one.
You run the contract. You own the award, the government relationship, and every signature. We support you.
Keep the contract you won. Win the next one.
Our Contracting Officer experience is what you are buying. We read the clause and tell you what it obligates you to do. We analyze the funding position and tell you when it stops the work. We build the schedule, hold the dates, research the question, set out each course of action with the risk it carries, and prepare the deliverable itself. This is the expert judgment a contracts administration department is hired for, and it is what we do for you.
Contract Administration & Compliance
Read more →We support your representative after award, building and tracking the performance schedule and monitoring compliance across deliverables, CDRLs, clauses, modifications, funding, invoicing, performance ratings, and closeout.
Market Research & Early Positioning
Sources sought responses, capability statements, and feedback on draft requirements, during the government's market research phase.
Read more →Solicitation Questions & RFIs
Formal questions to the government about the released solicitation, during the industry question period.
Read more →Proposal Development
A complete, fully responsive proposal: every volume and attachment the solicitation requires, mapped to how the government scores it.
Read more →Price Volumes
A defensible, fully built price volume for firm-fixed-price, T&M, and labor-hour work, priced to win and built to survive the government's analysis.
Read more →Proposal Compliance & Quality Assurance
A disciplined pre-submission review against Section L, Section M, and every hard requirement, so a strong bid is not lost on a technicality.
Read more →Clarifications, Negotiations & Debriefs
Support through evaluation notices, discussions, revised proposals, and the debrief, whether you win or you do not.
Read more →Our Contracting Officer experience is the difference.
We know what the clause obligates you to do because we used to enforce it.
Three clauses, three obligations
- FAR 52.212-4 Commercial Terms and Conditions
- Changes may be made only by written agreement of both parties. The contracting officer cannot direct a change unilaterally, and work performed on a verbal instruction is work you may never be paid for.
- FAR 52.219-14 Limitations on Subcontracting
- On a services set-aside, no more than 50 percent of what the government pays you may go to subcontractors that are not similarly situated entities. Tracked from the first invoice, not discovered at closeout.
- FAR 52.237-3 Continuity of Services
- Your obligation does not end at the end. On written notice you provide phase-in and phase-out services for up to 90 days, staffed well enough to hold the service at its required level while a successor takes over.
Five hires is a steep climb, and payroll never lets up. Even when you can carry it, we put expert capabilities on your side for less.
A five-person shop does not clock out between bids. Staff it yourself and you carry those salaries all year, whether the pipeline is full or quiet.
You pay for pursuits, not for a payroll.
A salary runs 2,080 hours a year whether or not a solicitation is open.
The price is fixed before we start.
We carry the risk for you. Seasoned contracting professionals know what the work takes, and a fixed price is how we say so. If we are wrong, we absorb it.
There is no seat to equip.
A contracts department needs software, market intelligence subscriptions, certifications, and continuing training, plus someone senior to supervise it. We provide all of that for you on day one.
You avoid recruiting and retention.
No search, no weeks with a seat sitting empty, no months before a new hire is fully productive, and no knowledge walking out the door when they leave.
Our contracting knowledge and experience allow us to produce a high-quality proposal within the given deadline.
A former Contracting Officer reads a solicitation once and understands what it will be scored on. A draft that takes four rewrite passes is more expensive, and you pay for those passes either way. When the due date is close, that difference stops being about cost. It decides whether you submit a strong bid, a rushed one, or none at all.
So what does a contracts department actually cost?Take a look
Every figure built from Bureau of Labor Statistics wage data and current market salaries, with the arithmetic shown so you can run it against your own numbers.
Read the full breakdown →Loaded 2026 market cost of staffing these five seats yourself, and carrying them whether the pipeline is full or quiet.
- Proposal Manager$100,000 base$135,000
- Proposal Writer$96,000 base$130,000
- Contract Administrator$110,000 base$149,000
- Compliance / Quality Assurance Specialist$85,000 base$115,000
- Subcontract Administrator$65,000 base$88,000
Loaded cost is base salary plus benefits and payroll taxes. The Bureau of Labor Statistics supports 48.5 percent ($676,000) for professional occupations as of March 2026. These figures use a conservative 35 percent.
How this is calculated →See the full breakdown →
Practical guidance for federal contractors.
Short notes on competing for the work, and getting paid for it.
What a contracts department actually costs
The salary is the smallest number in the decision. Here is the whole of it, built from federal wage data rather than from a brochure.
Why a strong representative still needs contract administration support
Administering a contract is a different job from running one. Your representative keeps the first. The second is where capable firms quietly lose money and their next award.
How small businesses build past performance from a standing start
The single biggest hurdle for new federal contractors, and practical ways to clear it.
Reading a solicitation: what actually matters first
Where to look before you decide whether a contract is worth bidding.
Cash flow while you perform: what every new contractor should know
Assignment of claims, progress payments, and financing options that keep you solvent between invoices.
Which FAR governs your contract right now
The acquisition rulebook is being rewritten one part at a time, and most of it is in force through agency deviations rather than the FAR you can look up.