Re: Input from the SMBs?
The problem is that the government operates at a scale that dwarfs the ability of SMBs to service.
Governments outsource because they don't want the overhead of thousands of employees and their associated liabilities on the books. The theory is that the government can concentrate on policy rather than personnel. There's not much advantage gained if you effectively have to retain the middle management and coordination that would be involved in letting and monitoring hundreds of individual contracts with SMBs.
I'd suggest that the government is trying to do rather too much centrally and should be trying to devolve a lot of its work to regions and local authorities, who could then manage a relationship with local SMBs. The historical pattern has been exactly the opposite because local democracy makes it difficult for a central government to impose its writ, but history also suggests that the less central government is able to achieve, the better.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
