We have a situation at a site where the incumbent contractor has been in place for the last 5 to 6 years for operational support of the IT infrastructure and has become very uncooperative and unresponsive to the hiring management staff request for information. This is a new situation for me since normally contractors attempt to please customers and not attempt to usurp the supervising agency’s authority to review, approve, and generally stay engaged in the day-to-day operations. Our company leadership in the past has probably not fully engaged in the operational aspects of the contractor and now due to high customer dissatisfaction desires to do so but appears to be afraid to engage the contractor on there behavior even though it is clear that the contractors work must be supervised to ensure that the best interests of the organization are served. After all, it will be us, the employees, not the contractors who will be held accountable in the end. What actions do you recommend to break this stalemate and improve the responsiveness of the contracted staff in this area, and to obtain the necessary information to understand the entire operational setup should the vendor walk away from the day to day support of the organization?I do not believe the replacement of personnel is an option at this point based on management’s reluctance to call the contractor on the carpet to date.
