Configuration Management/Quality Assurance (CM/QA

SOURCES SOUGHT NOTICE This Sources Sought Notice is for informational and planning purposes only and shall not be construed as a solicitation or as an obligation or commitment by the Government. This notice is intended strictly for Market Research. THIS IS NOT A SOLICITATION FOR PROPOSALS AND NO CONTRACT SHALL BE AWARDED FROM THIS SYNOPSIS. The Office of Information Systems and Technology (OIST) under the direction of the Department of Labor (DOL), Employment and Training Administration (ETA) Office of Management and Administrative Services (OMAS) requires services for monitoring Information Technology (IT) environments, monitoring, control and updating of developmental processes, monitoring and control of product releases, and monitoring and control of quality product testing by ensuring the IT environments are consistent, aligned and controlled, and that products meet functional and physical attributes of the customer requirements through well designed processes and quality testing throughout its production life-cycle. Quality Assurance (QA), Quality Control- software Change Management (sCM) and infrastructure Change Management (iCM) are services that support DOL/ETA OMAS and OIST's Information Technology (IT) vision, mission, and IT service delivery. Department of Labor's Office of the Chief Information Officer (OCIO) is responsible for the integrity of the Enterprise IT infrastructure through the operational activities of the infrastructure Change Management (iCM) team. The QA Branch is responsible for the quality of products produced through Quality Assurance (QA), Quality Control-Independent Verification (IV) Validation (V) & Testing (T) (QC-IVV&T) and software Change Management (sCM) activities, which ensure requisite processes are monitored, efficient, relevant, and continuously updated and streamlined to organizational business practices, and ensures fulfillment of project requirements, and satisfies the stakeholder expectations. The requirement is to provide ETA with Quality Assurance (QA), Quality Control Independent Verification (IV) Validation (V) & Testing (T) (QC-IVV&T), software Change Management (sCM) and infrastructure Change Management (iCM) services as required to meet DOL/ ETA OMAS/OIST infrastructure and applications development mission requirements. The vendor is expected to be knowledgeable and experienced in all aspects of QA, QC-IVV&T, sCM and iCM as they apply to the enterprise IT environment, an applications development methodologies and practices. The vendor shall have demonstrated experience with applying industry and government best practices to all activities identified above; demonstrated experience and knowledge of enterprise IT operations, demonstrated experience and knowledge with applications development and governance processes (e.g. Organizational Configuration Management Board (OCMB), Change Control Board (CCB) and Release Management (RM)); and demonstrated experience and knowledge with the practical application of Software Development Life-Cycle Management principles. Furthermore, with respect to iCM, the vendor is expected to be knowledgeable and experienced in network, data center operations and architecture, current techniques and tools for monitoring enterprise IT environments, industry and government best practices, Government security regulations and policies, and general change management principles. Likewise, the vendor is also expected to be knowledgeable and experienced in QA, QC-IVV&T, sCM as they applied to software development operations throughout the product's life-cycle; to include but not limited to, continuous monitoring of policy and process compliance, governance, current application testing techniques, defects (bug) reporting and change control activities; maintaining the integrity of the application and documentation repository; developing and maintaining configuration management plans; monitoring system configurations e.g. assessing and testing the level of compliance with established baseline configurations; applications (code) testing verification, application security testing (at the code level), defects (bugs) reporting techniques; monitoring updates to baseline configurations; and configuration status of the enterprise IT environment; maintain and upgrading QA, QC-IVVT&T and CM software tools. Throughout the life of this contract, the Vendor shall provide overarching QA relevant to established processes, policies, governance through a program of continuous process improvement. It is incumbent upon the vendor to ensure the integrity and quality of applications and subsidiary products developed to support the execution of ETA OMAS/OIST's mission. HOW TO RESPOND TO THIS RFI: The responses to this RFI will be used for the purpose of market research so as to gain an understanding of what capabilities are available in the marketplace from fully capable vendors. Your RFI response will NOT be considered as a proposal. The Department of Labor seeks these responses for informational purposes only. DEADLINE FOR SUBMISION: 12 P.M. (Noon) ET, August 29, 2014 RESPOND TO: Respond via email only to quitoriano.jeanette@dol.gov by the deadline. Include "Configuration Management/Quality Assurance" RFI Response from [company name] in the subject line of your email. Provide any cover letter information in the email and your company Capability Statement (Not to Exceed two (2) pages) as an attachment to your email. RESPOND FORMAT: - The RFI Response Document may be attached as Microsoft Word or an Adobe PDF file. - The email plus attachment cannot exceed 3MB. OTHER CONTACT INFORMATION: Office of Procurement Services, U.S. Department of Labor Jeanette L.B. Quitoriano Contract Specialist Telephone No.: (202) 693-4581 All interested firms shall submit a response demonstrating their capabilities. As stipulated in FAR 15.201, responses to this notice are not considered offers and cannot be accepted by the Government to form a binding contract. No solicitation exists; therefore, do not request a copy of the solicitation. The decision to solicit for a contract shall be solely at the Government's discretion. Any information submitted by respondents to this sources sought synopsis is voluntary. This sources sought notice is not to be construed as a commitment by the Government, nor will the Government reimburse any costs associated with the submission of information in response to this notice. Respondents will not individually be notified of the results of any government assessments. The Government's evaluation of the capability statements received will factor into whether any forthcoming solicitation will be conducted as a full and open competition or as a set-aside for small businesses, or any particular small business designation (e.g. SDVOSB, HUBZone, 8(a), SDB, WOSB, VOSB, etc.). Capabilities package: All interested firms shall submit a capabilities package with evidence to provide the items listed above and small business classification(s): (Small Business, 8(a), HUBZone, SDB, SDVOSB, WOSB, VOSB, etc.) The Government intends to consider all comments and the responsive capability statements when developing its final acquisition strategy and resulting RFQ(s). Responses may be submitted electronically to the following e-mail address: quitoriano.jeanette@dol.gov in a Microsoft word compatible format to be received no later than 12:00 p.m., Eastern Standard Time on 29 August 2014.