[moxious]

This answer is not correct. MITRE is not a staffing agency, but a special purpose entity called a Federally Funded Research and Development Center (FFRDC). The other answer in this thread is better -- a key thing MITRE gets pushback from other entities about is whether or not it is ideally suited to fill some government need, or whether it's just an anticompetitive way of awarding a contract to one body instead of letting it out as the government would normally do.

Those pressures tend to focus and specialize MITRE on issues which require objectivity and high levels of expertise in systems engineering sub-areas. They are most definitely not a staffing agency, although the government can (and sometimes does) misuse them to this effect.

[Junk_Collector]

No, Mitre is not an FFRDC. Mitre is the administrator of a number (about 6 or 7) of FFRDCs which are run as an identifiable separate operating unit of a parent organization pursuant section 35 of the FAR.

Further more, Mitre has several positions posted right now that have nothing to do with FFRDCs and are in fact, just providing personnel for government projects. Splitting hairs on the terminology is a great game to play on the internet, but what would the average person call a company that produces no products and provides administrative, research, and engineering personnel on a basis of awarded contracts? The fact that Mitre employees seem to continually conflate their work as engineering contractors and their roles as FFDR administrators is a large part of my "mixed" experience in working with them.

And frankly; by your definition Honeywell would be an FFRDC which I don't think anyone would argue.

[fl0wenol]

It's not like an agency can just go to MITRE and say "Hey, do you have any geospatial analysts, I need a few."

They have to jump through a lot of hoops to get to that point. It needs to be part of some research program or development project that they've convinced the sponsoring agency fits within the FFRDC charter and convinced MITRE and the COR they need to assist with, and awarded the tasking (beating everyone else trying to use that vehicle). MITRE and the COR get to decide which programs/projects, and they propose the staffing they think will help.

It's very inconvenient, let's just say.

[Junk_Collector]

Sure it's inconvenient. It's inconvenient to staff anyone in the government. If I could have ordered employees like pizza on any staffing vehicle, I would have staffed them regardless of nearly anything else and never looked back.

Right now I can go on Mitre's website and look at their hot jobs postings. Right there is PM support in the army acquisition core, COTS integration, and several software engineer postings supporting BMD and THAAD. These are not part of their FFRDC line up. A cursory look shows about 1/3rd of current Mitre posting appear unrelated to FFRDCs. These sorts of positions will place Mitre employees in government offices and labs doing the same work along side other contractors hired by other contracting vehicles and along side government engineers doing the same work. It's not wrong, it's just the truth of the matter. There should be more firewalls legally speaking but they often times get broken down just so work can get done. I think that trying to dress Mitre up is not very helpful to someone trying to understand it from the outside. Statements like, "Mitre benefits most when you establish an ever closer relationship with the government agency and people therein. The higher the governmant authority you report to, the more valuable you become within Mitre," sound downright dystopian.

Mitre fulfills multiple rolls. It runs several research centers and fills government positions based on current government contract awards. They treat their employees well and pay a little above average for defense work. Mitre is heavily focused on technical positions or systems engineering. Mitre is a non-profit corporation and does not produce a commercial product. They are prohibited from engaging in manufacturing without special permission from the government.

[fl0wenol]

Largely agreed. The tit-for-tat that can happen where positions get filled on programs having little to do with the FFRDC they're staffed under is a problem and it makes MITRE a target for other contractors who will complain to congress about, etc. It's an existential issue for them.

I've noticed federal agencies twist themselves into knots to try to get MITRE to staff something, and jump through the hoops, and really stretch the FFRDC charter, precisely because staffing anyone in the government is a shit show. I think the percieved value is a good chance of someone who isn't useless in the role and some stability.

I don't know who's fault that is, but I know MITRE hammers the line into PMs heads, you know, you're not a body shop. R&D/prototype work only.

At the same time, portfolio managers would be rewarded for forging new partnerships and getting new projects awarded via the FFRDC, even if they were kind of BS beyond a nice slide deck. Having projects to staff those PhDs on and getting kudos from the sponsors is what matters for advancement so...

Ehhhhh.

[Junk_Collector]

I think we are pretty much in agreement. It really doesn't help how much the government is willing to stretch the definitions of R&D and System Engineering either.