ROCK ISLAND ARSENAL, Illinois (Sept. 9, 2025) – Army Contracting Command-Rock Island’s Source Selection Support Center of Excellence (S3COE) team, which consists of Jacob Harrison, lead procurement analyst and procurement analysts Kelly Herlein and Zach Schuler collaborated with Charles Gram and Thomas Phillips from ACC–Detroit Arsenal to showcase the Fostering Acquisition Streamlining through Technology, Rapid Automation, and Contracting Knowledge (FAST TRACK) tool that Gram and Phillips developed with ACC headquarters’ G6 staff.
Gram serves as the chief for Global Intelligence and Linguist Services as well as providing direct support to the director of Combat and Services contracting. Phillips serves as the chief of the Intelligence and Security Command and the Ground Vehicle Systems Center, Development Command Pricing Branch.
Herlein explained that FAST TRACK is a closed artificial intelligence system, not a language learning module, designed to simplify source selection evaluations and significantly decreases the time required to complete them.
FAST TRACK will quickly crosswalk a solicitation and the contractors’ proposals to identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and observations, also known as SWOOs. The SWOOs can then be independently verified and/or changed by the source selection evaluators. The evaluators can interact with the tool to improve and expound upon the findings. After reviewing and making the appropriate changes, the tool will provide the evaluator with a write-up that includes appropriate findings, enabling the evaluator to have quickly available data to facilitate writing the evaluation report.
Harrison explained that while FAST TRACK is a ACC-Detroit Arsenal’s product, innovation and idea, when they approached ACC–Rock Island with the tool, which went from a concept to a prototype in just six weeks, the Rock Island team jumped on board.
“Our team was an early adopter of utilizing the tool, grabbing the bull by the horns for the Army Ignited acquisition, utilizing innovative evaluation criteria,” said Harrison. “Ms. [Lynda] Armer, [executive director of ACC-Rock Island] was particularly interested in the program, and she wanted our team to get ‘smart’ on it and we were able to work with the Detroit team to do so.”
On July 23, Gram and Phillips visited ACC-Rock Island where they participated in the bi-weekly ACE Your Acquisition podcast and presented FAST TRACK to the workforce during a town hall. Armer thanked them for their collaboration with the FAST TRACK tool.
Harrison stated that after Gram’s and Phillips’s presentation, people have expressed that they are really excited to use this tool.
“The people who have used the tool have spoken very highly of it,” said Harrison. “I think they are surprised at how good it is. There was a lot of skepticism initially, but once it is used, people are very positive about its capabilities.”
The system is adaptable in its source selection ratings to make the necessary changes. Gram and Phillips helped to work through identified challenges and taught the S3COE team how to work out any issues that may come up now that FAST TRACK is live.
Metrics are captured and evaluated continuously to ensure that the use of the FAST TRACK tool is driving forward DoD and Army priorities of acquisition reform. S3COE encourages the workforce to tune in to future ACE Your Acquisition podcasts for updates and to reach out to the ACC-Rock Island S3COE team for any questions regarding FAST TRACK.
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