The Department of Defense (DOD) is the federal government's largest consumer of information technology (IT) resources, spending almost $22 billion on IT in fiscal year 2001. For this reason, it is critical that DOD adopt effective IT acquisition practices. To better understand commercial IT acquisition practices and how they potentially compare with those used at DOD, we reviewed existing research, held discussions with academic and professional authorities, and interviewed executives and managers at leading commercial organizations about their IT acquisition decisionmaking and management activities. We used this information plus the extensive research and trade literature available on IT acquisition practices to develop a consensus view of what is critical to success when acquiring IT services. On October 31, 2001, we provided the results of our study to your offices via electronic mall. These results are included as an appendix to this letter. The purpose of this letter is to officially transmit the information to you in published form. In brief, we present a generic framework of practices from leading commercial organizations, which use the term outsourcing to describe activities associated with acquiring IT services. The framework is composed of a set of leading practices that represent those most critical to successful outsourcing. Grouped into seven common phases, the practices and underlying critical success factors define an IT outsourcing process.