AFA honors former AFICC contracting officer as top civilian

  • Published
  • By Steve Warns
  • AFIMSC Public Affairs

JOINT BASE SAN ANTONIO-LACKLAND, Texas – Kori McNabb's contributions to the Air Force Installation and Mission Support Center's mission recently earned her the Air Force Association Lisa S. Disbrow Outstanding Civilian of the Year Award.

As the lead contracting specialist with the Air Force Installation Contracting Center’s 766th Enterprise Sourcing Squadron at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Hawaii, McNabb led a five-member team with a $427 million portfolio and oversaw 30 projects valued at more than $100 million. She played a key role in partnering with AFIMSC's Detachment 2 to establish a civil engineering support contract within eight months that provided vital civil engineering subject matter experts to every installation in Pacific Air Forces in preparation for the Infrastructure Investment Strategy. 

McNabb also helped shape the architecture and engineer renovation at Andersen Air Force Base, Guam, including a $2.3 million hangar inspection for the first Pacific fighter wing bed down in 10 years.

“I was kind of shocked I won it,” said McNabb, who is now a supervisory contracting officer with the Joint Strike Fighter Program in Arlington, Virginia. “I felt a lot of it was more what the team did rather than what I did by myself. To me, I was just doing my job and doing what I was paid to do.”

The annual award recognizes Air Force junior civilian employees, GS-13 and below or equivalent, with no more than 10 years federal service who exemplify the professionalism and dedication to duty of former Air Force Under Secretary Lisa S. Disbrow. McNabb will receive the award during September’s AFA National Convention in Washington, D.C.

The 766th ESS is part of AFICC, a primary subordinate unit of AFIMSC. AFICC manages and executes above-installation level operational acquisition solutions across the Air Force.

“I think it shows AFIMSC touches a lot more than what most people think,” McNabb said. “Prior to working with them, I mostly worked directly under Air Force Materiel Command. In my head, I thought AFIMSC was more like civil engineering or base support-type stuff, but when you start working AFIMSC-larger portfolio contracts, you really see they have their hands in everything. To shine a light that AFIMSC is a large portion of every single installation, that’s important.” 

McNabb’s career in the federal civil service began as an entry-level secretary in 2010. She returned to school, earned an MBA, and began job shadowing program managers and contracting officers at the Air Force Research Laboratory while at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, where she found her calling as a contracting officer. She worked her way up to serve as the lead contracting specialist with the 766th ESS from 2019-21 before joining the Joint Strike Fighter Program.

“She came into our unit when we were significantly undermanned with multiple high-dollar late acquisitions, but you’d never know it by the time she left,” said Lt. Col. Kathryn Hinds, 766th ESS commander and award nominator. “She energized both her small team and our customers to quick solutions without sacrificing quality.”  
McNabb embodies Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. C.Q. Brown’s mantra of “Accelerate Change or Lose,” Hines said.

“She understands the critical importance of the strategic contracts we put into place (and their value) to the current and future fight,” the commander said.