As things move forward, you may be surprised to learn that the foe of your daily accomplishments, sometimes known under the alias “red tape,” is going to serve as an integral system of checks and balances in all that transpires with any agency reorganization.
A legal framework drives any federal agency re-org, and information is aplenty if you look for it. And there are actions you can take to position yourself for the future (more on that next week). So let’s do a brief deep dive.
Dr. David Shulkin, Under Secretary for Health at VA joined me on The Business of Government Hour this week to discuss VA’s healthcare mission, strategic priorities, challenges faced, innovations pursued, and efforts to promote a positive culture of service. Here is a snapshot of our discussion.
As new threats against the homeland develop, the DoD must expand on its traditional capabilities to effectively counter these threats. In order to reduce vulnerabilities at the Department, technology, workforce, and operations innovation must occur.
A few weeks ago on the DorobekINSIDER, host Chris Dorobek made a radical call for a government restart – he suggested doing away with the Federal Acquisition Regulation. The FAR was intended to answer any and every procurement question under the sun, but the resulting document has more than 99 parts and thousands of subchapters.Read… Read more »
“The execution of the ACA was seriously flawed. Three factors contributed to the rocky rollout: the nature of lawmaking, poor personnel decisions, and poisonous politics,” notes Dr. Zeke Emanuel. The American healthcare system is complex. It was not created complex and expensive from its origins, but evolved to become this way over a period ofRead… Read more »
Moderator Trey Hodgkins (far left) and panelists from left to right: Richard Beutel, Kevin Cummins, Aaron Wasserman and Angela Styles. “Taxpayers deserve a government that harnesses technology to better serve the people.” I would be surprised if anyone disagreed with this profound statement from former Missouri governor Matt Blunt. Citizens expect their government to spendRead… Read more »
Acquisition Reform – Industry experts have compared it to Groundhog Day and a complicated system of pendulums shifting between priorities. The descriptions may differ but one thing most agree on is that with federal acquisition becoming ever more complex, fixing it isn’t getting any easier. In fact, Frank Kendall, the Under Secretary of Defense forRead… Read more »
President Obama’s fiscal year 2015 budget proposals actually invest in programs that demonstrate effectiveness, and he invests in generating new knowledge about what works through more evidence and evaluation. While the headlines about the president’s new budget focus on the big numbers, there is a significant back story about what the Office of Management andRead… Read more »
Lawmakers need to draft a stronger information technology procurement reform legislation that gives agency chief information officers greater control of the infrastructure and business systems, former DHS CIO Richard Spires writes in a column for FCW. He noted that the Obama administration’s HealthCare.gov website woes have thrust the business of buying and managing IT toRead… Read more »