Dynamic Facilitation: Ottawa, Pakistan, and Polygamy

This post was submitted by Rosa Zubizarreta of DiaPraxis, an organizational member of NCDD. Contact Rosa at [email protected] if you have questions about this post. “From Conflict to Creative Community: A transformative Dynamic Facilitation learning journey” will be taking place in Ottawa on May 1-3, 2013. Discount available for NCDD members. For a fairly conventionalRead… Read more »

Thinking in the Moment: Three things you should drop everything for and do right now

Recognizing when and what to drop everything for and just do it is a valuable skill In my blog post on “Getting Things Done: Three key takeaways that will change your performance,” I mentioned that one of the biggest takeaways that I had from the book Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress Free ProductivityRead… Read more »

Government Mandate for e-Procurement Expected to Bring Savings

As a part of the “Campaign to Cut Waste,” the president has required that the Internet Payment Platform (IPP) go live for all government agencies by the start of the fiscal year. This means that as of October 1, 2012, businesses will have to use e-procurement to send bills to the federal government. While theseRead… Read more »

Expense Management: Trading Paper For Best Practices

Did you know that more than 2 out of 3 American businesses still mail receipts to their accounting departments? It doesn’t make for fast or reliable expense management, but it’s been ingrained in established business processes for so long, some companies are reluctant to put aside what they know for what’s new…even if what theyRead… Read more »

Spend Management: Why Automating Makes Sense

It’s no surprise that business is becoming more and more automated: as it goes for the world, so it goes for financial data. The stress of corporate spend management is paving the way for a more automated perspective, from spend analysis to policy enforcement and compliance. Being unable to access up-to-date financial data can seriouslyRead… Read more »

Federal Government Cracks Down On Expense Management

The General Services Administration (GSA) has made quite a few headlines recently due to excessive (and irresponsible) use of government funds at various conferences and training retreats, but now it seems it’s time for them to deal with a more cash-strapped budget. While spending has been much more carefully scrutinized since news broke of theirRead… Read more »

Federal Cloud Computing Experiences Slowdown Due to Security

With federal agencies facing a September 10 deadline to report on the details of their cloud computing initiatives, the Office of Management and Budget is increasing pressure to transition appropriate services to less expensive cloud alternatives. Budgetary realities combined with the successes experienced by other agencies, such as with cloud-based invoice managementsoftware for e-procurement, haveRead… Read more »

GSA Expense Management Fiasco Prompts Additional Scrutiny

In the continuing saga of the General Services Administration (GSA), Chief Dan Tangherlini faced the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee this week to respond to questions concerning the astounding lack of spend management his agency has shown in recent years, most of which came to light following a lavish April 2010 training conferenceRead… Read more »

End of Fiscal Year 2012 Sparks Federal Cloud Computing Expansion

As the fiscal year draws to a close, the United States’ government agencies are apparently taking the Office of Management and Budget’s new cloud-first guidelines to heart. Over the last several days, agencies have been rushing to award contracts with their remaining budgets in an effort to avoid returning the excess to the Treasury. NextGovRead… Read more »

Representative Proposes Legislation to Streamline Federal IT Acquisitions

In a move to help increase the pace and effectiveness of federal technology acquisition, Representative Darrell Issa (R-California) is proposing that Chief Information Officers within government agencies be allowed long-sought authority over their agencies’ technology budgets. “At a time we are facing record deficits and our national debt has exceeded [our gross domestic product], itRead… Read more »