Happy-Nearly-Here-Government New Year

Well I haven’t had much time to talk recently. This is because it’s the nearing the end of the fiscal year for government, as you govies and contractors know. For those not familiar, government celebrates its New Year’s Day at the end of September when fiscal money expires (i.e. Congress says you can’t use certainRead… Read more »

Smart Government Australia 2011 Conference – My account of Day 1

OK. It’s good to get back into Govloop. I recently spoke at the Smart Government Conference held in Canberra, Australia. I also chaired the first day – tiring, but fun. Not all the conference papers are available just yet, but I want to do is share my account of day 1 of the conference withRead… Read more »

The Roles of CIOs and CTOs

Introduction The role of the Chief Information Officer (CIO) has been in existence for many years in the government and its ultimate definition was finally settled by the Clinger-Cohen Act of 1996. At this time the position of the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) is being instituted across federal government departments and agencies, but the roleRead… Read more »

The City of Chicago Will Code for America in 2012

Today we’re pleased to announce the selection the City of Chicago as one of 2012 city partners. We’re especially excited because next year we’ll be working with Chicago to deploy Open311, which will help the city become more efficient, open and responsive. “The City of Chicago is breaking ground every day, increasing efficiency and deliveringRead… Read more »

A few useful widgets from CMHC

Whenever I work with a new client, I always enjoy the “internal document/material review” phase quite a bit as I get to learn a great deal about the organization in a short period of time. Part of the process is of course digging through content on the client’s website. In the case of the CanadaRead… Read more »

Rope Leadership

Peter Drucker wrote, “You manage things, you lead people.” I’ve nothing against management. The Army taught me “All computing is logistics.” Of course file cabinets mostly stand there and hold stuff. Took a quiet minute to think about the leadership phrase, “Asses and elbows.” Conjures what I see of someone in a crouch moving forwardRead… Read more »