This nontechnical riddle took me a while to figure out. This saying floats around in the halls and offices of every building. For me, it resounds on all occasions when I have met with management. Agencies’ management is whipsawed between necessary compromise to face budget cuts and changing priorities at the same time. Compromise, inRead… Read more »
I hate word “bureaucracy” because it degrades public sector workers at all levels. For many reasons, countless pejorative metaphors, theories, and political actions about public sector workers have decorated the iron cage. Public sector staff can weave webs supporting real collaboration, see contacts outside the hierarchy and rules; they seek out connections with people who… Read more »
Back in 2009, the movie the Hangover introduced us to the ultimate Wolfpack. In the film, the oddball character Alan, played wonderfully by Zach Galifianakis, toasts his future brother-in-law during his bachelor party. “You guys might not know this, but I consider myself a bit of a loner. I tend to think of myself as aRead… Read more »
Just like a good fairy tale, a mentoring relationship should have a happy ending. Each mentoring relationship is different and has its own dynamics. Nevertheless, there are certain things you should think about when you are starting a relationship with a mentor. Just like any other relationship, these partnerships require love and caring to growRead… Read more »
EIS is the main component of the Network Services 2020 (NS2020) Strategy. It will replace GSA’s Networx and regional and local contracts, which many agencies currently use to acquire best-value IT, telecom, and infrastructure. Agencies will start to transition in 2017.
In last week’s post, I discussed how three words at the beginning of Vanilla Ice’s Ice, Ice Baby provide an important message for government leaders. (Bet you never thought you’d read that sentence.) In that post, we discussed creating a Stop Doing List. Now, I will outline a model to Collaborate. As government leaders, weRead… Read more »
If you’re a regular reader of the ITS blog, you already know that we provide the government IT and acquisition communities with private-sector solutions for everything from simple IT commodities to complex infrastructure and emerging technology. Now, we’ve made it even easier for government buyers and our industry partners to get the information they need,… Read more »
Finally, research shows why cross-functional collaboration is so important to getting things done. A recent survey of 400 global company CEOs found that executing their company’s strategy heads their list of challenges. Related studies show two-thirds to three-quarters of large organizations struggle to implement their strategies. What these studies found sounds very familiar to whatRead… Read more »
As the Digital Era continues to progress, social and digital technologies will become more fully integrated into not just the work we do, but how we do it. Although external applications such as marketing, sales, and customer service have dominated adoption activities and discussions to date (particularly in the context of consumer goods and services),Read… Read more »
According to McKinsey, knowledge workers spend a whopping 19 percent of their day searching for information and expertise. Why? Take any one task and look at all the applications you use to get it done. Look at all the people you need to involve to do it. Look at all the time you waste switchingRead… Read more »