Harvard business sage John Kotter writes “We can’t keep up with the pace of change, let alone get ahead of it.” He says the historical success of hierarchical structures “can’t handle the challenges of mounting complexity and rapid change.” Large companies (and governments) cannot ignore the daily demands of running large enterprises that depend onRead… Read more »
If you’re in the government sector, new cloud services and products are likely in the plans for 2013. Cloudmomentum continues to build according to InformationWeek Government’s third annual Federal Cloud Computing survey, which showed that half of its agency respondents are currently moving ahead with cloud adoption or are in the early stages of doingRead… Read more »
The IBM Center’s newly-released “Next Four Years” Resource Center updates its 2009 Presidential Transition materials for new political appointees. But it offers more in the way of other good government imperatives that will challenge leaders tomorrow. There are six “go to” topics in the IBM Center’s Resource Center for incoming new political appointees as wellRead… Read more »
In the wake of the Open Government Directive issued by President Obama in December of 2009, agencies have been working to take specific actions to implement the principles of transparency, participation, and collaboration. However, do we want our National Security Agency (NSA) being transparent about all of their defense tactics and cyber plans? Does sharingRead… Read more »
Academics don’t always speak the same language as practitioners. But they oftentimes have useful ideas to convey. So how do we bridge the gap between research and practice? I’ve been asked to participate as a “practitioner” on a discussion panel at the upcoming conference of the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management (APPAM) ItRead… Read more »
A History of Entrepreneurship As someone who grew up with entrepreneurial parents, I can say without hesitation that there is no job experience that can completely compare with the rewards and perils of such a career path. Although many would prefer to be employed, even employed by large or in the past, bureaucratic organizations, manyRead… Read more »
How do you organize a cross-agency collaborative effort to get results no single agency could accomplish on its own? The Government Accountability Office (GAO) has developed an inventory of “mechanisms that the federal government uses to lead and implement interagency collaboration,” along with a self-assessment checklist to consider when using them. GAO’s latest study onRead… Read more »
Way back in the early 1990s during my undergraduate business studies, we began learning about various predicted changes that were going to occur in the structure of leadership throughout corporate America, and all organizations. Sixteen years later in graduate school, I was surprised at the universal nature of most of our experiences: the majority ifRead… Read more »
The Open Government Initiative set forth by the Obama Administration in 2009 requires Federal agencies to take immediate steps to achieve milestones in transparency, participation, and citizen collaboration. Most Federal, state, and local organizations have jumped on the social media bandwagon as a tool for communicating with citizens and making their agency’s goals transparent. However,Read… Read more »
While not every effective leader has the giftedness, skillset, mental horsepower or even the desire to be a CEO, many of the core strengths are one and the same. First and foremost, a chief executive who proves to be an effective leader must be a radical visionary. In Steve Jobs’ biography, Walter Isaacson describes visionaryRead… Read more »