Western civilization didn’t end last week, but the twitterati were aflame with 140-character discussions about the departure of Vivek Kundra, the Federal CIO, after two years on the job. Kundra has been one of the Obama administration’s most visible and colorful figures, launching numerous initiatives for transparency, IT procurement reform and basic computing approaches. WhatRead… Read more »
Hey GovLoop fans, I hope you share my excitement when holding the summer issue of The Public Manager. It’s being distributed to subscribers right now. If you can’t wait, if you urgently need help with information overload, managing in a fishbowl, or attending to the big challenge of 21st Century government reorganization being considered byRead… Read more »
In January of this year I posted a discussion paper on Ozloop entitled The public service in a Wikileaks world. Some of the ideas in that paper took me down the path of suggesting that we need a public service renaissance. Like many others, at the time I was very much of the view thatRead… Read more »
These were the memorable words that Barack Obama spoke soon after the Radical Jihadist and student of Anwar Al Awaki, Nidal Malik Hassan murdered 13 and wounded 29 other AMERICAN SERVICEMEN, shouting at the top of his lungs “Alu Akbar” or God is Great in Arabic. Despite clear signals of the rising incitement and hatredRead… Read more »
As Federal Eye columnist Joe Davidson pointed out for the Washington Post today, a year has passed since President Obama announced he would be “revamping” the federal hiring process. These were the reforms that were supposed to eliminate KSAs in favor of more traditional job applications and (at least in theory) shorten the hiring processRead… Read more »
In a recent blog posting from the Washington Post’s Al Kamen, we find an interesting, slightly tongue-in-cheek debate going on about who actually takes credit for the SEAL Operation that took down bin Laden. Obama, Bush, or as Kamen writes: Some folks tried to give Bill Clinton credit as well, since he launched that missileRead… Read more »
Customer service is about to become an annual performance goal for each federal department. First, there was last week’s presidential order on customer service. Then the Office of Management and Budget began pushing along compliance with the Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA) Modernization Act of 2010, which calls for agencies to measure customer service.Read… Read more »
President Obama’s executive order, “Disclosure of Political Spending ByGovernment Contractors” appears to have some flaws. The purpose of theorder is to ensure that contracting decisions are “merit-based” and are “freefrom undue influence of factors extraneous to the underlying merits ofcontracting decision-making…” Nobody can argue with that, but the reportingabout political contributions by contractors that theRead… Read more »
I am an addiction counselor at the Lincoln Nebraska Veterans Hospital. My supervisor received an Innovations Proposal Grant for a therapeutic Living House to supplement our treatment program at the hospital. It was a huge success! Guess what. After helping over 75 veterans, with an over the top success rate, it was closed down. ThisRead… Read more »
With First Lady Michelle Obama’s spotlight honed on the issues of childhood obesity, access to healthy food choices and exercise as an issue of “national security,” perhaps we should ask why this continues to be an issue plaguing Americans. Not only is the United States home to the greatest number of obese people, the secondRead… Read more »