Yearly Archives: 2009

Employee Double-Dipping Damages Government in Multiple Ways

I personally was shocked at today’s USA Today article on double-dipping by state employees: http://bit.ly/6TiQel. But beyond highlighting the basic sleaziness of the practice, the article missed the many negative impacts to the long-term success of government. In short, governments shoot themselves in the foot when such practices are tolerated. The first casualty is reputation.Read… Read more »

Webinar next Wednesday on VA’s Supplier Relationship Transformation Effort

The Department of Veterans Affairs is hosting a webinar on Wednesday, December 9 at 10:00 AM EST to discuss the status of its Supplier Relationship Transformation Effort. VA began this innovative effort, working with the vendor community, to effectively and efficiently deliver the highest quality cost-effective products and services to Veterans, at the right time,Read… Read more »

The Life of a Flyer

The Life of a Flyer So I spend a lot of times on airplanes. Primarily this USAirways route from Tampa to DCA. It’s pretty good – on-time, free Coke Zero, and it is direct. Every flyer has a routine. Some do work, some read a Kindle, some have magazines. Lately, I’ve been using it asRead… Read more »

Building a Wiki Community: Pet Projects

Since launching the moderated wiki, Whorunsgov has, on a couple of occasions, created projects to entice people to contribute. We try to focus these projects on narrow topics that people have strong opinions about. The projects include: 1) Tracking Blue Dog Democrats’ stances on the proposed health-care bill 2) Highlighting advocates and lobbyists that workRead… Read more »

Taking the Initiative

As a leadership coach, one of the issues that I hear about from my clients at the GS-14/15 level of the federal government is the lack of opportunities to demonstrate their capabilities and competencies through new and meaningful projects, tasks, or assignments. Often they will express their frustrations by saying that their senior manager doesRead… Read more »

DAUNTING CHALLENGES: Cultural Change | Paradigm Shifts

Recently on Twitter, a IT senior leader mentioned how daunting making change is today in any global enterprise. He invited me to share my views on leading cultural change and paradigm shifts based on the changes in progress in Enterprise Computing. It was impossible to respond in 140 characters :-), but I wrote a fewRead… Read more »

Protection for you and your home

My daughter-in-law passed along this email … it makes good sense! If you don’t have a gun, here’s a more humane way to wreck someone’s evil plans for you. Did you know this? I didn’t. I never really thought of it before. I guess I can get rid of the baseball bat. A friend whoRead… Read more »

USDA Forest Service Provides the Capitol Christmas Tree

The Forest Service is happy to announce that the 2009 Capitol Christmas Tree is from the Apache Sitgreaves National Forests in Arizona. As it has for decades, the Forest Service is proud to provide this beautiful and symbolic tree for the nation. Selected by the Superintendent of Grounds at the Architect of the Capitol, theRead… Read more »