Most of the laws that govern public participation in the U.S. are over thirty years old. They do not match the expectations and capacities of citizens today, they pre-date the Internet, and they do not reflect the lessons learned in the last two decades about how citizens and governments can work together. Increasingly, public administratorsRead… Read more »
Over a week has passed since government employees (those not furloughed due to the sequester, at least) returned to their offices, and as a result, the urgency of our You Are Essential campaign seemed to wither. In reality, the urgency remains. As conversations about government budget cuts and sequester continue, we need to reflect uponRead… Read more »
Luke McCormack, a former chief information officer for the Department of Homeland Security‘s Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, has been nominated to return to DHS as its CIO. He held the CIO role at ICE between 2005 and 2012 and has served as the Justice Department‘s CIO for one year, the White House announced Thursday.Read… Read more »
“Life begins at the end of your comfort zone.” – Neale D. Walsch The only time you are actually growing is when you are uncomfortable. If you want to get paid more and promoted faster, you’d better get comfortable with being uncomfortable. You only get out of life what you put into it. If youRead… Read more »
Earlier this week I posted a slidecast on my talk to Canada’s Access to Information Commissioners about how, as they do their work, they need to look deeper into the government “stack.” My core argument was how decisions about what information gets made accessible is no longer best managed at the end of a policyRead… Read more »
According to senior Navy officials, there are not enough fast-attack and guided-missile submarines to meet the needs of commanders around the globe. These comments came at the 2013 Naval Submarine League symposium where officials said they might have to may delay the retirement of some Los Angeles-class submarines. “The submarines are needed because they provideRead… Read more »
The questions regarding Healthcare.gov and the role the federal procurement system leads this week’s “FAR and Beyond” blog back to one of the Thirteen Thoughts for 2013: Requirements development –the blocking and tackling of federal procurement! Just as blocking and tackling are the fundamental keys to winning football, sound requirements development is the key toRead… Read more »
The difficulties with Healthcare.gov have been a big topic of conversation here in Washington, D.C. The recent New York Times story on the contractors involved in building it and the hearings on Capitol Hill have raised some uncomfortable questions for me about our profession. The main one is: Can’t we take responsibility for anything? WhenRead… Read more »
Leaders are trying to use measurements as their swimming goggles. It is the major technique they are relying on. My beef with measures is that we are not applying them proportionally. – Martha Johnson. You’ve probably heard the phrase, “measure twice and cut once.” But in government it seems like we are measuring eight times.Read… Read more »
The economic pressures government agencies feel from the uncertainty of budget cuts, real-time shut downs, and sequestration affects every part of an organization. The Project Management Office (PMO) is no exception. In a recent blog post, I discussed a new approach, Project Intelligence (PI), which seeks to improve project execution by providing project managers withRead… Read more »