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 »
Same location, different hiring methods You would think that local government hiring processes might have similarities to one another when they are located in the same geographic region. As I conducted research for my book, Jobs That Matter: Find a Stable, Fulfilling Career in Public Service, I found this definitely to not be the case.Read… Read more »
This week is celebrating two large groups of government employees: Municipal Clerks and all of those in Public Service. Public Service Recognition Week About: Public Service Recognition Week (PSRW) is hosted annually by the Partnership for Public Service and the Public Employees Roundtable. Their website has a “Celebration Toolkit” and an “Events” page to helpRead… Read more »
When you invest in something, you want to know how well your investment is paying off – your ROI. Well, citizens “invest” in government (and their community), so they want easy access to useful information about it. They want to see a return on their investment. But open government is not just beneficial for citizens;Read… Read more »
I am a true believer of the following statements: That government employee’s work for less than what they could earn in the private sector. That our best public sector employees should be compensated with the best paychecks. That pay-for-performance is a great concept that should be applied as an incentive to encourage great workplace performance.Read… Read more »
Sunshine Review They’re “a non-profit organization dedicated to state and local government transparency. The Sunshine Review wiki collects and shares transparency information and uses a ‘10-point Transparency Checklist‘ to evaluate the content of every state and more than 5,000 local government websites” (more about them/source; emphasis added). Sunlight Foundation It’s open government in action. MajorRead… Read more »
I am working on a project of revamping our Court’s public website and we are making every attempt to ensure we do it right this time. We are soliciting feedback from our audiences and are doing a lot of research on best practices. I recently found a great government site which outlines many of theRead… Read more »
This month, the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE) released their 2011 Internship & Co-op Survey. And the survey says… There’s going to be a 7% increase in internships for 2011, and this increase is expected in every region and in almost all industry sectors for which they had data. The two exceptions? GovernmentRead… Read more »
It’s that time of the week where we let you know about some of the stories going on in the open government and technology space! Have any that should have been included? Share them in the comments! “White House unveils tax calculator designed to give taxpayers a receipt” (Nextgov) Here’s the White House’s blog postRead… Read more »
You know you’re doing something wrong with your council website when you mostly say ‘YES’ to this list Are you a web manager or just someone who wishes to know how your local council website is performing? Or maybe just a curious observer of public services online? If you are, you should continue reading…. Good,Read… Read more »