The NCMA recently published an open letter to Government employees on how to become engaged with the NCMA without conflicts of interest or ethical violations. NCMA provides a collection of neutral networks or communities, at the local and national level, where contract management professionals from all types of government and industry agencies and organizations canRead… Read more »
Federal workers owed more than $3 billion in income taxes in 2008, according to the Internal Revenue Service, a figure down slightly from the year before. The agency reported that 276,300 current and retired federal employees owed $3,042,200,000 in 2008, down from $3,586,784,725 in unpaid taxes in 2007. The list includes White House and CongressionalRead… Read more »
One of the first questions I asked myself when familiarizing myself with the Open Government initiative was: “How is the Obama Administration’s Open Government (Open Gov) initiative different from the Bush Administration’s E-government (E-gov) initiative?” There are many people who use the two terms interchangeably but this paper argues that although they are distinct initiativesRead… Read more »
Have you heard of GraphJam? It’s a great site with a simple user interface that lets people make bar graphs, Venn diagrams, and more. The applications are mostly funny – making fun of song lyrics, vacation spots that you want to go to vs. those of your spouse, and so forth. Pop culture. But whatRead… Read more »
When USA.gov was born, a central links directory for the government was a huge asset. Now, however, citizens turn to Google for lists of links. So if USA.gov is to add value, I think it’s time for a major re-think of its purpose. It’s an important discussion…one that impacts – and therefore should involve –Read… Read more »
Master Plans are tricky. Take a look at Le Corbusier’s Master Plan for Paris here. The best design happens when the design is the result of organic limitations. I told a professor I was having a hard time reconciling my love of order with my love of nature. How is it, I said, that IRead… Read more »
Executive Board of Young Government Leaders (YGL) joins the Combined Federal Campaign of the National Capital Area (CFCNCA). If you live in the Washington metropolitan region, that means you can contribute to YGL as a Federal employee by entering the YGL code #38096 on your agency’s CFC pledge card. Outside of Washington, contributors you canRead… Read more »
If you have experienced a successful outcome from a collaborative initiative, you understand what the commitment can achieve. However, most people have experienced unsuccessful collaboration, thus they come into projects with biases and pre-conceived low expectations for success. The job of the process facilitators is to manage those notions and foster real collaboration within theRead… Read more »
After combing through the Open Government Directive very carefully over the last few days, I transitioned from the strategic to the tactical and started asking the question: How are we actually going to get all of this work done in the next 120 days? Given, the directive calls for some discrete action within the nextRead… Read more »
Back around year 1990 I remember my amazement at learning that Iceland had the largest router network at around 50 routers of any European business or government. There was a pretty sensible explanation around the low density of the population and the realisation that a step change in the country’s economy as well as socialRead… Read more »