with Francis Rose, Monday-Friday 1-3pm
ONLINE EXTRA: Agriculture Department FY2011 budget request
02-01-10
Federal News Countdown for January 29th
01-29-10
The countdown panel this week is another great one:
--John Salamone, Senior Consultant for Federal Management Partners and former Executive Director of the Chief Human Capital Officers Council at the Office of Personnel Management
--Julie Myers Wood, President of ICS Consulting, LLC and former head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement
--Amy Morris, "Daily Debrief" anchor, Federal News Radio
Here are the stories we're counting down this week:
NUMBER THREE
Salamone: Amputee Dayton Webber, 11, excels at wrestling -- and a whole lot more
Wood: U.S. is unprepared for major bioterrorism attack, commission finds
Morris: Metro now has federal presence with GSA appointment
NUMBER TWO
Salamone: OPM launches revamped USAjobs.gov
Wood: Feds detail Christmas Day attack
Morris: Researcher to reveal more Internet Explorer problems
NUMBER ONE
Salamone: Obama to Seek Spending Freeze to Trim Deficits
Wood: Obama's State of the Union Address
Morris: Agriculture Secretary Vilsack Announces $310 Million In Recovery Act Funds For Rural Broadband Projects
Cyber coordinator Howard Schmidt outlines his priorities
01-28-10
From "Schmidt answers doubters as cyber czar" on FederalNewsRadio.com:
"In his first public appearance since becoming the White House cybersecurity coordinator, Howard Schmidt didn't waste time putting to rest long-standing concerns about this new position.
"Who will he answer to in the White House?
"How will he work with federal chief information officer Vivek Kundra and federal chief technology officer Aneesh Chopra?
"Schmidt says one of the first meetings he had was with Kundra and Chopra."
Just three days after my In Depth Conversation on "Howard Schmidt's To-Do List," I played parts of Mr. Schmidt's presentation. You can hear the whole event, including the Q&A, by clicking the audio link.
Your agency's energy consumption, under the microscope
01-28-10
From "Agencies going green and saving green" on FederalNewsRadio.com:
"Since last October, the Federal Government has been under an Executive Order to step up efforts to reduce energy use and save taxpayer money in the meantime. But how are federal agencies doing in progressing toward that goal?
"That was the question posed during yesterday afternoon's hearing entitled 'Cutting the Federal Government's Energy Bill' by Senator Tom Carper, chairman of the Senate Federal Financial Management subcommittee."
I played some highlights of the question-and-answer part of the hearing.
Click to watch the entire hearing
Former Transportation CIO Dan Mintz on the iPad and the Federal enterprise
01-28-10
The iPad from Apple is now public, and according to projections found by CSC's Dan Mintz, analysts expect at least one and a half million to be sold by the end of 2010. That means it won't be long until someone wants to use one on your network.
Dan and I talked about the unit itself, and what the introduction of this product means for the evolution of mobile technology in the Federal space.
Health care reform and your FEHBP: three former OPM directors detail the issues
01-27-10
About two weeks ago we played a presentation from Walton Francis, the author of the Checkbook Guide to Federal Health Insurance Plans, about using the Federal Employee Health Benefits Plan as a model for health care reform (available at Federal News Radio dot com). Today we have a different view from three former heads of the Office of Personnel Management, from an event last week at the Heritage Foundation.
Former OPM Directors Linda Springer, Dan Blair, and Donald Devine talked about the potential impact health care reform legislation that's being debated in Congress might have on Federal employees.
GSA's Dave McClure believes in follow-up after the collaboration
01-27-10Yesterday we talked about the President's management agenda a year into the administration, and one of the people we talked to was Dave McClure of the General Services Administration. Dave and I covered a lot of ground in a short period of time with my in-studio guest Alan Balutis. I invited Dave back today to expand on some of the issues we talked about yesterday, because the things his office is doing cut across government.
SBINet Executive Director Mark Borkowski explains reassessment of program
01-27-10
From "DHS deciding on future of SBInet" on FederalNewsRadio.com:
"The Homeland Security Department is reevaluating its Secure Border Initiative-Net program.
"DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano Jan. 15 ordered a departmentwide reassessment of the $6 billion-to-$8 billion program. SBInet's goal is to use technology, including cameras, sensors, advanced detection technologies, unmanned aerial vehicles and other computer hardware and software, to better secure the northern and southern borders.
"DHS awarded Boeing the SBInet contract in September 2006 with high expectations, but little has gone as expected.
"The agency instructed Boeing to deploy SBInet at two places along the Southwest border, Tucson and Ajo, Ariz. But the technology has not performed well, says Mark Borkowski, SBInet executive director."
I played parts of Jason Miller's conversation with Mark Borkowski on the show today. You can hear the whole conversation by clicking on the audio link.
In Depth Conversation: Obama administration's management agenda, one year later
01-26-10
About two years ago, a group of experts led by Alan Balutis of Cisco Systems authored a series of articles that were published in "The Public Manager" magazine. These articles proposed solutions to the next President's management challenges across agencies.
Recently Mr. Balutis re-united his team - and added some new players - to compare their recommendations to the accomplishments of the Obama administration's first year in office. The collection of articles, called "The Obama Administration's Management Agenda," is just out from "The Public Manager."
Click to read the entire report
Today's program included conversations with a cross-section of experts from inside and outside government who authored pieces for the collection; and Mr. Balutis was with me in studio as both a guest (discussing his contributions) and a guest host (asking "insider" questions of the other experts). The guest list included:
--Stephen Benowitz, former Associate Director, Office of Personnel Management
--Allan Burman, President, Jefferson Solutions, former Administrator, Office of Federal Procurement Policy
--Martha Dorris, deputy associate administrator for the Office of Citizen Services and Communications at GSA
--Gerry Gingrich, Professor of Systems Management, Information Strategies Department, National Defense University
--Donald Kettl, dean of the University of Maryland's School of Public Policy
--Dave McClure, associate administrator for the Office of Citizen Services and Communications of the General Services Administration
--John Sindelar, client industry executive at HP, former deputy associate administrator for the Office of Governmentwide Policy
--W. Frederick Thompson, advisory fellow with Cisco's Internet Business Solutions Group
--Robert Tobias, director of the Institute for the Study of Public Policy Implementation at American University
These conversations "covered the waterfront" in the realm of Federal management.
In Depth Conversation: Howard Schmidt's to-do list - cyber priorities for 2010
01-25-10
Cybersecurity Coordinator Howard Schmidt is now on the job, and his plate is already overflowing. Three cybersecurity experts joined me today to talk about a wide variety of cyber issues:
--Dan Chenok, Senior Vice President at Pragmatics and former branch chief for information policy and technology in the Office of Management and Budget
--Greg Garcia, President of Garcia Strategies and former Assistant Secretary for Cyber Security and Communications
--Hugo Teufel, co-leader of PricewaterhouseCoopers' Privacy Practice and former DHS Chief Privacy Officer
Some of the topics of discussion included:
--What jumps to the top of the list of tasks Mr. Schmidt should pay attention to?
--How do the events of the last week (Google/China, Sec. Clinton's speech) change priorities for cybersecurity?
--What's Congress's role in cybersecurity oversight, and how could it change to improve security?
--Does the cybersecurity workforce exist that's required to execute the government's need?
--How does government need to work with the private sector and academia in this area?
--How should the administration balance cybersecurity and privacy with its goals for openness and transparency?
The panelists were with me for the entire show.
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