Digital Government

Deja vu: Obama taps former OMB director for second stint

Jacob Lew was nominated today by the president to be the director of the Office of Management and Budget. Lew was budget director from 1998 to 2001, under President Bill Clinton.

People

FLITE cancellation: VA pulls plug on modernization effort

The Veterans Affairs Department is canceling its $400 million financial system modernization program and directing the resources to other projects throughout the department.

Digital Government

Survey Shows Telework Improvements

Survey results released Monday give the first complete look at the number of federal employees participating in agency telework programs.

People

The first affliction of the federal workforce: Low expectations

The surest way to nurture mediocrity is to expect mediocrity. That, in a nutshell, is one of the major afflictions of the federal workforce in many offices across the government, according to readers commenting on stories at FCW.com.

Digital Government

Skype tries to break Congress' ban

Government Computer News

Digital Government

Mapping tools boost accountability, collaboration

Systems used in Maryland focus on results, officials say.

Digital Government

HHS issues final rule on meaningful use for e-health records

Up to $27 billion will be available during 10 years for the incentive payments, allowing health professionals to obtain as much as $44,000 under Medicare and $64,700 under Medicaid, while hospitals could receive millions of dollars to help with the implementation and use of certified electronic health professionals.

Digital Government

U.S., Canada launch border initiatives

Countries have agreed to complete a joint threat and risk assessment.

Digital Government

VA ends financial management modernization project

Department will concentrate on smaller initiatives that have better odds of success and will make a difference.

Digital Government

Forward march: Army e-mail overhaul still a go

Army CIO Jeffrey Sorenson is working with the Defense Information Systems Agency to get enterprise e-mail off the ground.

Digital Government

‘Expensive’ older feds provide valuable mentoring resource

One of the recent posters to this blog, “Civil Servant,” makes a good point about the hard-to-measure value to new feds of those “expensive legacy employees”—long-time feds who really know the ropes.

Cybersecurity

Internet Filtering Gaining Traction?

Australia is in the midst of a heated debate over blocking websites citizens can view. The controversial ban has been postponed for a year -- conveniently after the country's elections -- so that an independent review board could determine exactly what controversial websites should be banned. Internet Service Providers have already agreed to block access to certain sites known for posting child pornography.

Digital Government

Gen. Mattis and Defense Tech

The warfighting philosophy of Marine Gen. James Mattis, nominated to replace Gen. David Petraeus as the next commander of U.S. Central Command, is to break down units into very small groups that have lots of autonomy that allows them to act very quickly. Gregg Grant, who covered Defense issues for <em>Government Executive</em> and now works for Defense Technology, <a href=http://defensetech.org/2010/07/09/mattis-may-get-chance-to-test-innovative-concepts-in-new-ao/#more-8173>writes</a> that under such a "decentralized battlefield . . . quality becomes much more important than quantity."

Digital Government

Big Health IT Rules Coming

<em>This post was written by Aliya Sternstein.</em> Expect many major announcements this week from the administration and its advisers

Digital Government

No Room for IT?

I'm in the process of analyzing the results of the <a href="http://www.fedview.opm.gov/">2010 Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey</a>, and you certainly can expect more posts, particularly on telework and the generation-specific results of the survey, in the days to come. But one thing from the survey struck me as a bit surprising: this year's survey did not ask how employees use information technology or how satisfied they are with IT systems to perform work. These questions have been asked of employees on past surveys, and I <a href="http://wiredworkplace.nextgov.com/2010/02/opm_kicks_off_2010_employee_survey.php?oref=search">questioned</a> back in February whether the new survey might make an even better attempt to gauge employee perceptions of agency IT programs and their ability to promote knowledge-sharing and collaboration.