In Depth Show Blog – January 28, 2014

More participants in the Thrift Savings Plan are paying off loans than any time in the past decade and more TSP account holders took hardship withdrawals last year than in the last 10 years. Kim Weaver, director of External Affairs at the Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board, says two events that affected federal employees in 2013 had the TSP on alert.

Thirteen federal agencies have real estate requirements on the General Services Administration’s “wish list” for 2014. Several major agencies have facilities on the list — DHS, HUD, Justice and more. Bob Peck is director of Consulting for the Southeast Region for Gensler and former commissioner of the Public Buildings Service at the GSA.

You’re too late if you’re waiting for the millennial generation to start working at your agency. They’re already there. The Bureau of Labor Statistics says by the year 2020, 40 percent of the workforce will be millennials. Thinking like them will be important to integrating them into your organization. Virginia Hill, national president of Young Government Leaders, is writing about millennials in The Public Manager.

A culture of corruption exists in government contracting and negotiations. But it doesn’t exist in the United States. Steve Kelman, a professor at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government and former OFPP administrator, argues that high profile corruption incidents like the Navy’s Fat Leonard scandal aren’t typical.

For the second year in a row, the General Services Administration is canceling its annual Training and Expo conference. It’s also moving its Smart Pay training conference to an all-digital forum. Larry Allen, president of Allen Federal Business Partners, is author of the Week Ahead newsletter.

Members of the Senate Armed Services Committee are unanimous in arguing to restore military retiree pension payments reductions. A little over a month after Congress voted for those reductions as part of the Ryan-Murray budget agreement, members of the Committee agree the provision needs to be repealed as quickly as possible. And as Federal News Radio’s Jared Serbu reports, the Defense Department agrees too.

Agencies are treating privacy today like they treated cybersecurity three or five years ago. They realize it’s important. They realize they have to do it. But they aren’t exactly sure how and what it means to apply privacy to data. Federal News Radio’s executive editor Jason Miller shares some advice from one agency that is a little ahead of the game.