It's the oldest challenge in government and business: How to make things easier for customers. In the digital age, customer service has evolved into something more ambitious: customer experience (CX). CX asks, among other things, how you get the idea of better service or experience down to the individual employee.
You might not think of the CIA is concerned with art or what it calls "the beauty in intelligence." But the agency, in fact, has an extensive art collection dating back to the late 1960s to go along with some artist who work there.
In today's Federal Newscast: The White House is widening the rule prohibiting employers from asking potential employees about their salary history. Cloud infrastructure providers are getting new cybersecurity requirements. And the chaos surrounding Red Sea shipping routes has jacked up the cost to relocate federal employees.
Postmaster General Louis DeJoy is telling Congress that implementing these plans is necessary to keep USPS from running out of cash in the coming years.
A cloud computing security program established in 2011, continues to present difficulties to government and industry: FedRAMP, the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program, is a way of establishing that cloud computing service companies are secure. But more than 12 years in, the program still has cost uncertainty. And agencies don't always use FedRAMP approved vendors, according to the Government Accountability Office.
In today's Federal Newscast: The cybersecurity threat from Chinese infiltrators continues to grow, according to an outgoing Army general. The Department of Veterans Affairs got more than 46,000 homeless veterans into permanent housing last year. And employees at Social Security headquarters are ordered to increase in-person work, starting in April.
While the threat of a partial government shutdown still looms, one group of federal employees has a message for Congress. Find a way past it. That is, in part, what concerns Federally Employed Women (FEW). For more, the Federal Drive with Tom Temin spoke with Pamela Richards, FEW's president.
In today's Federal Newscast: The Navy no longer requires a high school diploma to enlist. A long-time federal technology executive is retiring. And a former acting IG has been sentenced to 18 months in prison in a software-theft conspiracy.
It's not an agency, but it works to transfer vital technology developments out of federal laboratories and into the market. The Federal Lab Consortium encompasses some 300 federal organizations.
In today's Federal Newscast: Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin is expected to make a full recovery, according to doctors at Walter Reed Military Medical Center. The Department of Homeland Security is pushing hard to improve customer experience. And sex and work-culture scandals at the FDIC catch the attention and ire of Iowa Sen. Joni Ernst.
During her time as governmentwide chief diversity officer, Janice Underwood led significant strides in the Biden administration’s DEIA goals. But at the same time, some agencies still struggle with vacancies and a lack of clarity on diversity leadership roles.
Lawmakers are also investigating whether the SSA IG inappropriately referred the DHS IG to an outside law firm.
Members of the Senate Finance Committee are calling on the Internal Revenue Service to rely on barcodes to process millions of paper tax returns more quickly.
A new initiative from Health and Human Services seeks to improve preventative care in under-served communities. The HEROES Program will run through the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H). HEROES stands for Health Care Rewards to Achieve Improved Outcomes.
Federal improper payments roll on and on, year after year. Among the most frustrating are fraudulent unemployment benefits, federal dollars that get spent by the states. Last fall, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) estimated that as much as 15% of pandemic-era unemployment spending went to fraudsters, or as much as $135 billion.