Workforce

  • The hacking of the Office of Personnel Management's security clearance database is just the latest blow to the government's background-check system. Two years ago, a contractor with a security clearance shot a dozen colleagues at the Washington Navy Yard. Only later did the government learn he had a history of mental illness. Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.) has spent years advocating for reforms to the security-clearance process. He joined Emily Kopp on the Federal Drive to discuss his latest strategy — to pass an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act that would force agencies to better manage the system.

    July 10, 2015
  • Budget cuts totaling $1.1 billion over the past five years impacted nearly every fact of the Internal Revenue Service's mission. The Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration says IRS officers answered 25 percent fewer taxpayer phone calls over past four years. And the agency closed 34 percent fewer cases. Computer network downtime topped nearly 66-thousand hours. Matthew Weir is an assistant IG for the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration. He tells In Depth with Francis Rose about the kinds of work automated service collection contact representatives and field collection officers do and how it's suffered.

    July 09, 2015
  • Tune in to FEDtalk this week for a discussion with representatives of federal employee organizations on Congress. Guests will discuss legislation that affects the federal workforce and government, the recent Office of Personnel Management (OPM) data breaches, budget reconciliation and the fate of this year's appropriations bills.

    July 09, 2015
  • The Office of Personnel Management announced today that 21.5 million people were affected by the second breach of its background investigation databases. This includes 19.7 million people who applied for a background check, as well as another 1.8 million people whose personal information was included on clearance applications, such as spouses.

    July 09, 2015
  • FBI Director James Comey said the White House is about to release a final tally describing the number of people whose personal data was compromised in the OPM cyber breach. The agency has offered 18 months of free credit monitoring and identity-theft protection to the 4.2 million federal employees affected by the first breach in the agency's personnel database. But it's remained quiet about who has been affected by a second, larger breach.

    July 09, 2015
  • For the first time the Combined Federal Campaign will try to generate excitement and participation among that newest class of feds -- teleworkers. Federal News Radio Senior Correspondent Mike Causey explores.

    July 09, 2015
  • The National Treasury Employees Union announced Wednesday it was suing OPM, saying the agency violated the constitutional rights of union members.

    July 08, 2015
  • A second federal employee union is suing the Office of Personnel Management over the two recent cybersecurity breaches. The National Treasury Employee Union files a lawsuit in federal court today. NTEU says OPM violated its members' constitutional rights by not protecting their personal and private information. Colleen Kelley is the union's national president. She explains her union's decision to take OPM to court.

    July 08, 2015
  • The National Treasury Employees Union sues the Office of Personnel Management over the agency's recent cyber attacks. NTEU says OPM violated its members' informational privacy rights. It filed the lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. Carrie Cordero is a lawyer and adjunct law professor at Georgetown University Law Center and former counsel to the Assistant Attorney General for National Security. She tells In Depth co-host Jared Serbu that OPM's recent cyber breaches have raised a few different privacy questions.

    July 08, 2015
  • The House on Tuesday passed a bill making it easier for part-time federal land management employees to become full-time.

    July 08, 2015
  • DJ Patil, the government's first-ever chief data scientist, explains his mission using a simple phrase: "responsibly unleash the power of data for the benefit of the American public.” In part 2 of Federal News Radio’s special report, Deconstructing the CDO, Patil tells Federal News Radio how his office is helping agency CDOs bring a ruthless focus to data.

    July 08, 2015
  • The Defense Department’s new personnel chief has two months to go before he delivers a set of recommendations to overhaul DoD’s HR system. But he’s made clear that among his top priorities is to ensure longer tenures for military officers and that moving people from job to job every one or two years is a bad management strategy. Federal News Radio’s DoD reporter Jared Serbu has the details.

    July 07, 2015
  • Recent cybersecurity embarrassments at the Office of Personnel Management, the White House and the State Department have cybersecurity experts wondering how the government became so vulnerable. Their response: it hasn't always been this way.

    July 07, 2015
  • More than 200,000 men and women leave the military every year. Many of them discover finding a job and transitioning to a civilian life can be difficult. DOD's newly redesigned Transition to Veterans Program aims to help former service members adjust to their new roles. Susan Kelly is the program director and spearheaded the program overhaul. For that, she was named one of the 33 Service to America Medal finalists. She joined Tom Temin on the Federal Drive with more on the program redesign.

    July 07, 2015