The latest small business contracting numbers numbers show agencies are struggling to hit their goals for doing business with small businesses. Those companies and entrepreneurs want to bring innovation and agility to the federal government, but they struggle to navigate the process. Martha Dorris, deputy associate administrator at GSA's Office of Citizen Services and Innovative Technologies and ACT-IAC Small Business Conference Government chair, and Ira Hobbs, principal at Hobbs & Hobbs and former chief information officer at the Treasury Department and ACT-IAC SBC industry chair, tell In Depth with Francis Rose small business could hold the keys to success for your next IT project.
In part 3 of our special report, Shared Services Revisited, Federal News Radio explores the administration's plans to ensure success in consolidating and standardizing financial systems this time around. Beth Angerman, director of Treasury's Office of Financial Innovation and Transformation (OFIT), said the goal is creating a repeatable, sustainable process for agencies to move to federal financial management providers. Over the next six months, Treasury and OMB must answer many of the outstanding questions about how this initiative will truly work.
In our special report, Shared Services Revisited, OMB still must solve long-standing challenges to ensure federal providers are capable of bringing on large, cabinet level agencies. The role of the private sector is leaving some vendors unhappy, but officials say history shows their success rate with financial management system implementation to be poor.
In part 1 of Federal News Radio's special report, this second attempt by OMB to move agencies to financial management shared services is fraught with the same obstacles of a decade ago. But OMB believes this attempt at shared services is different. The administration says budget concerns and technology advancements will help overcome these long-standing barriers.
In this week's Inside the Reporter's Notebook, Executive Editor Jason Miller explores how DoD is developing its cloud security standards and Treasury is filling a financial management void.
GSA, NASA and NIH are providing agency customers more insight into what they are buying, how they are buying it and what prices they are paying. OFPP plans to launch the Prices Paid Portal later this year. But others say it's not about the data, but the outcomes agencies are trying to achieve.
The White House will release an updated list of agency high-priority goals and cross-agency priority goals with the annual budget request to Congress in March. Meanwhile, the Office of Management and Budget detailed agency successes over the last two years in meeting current goals.
John Koskinen, sworn in as IRS commissioner in late December, has been meeting with frontline employees and crunching numbers for the last several weeks. He told Congress Wednesday that every corner of the agency is underfunded, and as a direct result, the Treasury is collecting fewer dollars than it should.
More and better information is getting to be the driving force behind spending and program decisions across the government. OMB is requiring agencies to update strategic plans and objectives based on their analysis of program and back-office data.
Nani Coloretti, Treasury's assistant secretary for management and performance improvement officer, said prioritizing data, analyzing it in way that makes sense to senior officials and following through on opportunities for change are among the ways to improve agency processes. A Federal News Radio survey of PIOs show agencies are using data to improve mission execution.
Some agency leaders who would be charged with implementing the bill are unsure the DATA Act can be brought to life successfully. Officials said the government can improve how it makes data accessible and publishes procurement and other spending information. But the DATA Act may be asking for things that aren't pragmatically possible.
On this week's Capital Impact show, Bloomberg Government analysts discuss how the debt limit and furloughs are affecting the economy, and how a case being reviewed by the Supreme Court, could impact future elections. October 10, 2013
Treasury's Office of Financial Innovation Transformation (OFIT) issued a draft set of requirements that agencies must meet if they want to be federal shared services providers. The requirements should be finalized this fall, and a new set of providers will be in place in the coming months.
The White House updates Circular A-123 to include a new appendix to address federal financial management systems. OMB expects the new regulations to let agencies focus on a smaller-scale, risk-based approach to improving financial systems.
The Office of Federal Financial Management is updating Circular A-123 to focus on risk management and data-driven decision-making. OFFM also plans on rescinding the financial systems requirements circular, A-127, in the coming weeks.