Department of Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates earlier this week outlined 23 changes for how DoD contracts goods and services aimed at boosting efficiency and productivity in defense spending. The strategy is part of Gates’ efficiencies initiative created to save the department $100 billion over the next five years. “We have not seen the productivity [...]

Federal Chief Information Officer Vivek Kundra will be delivering the opening plenary address at the PMI Global Congress, discussing how the federal government is making progress in managing the complex projects for government IT. As a driver of unprecedented change in the federal government’s IT operations, including pioneering work to drive transparency and decrease the [...]

John Berry, director of the Office of Personnel Management, recently discussed the progress made thus far on hiring reform implementation during a CHCO Council Full Council Meeting. “I am proud that all federal agencies have begun delivering on our commitment to improve the hiring process,” Berry said. “Hiring reform implementation is critical for us because [...]

Department of Homeland Security announced last week Memphis International was one of eight airports receiving full-body scanners, which can detect hidden objects on a person. The scanners, also called Advanced Imaging Technology units, are being installed at four different checkpoints throughout the airport as an additional security measure. Currently, there are 194 full-body scanners at [...]

Department of Health and Human Services yesterday announced $31 million for awards to 10 communities in eight states and one award to a state health department to support public-health efforts to reduce obesity and smoking, increase physical activity and improve nutrition. The awards are part of the HHS “Communities Putting Prevention to Work program,” a [...]

The White House has launched the new Challenge.gov, an online platform provided by the General Services Administration that allows federal agencies to post contests aimed at increasing public involvement with the government. As part of President Barack Obama’s call for an open government, agencies were called upon to leverage challenges and prizes to spur citizen [...]

As the federal government ups its battle against cyber attacks and threats, the civilian and military officials in charge of those operations are committed to adopting meaningful measures to protect citizens’ privacy, National Security Agency Director Gen. Keith B. Alexander said on Tuesday. Speaking at the O’Reilly Media Gov 2.0 Summit in Washington, D.C., the [...]

A massive computer failure is making it difficult for people to get driver’s licenses and file tax returns in Virginia, but now Gov. Bob McDonnell has ordered a third-party investigation into the problem, according to NewsChannel 3. The computer problems have been affecting the Department of Motor Vehicles, the Department of Taxation, and the State [...]

The Federal Communications Commission yesterday introduced four new application programming interfaces that make FCC data available as web services, and unveiled a community website for “citizen developers” that provides code and tools for using the data sets. FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski announced the APIs and website at the Gov 2.0 Summit at the Grand Hyatt [...]

The Government Accountability Office, NASA and the General Services Administration have been ranked the best places to work in the federal government in a survey of roughly 260,000 employees at 290 departments, agencies and sub-components. The three agencies made it to the top 10: GAO ranked second on the list, followed by NASA as the [...]