budgets

Getting better performance out of supply chain and operations activities is not at the top of everyone’s priority list, but it should be. In today’s world, moving things smartly and efficiently – regardless of whether they are people, product or petabytes – is paramount to success.

This challenge is not a new one. But, the pressures of meeting customer demands, fulfilling their mission requirements, and maintaining high service levels is significantly complicated at a time of diminishing budgets. Even though government organizations recognize the importance of making their operations more efficient, leaders must prove the benefit of the change before investing time, people, and money in system and process improvements. Keep reading →


For a number of years, there has been a certain relationship between different segments of the federal information technology market. But those relationships are changing as agencies have had to come to grips with stark new budget constraints, which are expected to be reflected in the new federal budget being released by the White House today.

Those changes are already having an important implications for the companies competing for federal IT contracts as well as for the federal and military leaders responsible for acquiring and operating the IT technologies that support their civil and military agency mission requirements.
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This article was adapted from introductory remarks made Feb. 13 at the 25th Annual Federal Networks by conference chairman, Warren Suss, president of Suss Consulting. For more news and insights on innovations at work in government, please sign up for the AOL Gov newsletter. For the quickest updates, follow us on Twitter @AOLgov.
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It was bound to happen and it appears it has just begun – cyber burn-out.

Recently a few security professional expressed symptoms that are associated with burn-out. This type of attitude is so uncharacteristic of these individuals. They are talking about, and more importantly, exhibiting the depletion and drain of professional drive. Keep reading →

The Navy’s new ship network system may go online later than expected, if service officials press ahead with a $102 million cut to the program’s budget, the Navy officer leading the effort said today.



The service is considering a $102 million reduction to the Consolidated Afloat Networks and Enterprise Services (CANES) program, as part of its yet-to-be released five-year budget plan, Program Manager Capt. Didier LeGoff said today.



The CANES system will replace the disparate command, control and communication systems currently on board Navy ships, and put those vessels under a single, uniform network.

Reducing costs. Reducing spending. Reducing debt. Managing through the new austerity. Doing more with less. This familiar language that the private sector uses when times get tough, is becoming increasingly familiar to governments worldwide. And the message is clear: Business as usual will no longer be tolerated.

Around the world, the massive fiscal stimulus programs that were put in place to pull economies out of the 2008 Great Recession are now being translated into fiscal consolidation strategies, and for good reason. The unprecedented fiscal expansion has led to explosive–and, in some cases, unmanageable–sovereign debt levels. The 2010 Greek debt crisis, which created financial shock waves around the globe, indicated how volatile the situation has become for a number of countries. Keep reading →

President Barack Obama used social media giant LinkedIn to hold another in a series of electronic town halls Sept. 26 to speak to a studio and online audience about his $450 billion jobs proposal.

The electronic town hall was originally broadcast live via the White House’s website and featured on LinkedIn’s website, accompanied by a discussion thread called “Putting America Back to Work 2011.” Keep reading →

Government leaders know there will be no silver bullets, only hard choices, when it comes to preparing the inevitable budget cuts now facing federal agencies.

The question is, how will they proceed? Keep reading →

Federal agency and department leaders should plan for a 5 percent reduction in discretionary spending in fiscal year 2013, and prepare for more cuts –at least 10 percent–according to a White House Office of Management and Budget memo. At the same time, OMB urged agencies to look for opportunities to enhance economic growth.

Unless agencies have been given explicit direction to the contrary by OMB, overall agency funding requests for fiscal year 2013 should be “at least 5 percent below your 2011 enacted discretionary appropriation,” OMB Director Jacob Lew wrote in an Aug. 17 memo to federal agency and department heads. Keep reading →

The federal government’s use of grants to achieve national objectives has grown into a $600 billion lifeline to states, local governments and institutions. More than 1,670 federal grant programs were offered by 23 federal grant-making departments and agencies in fiscal year 2010, according to the Office of Management and Budget,.

The risks associated with administering those funds, and concerns about the lack of effective oversight tools, continue to draw criticism–the most recent coming in a new report issued last month by the Government Accountability Office. Keep reading →

Reducing energy costs at federal agencies will take a lot more than getting employees to power down their computers at night and installing motion sensors to control the office lights.

It requires planning and a very specific strategy, says Rebecca Ranich, co-lead of Deloitte Consulting LLP’s Federal Government Energy Management initiative. Keep reading →

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