Tag Archives: Open Government Initiative

Improving the Citizen Experience With Government Services

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In 2011, President Obama announced "Improved Customer Service" as a cross-agency priority. Since then, a concerted effort has been put forth to improve the citizen experience with government services. The goal was for each agency to develop a customer service plan that included ways to use technology to improve the customer experience. Agencies posted the plans on their Open Government websites in October 2011, with the goal to build on these plans to streamline and improve customer service delivery.[Tweet "Improving the Citizen Experience With Government Services #GovEventsBlog"]

Since then, the "digitization of government" has become a hot trend followed by the media. More and more agencies are moving formerly cumbersome and paper-intensive processes online as Internet access via smart phones and other devices has become prevalent. All this work has resulted in some positive outcomes. Continue reading →

Picking Up the Open-Gov Torch

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From time to time GovEvents will come across information we feel our members and audience would benefit from. Here's something we wanted to share:

Originally posted on FCW

In September, the White House announced a series of new initiatives as part of its second Open Government National Action Plan. Among them was a commitment to developing and implementing a governmentwide open-source software policy by the end of 2015.

But two of the leaders of that initiative -- Todd Park and Steven VanRoekel -- left the White House toward the end of the summer, raising questions about whether the program will stay on track.

Former U.S. Chief Technology Officer Park and former U.S. CIO VanRoekel were in their respective positions for more than two years and played a role in the launch of the Digital Government Strategy, the Presidential Innovation Fellows program and the U.S. Digital Service. They also had a hand in writing the second open-government plan, which set a Dec. 31, 2015, target for developing an open-source software policy that, with the Digital Services Playbook, "will support improved access to custom software code developed for the federal government." Continue reading →

Defense Intelligence Worldwide Cancelled: Government Events Down, But Budget Savings Up

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Orginally posted by by  on FedConnects

According to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) last week, efforts to reduce travel and increase oversight in travel and conference spending have saved the federal government roughly $2 billion from fiscal 2010 to fiscal 2012.

Earlier this year, a Market Connections poll showed 38% of government employees plan to attend fewer educational and trade events in FY2013 than last fiscal year.  The majority of poll respondents said budgetary and agency travel restrictions are the cause, and just over one-third of respondents reported that management would not allow them to attend events in 2013.

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