Innovation

Why?  Because prizes are effective.  Under the right circumstances, they can be more effective than traditional investments in research and development.

Lowery says: “After falling out of favor for decades, such high-publicity, fat-reward contest came into vogue again in the aughts in the wake of the 1996 Ansari X Prize for advances in commercial spaceflight” which Burt Rutan’s SpaceShipOne won in 2004.

On November 8, the President-elect will begin the next phase of the transition to power that culminates with Inauguration Day on January 20, 2017.  The next Administration will have a tremendous opportunity to drive change that improves mission performance across government, in ways that can positively impact millions of lives across the Nation across a broad range of mission areas – including health care for citizens, stewardship of natural resources, and delivery of benefits with financial integrity.

Michael J. Keegan

FAA looks to take over commercial space traffic control. The Federal Aviation Administration is making the case that it and not the military should police commercial space traffic, and Congress is helping the flight agency take the first step.

One thing is certain, digital is not simply a side project of the White House, but a booming industry and an expected condition of business. The real question becomes not if, but how the government can mature and scale digital services – whether at USDS, across agency digital services teams, out of the 18F program now housed in GSA’s Technology Transformation Service, or elsewhere.

NASA leads the nation on a great journey of discovery, seeking new knowledge and understanding of our Earth, sun, solar system, and the universe— out to its farthest reaches and back to its earliest moments of existence.

To do this, it invests on the order of $3 billion annually in fundamental and applied research and technology development across a broad range of topics, including space and earth sciences, life and physical sciences, human health, aeronautics, and technology.

This post will build on an earlier post, which looked at the future of digital government, by including insights from the “Innovation in the Next Administration” event hosted by Georgetown’s McCourt School of Public Policy and the Beeck Center for Social Impact and Innovation on October 6^th.

Trump teams begin meeting with federal agencies. President-elect Donald Trump has begun to deploy transition teams in three waves to meet with federal agencies.

OPM leads the Federal Government's efforts to improve strategic human capital management.  OPM focuses on building a professional civil service based on merit principles, where Federal employees can effectively serve the public throughout the employment life cycle – while also receiving benefits and services from “hire to retire” that are consistent with best practices.  That effort continues today as OPM embarks on a new initiative to integrate HR offerings and HR data sets across the Government.

Michael J. Keegan

Does HealthCare.gov have a future? HealthCare.gov is the web-based marketplace where users shop for health plans. It includes a data hub that transmits eligibility information across federal agencies and an identity management system that handles user registration and updates and pings insurance issuers and the exchanges in states that manage their own systems.

Michael Keegan

Trump's pick for OMB sounds enthusiastic about the Data Act. Rep. Mick Mulvaney (R-S.C.) stressed the importance of getting accurate and useful data in order to inform his and President Donald Trump's decision-making during his confirmation hearings to lead the Office of Management and Budget.