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1.9% is theTrump administration’s proposed pay raise for federal
employees in fiscal 2018
some appointments for the sake of “run- ning a very good, efficient government.” Sullivan acknowledged that refusing to fill some of the Senate-confirmed positions could be part of a strategy to shrink government. “There can be dif- ferences about the 970,” he said, “but the 221 are critical to leadership...and for those 221, they’re not doing any bet-
ter than they are [for] the 970.”
In addition, the Trump administra- tion is taking about “10 days longer than average to complete the review process before sending a nominee to the Senate,” according to an appointments tracker on the White House Transition
Project’s website.
Sullivan said such a slow pace has a
negative impact on governance, includ- ing the administration’s ability to man- age a crisis. He offered two possibilities for why the Trump White House is tak- ing so much longer to fill positions than its predecessors did.
“For one, they have far fewer appli- cants” for positions than Barack Obama or George W. Bush had, Sullivan said. “Another possibility is that it’s much harder for those who have only expe- rience in business to understand how complex the federal government is.”
— Chase Gunter
CRITICAL READ
WHAT: “Security Breaches in the U.S. Federal Government” by Min-Seok Pang ofTemple Uni- versity and HüseyinTanriverdi of the University ofTexas at Austin
WHY: The federal IT community has long recognized the impor- tance of moving investments from legacy support to new IT for improvements in perfor- mance, security and value. But just what kind of outcomes does a shift from spending on opera- tions and maintenance (O&M) to development, modernization and enhancement (DME) yield for agencies?
Based on five years’ worth of data on security incidents from Federal Information Security Management Act reports, spend- ing data from the IT Dashboard, federal workforce data and
other sources, the researchers concluded that agencies can expect a 5 percent decrease in the number of security breaches for every 1 percent in funding that moves from O&M to DME or managed services.
The data also suggests that agencies with geographically far-flung operations experience fewer breaches than those with a large primary footprint.
VERBATIM: “We find that agencies that invest more
in new IT development and modernization experience fewer security breaches
than ones that invest more in maintenance of legacy systems. Outsourcing legacy systems to the cloud also reduces the frequency of security breaches.”
FULL REPORT:
https://is.gd/FCW_breaches
Trump transition is the slowest in decades
The Trump administration is appointing Senate-confirmed positions, including those critical to national security, at a historically slow pace, experts say.
Terry Sullivan, executive director of the nonpartisan White House Transi- tion Project, characterized the progress as “slow — in every dimension.” His organization has tracked presidential appointments since Bill Clinton’s tenure. Compared to previous administrations, Trump’s is “way behind,” Sullivan said.
Of the 970 Senate-confirmed political appointments President Donald Trump can make, only 45 have even been nomi- nated. The average for Trump’s three most recent predecessors at this point in their administrations was 95.
When it comes to filling the 221 most important appointments, which include critical national security posts, past administrations have taken about 18 months. Sullivan said that timeline is too long, but the Trump administration is far behind even that. At its current pace, filling those positions would take about three years, “which would mean they’d be in the election cycle before they stood up their government,” Sul- livan added.
In February, Trump told the “Fox and Friends” TV show that he’s not making
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Study pegs security benefits of new IT spending | @FCWnow http://hpe.to/60198jv05 #GovSec
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