GovExec Daily

As with most things during the COVID-19 crisis, the 2020 Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey was different than it had been in previous years. It was delayed twice and the results finally came out, showing that federal employees surveyed are more engaged and happier in their jobs.

Erich Wagner covers the federal workforce for us here at GovExec. He joined the show to discuss survey results and other pay and benefits stories that affect federal employees.

The federal civil service is huge and varied, with federal employees in jobs across agencies as different as the Justice Department and the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board.

Love Rutledge is the host of the Fed Upward podcast and a federal employee at the Office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Force Readiness. She's joined the podcast talk about what it's like being a public servant during Public Service Recognition Week.

The Biden administration often claims that it inherited a series of policy crises when it came into office in January. Less prominent than the economic and public health crises involving COVID-19, for example, is the crises in the civil service. Biden's bedrock task, our guest today has written, is to strengthen the civil service to tackle the policy problems facing the administration.

Dr. Donald F. Kettl is Professor in the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin and a GovExec contributor. He's authored many books, including Escaping Jurassic Government: How to Recover America's Lost Commitment to Competence and The Politics of the Administrative Process. His most-recent piece on our site is headlined "Biden Needs a Strategy for Strengthening the Federal Workforce." He joined the show discuss how the administration can support the civil service.

This week marks Public Service Recognition Week, a celebration of those who serve the U.S. as federal, state, county, local and tribal government employees. Throughout the country, government officials, communities and non profit organizations will celebrity public servants and the jobs they do supporting the nation.

Jordan LaPier is a Senior Communications Manager at the Partnership for Public Service. He joins the show to talk about Public Service Recognition Week.

Friday marks the 100th day of Joe Biden's time as president. He marked the occasion with a speech to a joint session of Congress in which he touted his administration's accomplishments and proposed a series of far-reaching policies that come with a price tag in the trillions.

The 100-day mark has been a part of American political culture since Franklin Roosevelt's presidency. Katherine McIntire Peters is GovExec's Deputy Editor and Tom Shoop is GovExec's executive vice president and editor in chief joined the show to examine Biden's 100-day record against his promises and his predecessors.

After more than a year of dire news around the pandemic, the number of American adults who have been vaccinated against COVID-19 is rapidly rising. Nearly 100 million adults in the U.S. have had at least one shot of any of the available vaccines, but the pandemic is far from over. The next phase of vaccine distribution planning is paramount for public health if the U.S. – and the world – is to get to herd immunity going forward.

Dr. Pooja Kumar is a McKinsey partner and Shubham Singhal is a McKinsey senior partner. They are co-authors on a new McKinsey report titled "A light at the end of the tunnel: US COVID-19 vaccine administration." They joined the show to discuss how stakeholders can come together in the pursuit of a fully-vaccinated public and COVID-19 herd immunity.

The year-plus of the coronavirus pandemic isolation period has forced government to heed the call of modernization with speed unseen before it. The necessity of telework made the federal government switch to a more agile tech and workforce situation, including IT contracting and operations. The Biden administration came into office against that backdrop and, according to our guest today, has brought in a series of appointees who speak to a brighter, more professional future for government's digital transformation.

Stan Soloway is president and CEO of Celero Strategies, LLC and a GovExec contributor. He formerly served as deputy undersecretary of Defense for acquisition reform and director of the Defense Reform Initiative during Bill Clinton's administration. His post "Biden Appointments Signal Major Changes In Digital Operations and Acquisition" analyzes the new appointments in the administration. He joined the show to discuss his piece and the future of government digital ops and acquisitions.

Recent Postal Inspector General reports paint a less-than-rosy picture for the United States Postal Service. Delayed service, financial burdens and understaffing plague the USPS, with customers increasingly frustrated. With all of this hanging over their heads, President Joe Biden's Postal Board nominees appeared on Capitol Hill as part of their confirmation process.

Eric Katz covers postal issues at GovExec and he joined the podcast to talk about the nominees and the state of USPS.

The federal workforce is made up of more than two million individuals, so it is hardly a monolith of ideology, values or common sentiment. Each one swears an oath to the Constitution, of course, but they are human beings with their own viewpoints, including on policy and politics.

Dr. Edoardo Teso is an Assistant Professor of Managerial Economics & Decision Sciences at Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management. Dr. Guo Xu is an Assistant Professor of Business and Public Policy at the Haas School of Business University of California at Berkeley. His research focuses on the selection, recruitment and allocation of talent in private and public sector organizations. Teso and Xu examine the connection between politics and public employees in a working in a new working paper for the National Bureau of Economic Research titled "Ideology and Performance in Public Organization." They joined the podcast to discuss their paper and the ways ideology does or doesn't affect civil servants' job performance.

When compared to other developed nations, the United States is lagging behind on providing paid leave for the workforce. A 2019 bill brought the federal government closer to other developed nation-states like the United Kingdom and France, but a new bill in the Senate would provide even more leave to federal employees and position the federal government as a leader in the U.S. on leave.

GovExec Senior Correspondent Erich Wagner covers the federal workforce. He joined the show to discuss the paid leave bill and other pay and benefits stories that affect federal employees.