The Federal Drive with Terry Gerton

The Veterans Benefits Administration (VBA) needs talent in all sorts of areas. Needing to fill differing jobs requires differing recruitment practices. For how they're going about it, Federal News Network's Eric White spoke to the executive director of the VBA’s Office of Human Capitol Services, Dr. Aaron Lee.

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The Government Accountability Office (GAO) has been sifting through stacks of research on how many people actually teleworked over the last three years, and whether telework will continue to have a positive economic impact. For what auditors learned, Federal Drive Host Tom Temin spoke John Sawyer, GAO's Director of Education, Workforce and Income Security.

[GAO Report linked here]

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Apprenticeships go way. They became codified in the United States some 86 years ago with enactment of the National Apprenticeship Act. Now the Labor Department has brought new focus to this part of job training through what it calls the Apprentice Trailblazer Initiative. For what it is and what Labor hopes to accomplish, Federal Drive Host Tom Temin spoke with Senior Policy Advisor Manny Lamarre.

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On today's episode of the Federal Drive with Tom Temin:

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The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency is about to give cloud security across government a boost with the impending finalization of security “baselines” for widely used Microsoft applications.

Meanwhile, the hacking of a Biden administration cabinet member’s emails via Microsoft’s cloud environment has sparked a high-level government investigation into the incident, as well as broader review of cloud security best practices

CISA’s work under the “Secure Cloud Business Applications” or “SCuBA” project has been ongoing since 2021. The project aims to give agencies and other organizations resources for securing their cloud environments. CISA released an initial set of security baselines for the Microsoft 365 suite of business applications last year for feedback from the technical community.

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After the National Science Foundation, like many federal agencies, announced return-to-office plans for its employees, the American Federation of Government Employees is calling on the agency to take a step back.

In a new union-conducted survey, AFGE Local 3403, representing roughly 1,000 NSF bargaining unit employees, found that a majority of agency workers are concerned about going back to the office more often — and some will consider leaving the agency if the plans are implemented.

“I started this job when NSF was posturing a hybrid and remote workforce, which indicated to me that NSF would have remote work available,” one employee wrote in AFGE’s survey results, obtained by Federal News Network. “Because they are essentially not allowing anyone to be remote, I will be finding a new job by October.”

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Defense contractors are scratching their collective head, after a procurement reform commission released some early findings. The Planning, Programming, Budgeting and Execution Commission (PPBE) seemed to sidestep some important questions, according to Federal Drive Host Tom Temin's guest: David Berteau, President and CEO of the Professional Services Council.

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For several years, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) has issued recommendations for reforming the Capitol Police. Federal Drive Host Tom Temin's guest has compiled all of the studies and recommendations, as well coming up with a few reform ideas of his own. Taylor Swift is a senior policy adviser with Demand Progress.

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As long as the United States has traded with other nations, customs brokers have been at the center of it. Now Customs and Border Protection (CBP) inaugurates new continuing education for its brokers, as trade volumes and complexity grow. For the details, Federal Drive Host Tom Temin spoke with John Leonard, the Deputy Executive Assistant Commissioner for CBP's Office of Trade.

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