ATARC Federal IT Newscast

Whether we plan for it or not, organizations have internal cultures that determine the employee experience, and, by extension, the customer experience as well. In this episode, Nina and Chris sit down with Erik Anderson, the Chief of the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) Office of Administration which oversees the day to day operations of the agency. As a newer Senior Executive, Erik brings fresh perspective and insight on leadership theories and ideas…theories that were put to the test as he took the lead of his organization in the midst of the pandemic. Join us as we discuss what has proven to work in the crucible of managing a new organization in challenging circumstances, and the importance of planning for the culture you want to build. 1:50 - Chris' favorite question: what does the future hold when it comes to digital and workforce transformation in the federal government? 2:38 - Out of a season of challenge, change, and transition, an emerging opportunity to embrace new technologies 4:05 - Culture starts at the top: Erik shares his experience of being called into a new leadership position in a completely new organization in the middle of the pandemic, and realizing that before anyone would trust him he'd have to set the tone by opening himself up first 7:40 - As leaders, we can sometimes worry about those we lead abusing our trust. But the truth is if there is mutual trust between you and your employees, more often than not they will make you look like a genius 9:23 - How does a culture of trust in the workforce affect the customer experience? 10:57 - Culture happens no matter what, so why not plan for the culture that we want in our organizations? Developing metrics and plans around what kind of culture we want to build as an organization 14:32 - What does it cost to change a culture? What is the cost of ignoring it? 16:30 - How to measure a culture: concrete steps, metrics, and methods. Oh, and once a year isn't enough (looking at you, FEVS!) 19:45 - The critical role of doing exit interviews for EVERY employee who leaves your organization…and doing "stay" interviews for those who don't 24:57 - Setting aside your title: how humility in leadership can open the door for organizations to find both unexpected opportunities and advance warning of incoming threats 27:30 - Where career advice and workforce transformation meet: don't look for jobs, look for quality (humble) leaders 30:07 - What this looks like in IT: when those in leadership feel the need to be the smartest person in the room, other team members run out of room to contribute and grow 34:30 - Wave the magic wand! Erik's one wish for moving the ball forward when it comes to workforce transformation Connect with Nina and Chris: Nina Bianchi: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bianchininafuture/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/NinaFuture Christopher Crist: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christopher-crist-a1544a135/ 

As one of the world's top cybersecurity experts, join Joe Saunders and Nicolas Chaillan as they cover a vast variety of topics including memory based exploits, Google's Project Zero, supply chain risk, open source adoption, 5G economic and security risks, and more!

Join this episode of In the Nic of Time with Rob Slaughter, CEO, Culture Executive Officer, Defense Unicorns and they discuss the challenges with bringing DevSecOps to the largest organization on the planet, the DoD.

Does "Solving for X" actually make sense in the real world? In this episode, Nina and Chris welcome two senior federal leaders, Dorothy Aronson, Chief Information Officer and Chief Data Officer for the National Science Foundation and Robyn Rees, an ATARC Board Member and advocate for unlocking human capital data to power workforce transformation. Together their combined experiences span across both the private and public sector and in this episode they discuss the similarities between customers and employees - since employees and customers too. They share how customer-centered design can also be used to improve the employee experience. Can we create a marketplace where employees can manage their own portfolio of skills and be matched to jobs like Uber drivers are matched to riders? Dorothy believes the workforce of the future will enjoy what they're doing and enjoy doing it from wherever they want using the tools they select rather than structured tools that are forced onto them. Robyn shares her thoughts about where the distinction between CX and EX might come from and how to overcome it. Dorothy advocates for the importance of leading with humanity versus just managing to build trust with teams. Robyn discusses the need for cultural change that's enabled through digital change by putting the tools in the hands of the people getting the work done and by Solving for X. Connect with Nina and Chris: Nina Bianchi: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bianchininafuture/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/NinaFuture Christopher Crist: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christopher-crist-a1544a135/

Join this episode of In the Nic of Time, with Special Guest Carl "C.J." Unis, United States Space Force as they discuss the supply chain risks we are facing, particularly with what is going on with the Ukraine/Russia conflict, with Taiwan and China and what we've seen after COVID.

Nina Bianchi, Solution Principal for Medallia Public Sector, and Chris Crist, Chief of DevSecOps at US Transportation Command both agree that workforce and digital transformation in the federal government lies at the intersection of the customer, employee, and workforce experiences. The question is…which one comes first and what does the workforce experience of the future look like? How does the government use the EX + CX = WX formula? Can it be used to help the government becomes the Nation's top employer? In this episode they dig into the government employee experience. Are federal employees waking up excited to go to work, and if not, how does that impact the customer experience? Are customers receiving service worth telling their family or friends about - in private sector positive customer testimonials are essential! Nina connects the customer experience (CX), such as filing taxes, applying for  student loans, or using a veterans hospital, as a reflection of the federal employee’s experiences (EX). What would we hear from our employees if we simply asked them how they're doing or what challenges exist is serving the Nation’s customers? There is undoubtedly a connection to the customer and employee experiences. Most importantly how can the workforce experiences help attract the best and brightest talent to government jobs? Join them as they try to Solve for X. Connect with Nina and Chris:  Nina Bianchi:  LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bianchininafuture/   Twitter: https://twitter.com/NinaFuture   Christopher Crist:  LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christopher-crist-a1544a135/

Join this episode of DevOps Community of Practice as our Host, Brian Fox, sits down with Special Guest, Ian Anderson, Lead DevSecOps Engineer, Naval Surface Warfare Center, to discuss DevOps within the Navy, best practices they have seen, current challenges and successes and where they see the future of DevOps and technology as a whole going in the DoD.

Join this episode of In the Nic of Time, with Kate Stewart, VP of Dependable Embedded Systems, the Linux Foundation as they talk about her work as one of the founders of SPDX, the projects OpenChain and Zephyr but also how she helped make Linux a first class citizen for RTOS!

Join this episode of In the Nic of Time with Joey Arora, VP of Growth at the Outpost as they discuss the importance of dual-use technology in DoD and how to enable companies to become the next billion-dollar competitors to the current primes.

Join this episode of In the Nic of Time with Armon Dadgar, Co-Founder and CTO of HashiCorp, as they discuss his journey and how HashiCorp managed to innovate in virtualization, key management, policy as code, service mesh and more.