Smarter Gov Tech, Stronger MerITocracy

John Curran

MeriTalk

John Curran is MeriTalk's Managing Editor covering the intersection of government and technology.

Federal agency clients of Apptio – a provider of cloud-based software solutions for Technology Business Management (TBM) and Cloud Financial Management (FinOps) – are seeing savings of up to 20 percent on their cloud computing spend by taking advantage of the company’s TBM and FinOps services. […]

The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) will kick off a public proceeding later this week aimed at implementing the reclassification of an estimated 50,000 Federal government employees deemed to be in “policy making” positions into a new ‘Policy/Career’ personnel schedule. […]

The Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program’s (FedRAMP) Program Management Office (PMO) is in the process of drafting a standard for low-impact key security indicators (KSIs) as part of ongoing work on the program’s “20x” revamp unveiled on March 24. […]

President Donald Trump’s executive orders issued on Tuesday directing the government to simplify the existing Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) and to prioritize buying “commercially available” products and services – rather than “non-commercial, custom products or services” – received positive initial reviews today from government technology experts, who also said they are eager to see how well the orders play out going forward. […]

White House

President Donald Trump issued two key executive orders on Tuesday night – one that seeks to pare down the existing Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) to make it more efficient – and a second that directs the government to “prioritize” acquisitions of “commercially available” products and services rather than “non-commercial, custom products or services.” […]

CISA

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) may have to run for a while without the services of Sean Plankey as director of the agency after Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., said on Wednesday that he will place a hold on the nomination made by the White House last month for Plankey to head the agency. […]

Tech Tonic May 2025

Who’s tops in the latest crop of innovators in government and industry that are defending our networks against cyber adversaries? We’re going to find out on May 15 at Tech Tonic in Washington, D.C., when MeriTalk honors the 2025 class of Cyber Defenders from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. at Morton’s The Steakhouse. […]

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) is looking for a 15 percent year-over-year budget increase for fiscal year (FY) 2026 and plans to use the higher funding to restore depleted agency staffing levels and to pursue several major lines of work including in the areas of science and technology, fraud prevention, and cybersecurity. […]

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) is pushing the Defense Department (DoD) to create a framework that will guide investments in its Combined Joint All-Domain Command and Control (CJADC2) project and warned of trouble ahead if it does not do so. […]

John Curran
MeriTalk