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1 – 10 of over 27000This paper aims to look at the culture of federal workers and some reasons why workers may or may not want to share knowledge among their peers. To overcome the resistance to…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to look at the culture of federal workers and some reasons why workers may or may not want to share knowledge among their peers. To overcome the resistance to knowledge sharing, the paper seeks to explore the benefits of having a knowledge management facilitator with experience in the social professions guiding an agency toward becoming a team learning organization. The objective is to show how cultural changes among the federal workers can enable them to participate in team learning and achieve their fullest potential in their careers and their personal lives. Through employee enrichment, federal organizations can enable their workers to achieve new goals, which in turn can promote improved efficiency, innovation, and effectiveness within the organization.
Design/methodology/approach
Some federal agencies have a strong KM program in place that applies the concepts involving people, processes, learning and technology as part of their culture. Others have focused on the technology aspect of KM, while resisting incorporation of the remaining elements that are necessary to sustain a knowledge‐sharing culture. Although more investigation is needed to determine each federal agency's position on knowledge management, one thing is certain – encouraging individuals to reach their fullest potential will have a beneficial impact among federal agencies and encourage knowledge sharing among the workforce.
Findings
The paper illustrates that addressing the people aspect of KM is an important step that can provide a foundation for establishing a sound knowledge management program throughout the federal government. Focusing on the individual workers, it is necessary to keep in mind the systems approach to KM and incorporate appropriate elements of the system, as individuals are encouraged to participate in the knowledge management process. The paper provides certainty that implementing a sound KM program will benefit today's federal knowledge worker and further the growth of the future knowledge worker in the 2020 decade.
Practical implications
The paper improves the efficiency of the federal workforce.
Social implications
The paper acknowledges the federal worker's value, which instils a commitment of the federal knowledge worker and stimulates employee creativity.
Originality/value
The paper provides insight into the culture of federal workers and changes that can be made to improve the innovation, efficiency and effectiveness of the federal work force.
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Gregory M. Vecchi and Robert T. Sigler
Forfeiture of assets has become an important tool in drug interdiction. Forfeiture provides substantial funds to law enforcement agencies and can produce goal displacement. A…
Abstract
Forfeiture of assets has become an important tool in drug interdiction. Forfeiture provides substantial funds to law enforcement agencies and can produce goal displacement. A survey was conducted of all members of three task forces dedicated to drug interdiction in the Miami, Florida area regarding the goals and the value of asset forfeiture. While all subjects endorsed the goals relating to the punishment of drug dealers as most important, federal officers not assigned to joint task forces valued economic benefits to the agency less than federal agents assigned to joint task forces who, in turn, valued economic benefits less than non‐federal task force agents.
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The Bureau of Economics in the Federal Trade Commission has a three-part role in the Agency and the strength of its functions changed over time depending on the preferences and…
Abstract
The Bureau of Economics in the Federal Trade Commission has a three-part role in the Agency and the strength of its functions changed over time depending on the preferences and ideology of the FTC’s leaders, developments in the field of economics, and the tenor of the times. The over-riding current role is to provide well considered, unbiased economic advice regarding antitrust and consumer protection law enforcement cases to the legal staff and the Commission. The second role, which long ago was primary, is to provide reports on investigations of various industries to the public and public officials. This role was more recently called research or “policy R&D”. A third role is to advocate for competition and markets both domestically and internationally. As a practical matter, the provision of economic advice to the FTC and to the legal staff has required that the economists wear “two hats,” helping the legal staff investigate cases and provide evidence to support law enforcement cases while also providing advice to the legal bureaus and to the Commission on which cases to pursue (thus providing “a second set of eyes” to evaluate cases). There is sometimes a tension in those functions because building a case is not the same as evaluating a case. Economists and the Bureau of Economics have provided such services to the FTC for over 100 years proving that a sub-organization can survive while playing roles that sometimes conflict. Such a life is not, however, always easy or fun.
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The federal government buys about $200 million worth of goods and services each year. Through its purchasing decisions, the federal government can signal its commitment to…
Abstract
The federal government buys about $200 million worth of goods and services each year. Through its purchasing decisions, the federal government can signal its commitment to preventing pollution, reducing solid waste, increasing recycling, and stimulating markets for environmentally friendly products. The Resource Conservation and Recovery Act of 1976 (RCRA) directs the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to identify products made with recycled waste materials or solid waste by-products and to develop guidance for purchasing these products. The act also requires procuring agencies to establish programs for purchasing them. This report examines efforts by federal agencies to (1) implementation of RCRA requirements for procuring products with recycled content and (2) the purchase of environmentally preferable and bio-based products. EPA accelerated its efforts in the 1990s to identify recycled-content products, but the status of agencies’ efforts to implement the RCRA purchasing requirements for these products is uncertain. The four major procuring agencies report that, for many reasons, their procurement practices have not changed to increase their purchases of environmentally preferable and bio-based products. One reason for the lack of change is that EPA and the U.S. Department of Agriculture have been slow to develop and implement the programs.
The purpose of this paper is to provide findings of an exploratory study of Special Agents in Charge (SACs) in a variety of federal law enforcement agencies and presents summary…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to provide findings of an exploratory study of Special Agents in Charge (SACs) in a variety of federal law enforcement agencies and presents summary descriptions, including demographics and career paths of female agents.
Design/methodology/approach
Incumbent SACs, reached with assistance from law enforcement organizations and through snowball techniques, anonymously completed questionnaires that were mailed to each individually. This methodology provided a snapshot in time of the first generation of women to have reached the rank of SAC.
Findings
The findings suggest that women are moving up the ranks of federal agencies even while their overall percentages of employment have become somewhat static. Regardless of type or size of federal agency, there are a number of common career paths and the ages and racial demographics of the women are also similar across agencies.
Practical implications
As federal agency recruitment of women seems to have stagnated, a portrait of women who have reached middle management may provide insight into the obstacles women face in these agencies and also into how some women have overcome these obstacles.
Originality/value
The findings are derived from the first ever study of women SACs. In addition to providing a snapshot of incumbent women, it will provide baseline data for later studies of future generations of women who move up in the ranks of federal law enforcement.
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Charles R. McClure, William E. Moen and Joe Ryan
This article summarizes a study that identified and described federal information inventory/locator systems. Such locator systems provide an important means of accessing a range…
Abstract
This article summarizes a study that identified and described federal information inventory/locator systems. Such locator systems provide an important means of accessing a range of government information not previously available to the public or other government officials. Overall, the study's goal was to improve access to and use of U.S. government information. The study produced a final report describing study efforts, identifying issues and conclusions, and recommending the design of an networked‐based government‐wide information inventory/locator system (GIILS) (Volume I), the Federal Locator Database (FLD) — a machine‐readable database of descriptive information on some 250 federal databases, of which fifty‐three met the study's criteria as a locator, and a user's guide to that database (Volume II includes a machine‐readable version of the database and the user guide and codebook). The study recommends that the U.S. Office of Management and Budget develop a policy framework requiring agencies to design and maintain machine‐readable locators, meeting certain requirements and standards and that these be accessible over the Internet/NREN.
John Carlo Bertot and Charles R. McClure
Federal government agencies increasingly use electronic bulletin boardtechnology as a means of providing access to and dissemination ofelectronic government information. This…
Abstract
Federal government agencies increasingly use electronic bulletin board technology as a means of providing access to and dissemination of electronic government information. This paper identifies and analyzes existing government bulletin boards (BBSs). It also assesses the types of information available to information users on the BBSs as well as the cost and technological access issues involved in federal agency use of BBSs. Furthermore, the paper presents a typology of bulletin boards. Finally, it discusses information policy implications resulting from BBS development, especially with regard to access and dissemination of electronic government information. These “new” access mechanisms are often‐times difficult to use, are poorly deployed and operated, and may serve to limit access to some types of government information.
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This chapter on terrorism prevention provides the reader with an overview of the various terrorist prevention organizations within the United States at the federal, state, and…
Abstract
This chapter on terrorism prevention provides the reader with an overview of the various terrorist prevention organizations within the United States at the federal, state, and local levels. It is divided into two different sections, the first providing a detailed description of various federal agencies involved in terrorism prevention and an overview of how state and local agencies fit within the federal framework. The second section of this chapter describes various efforts to integrate these disparate organizations into a cohesive effort to prevent terrorism activities. This chapter concludes with some suggestions for future consideration to help with the overall terrorism prevention effort.
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Cass Hausserman, Susan Jurney and Timothy Rupert
We experimentally investigate how the level of government (either federal or state) and whether funding is being allocated to enforcement or service efforts in a revenue agency…
Abstract
We experimentally investigate how the level of government (either federal or state) and whether funding is being allocated to enforcement or service efforts in a revenue agency affects trust in the agency, as well as support for the funding initiative. We find that the two independent variables interact, such that trust in the state agency is not affected by whether the proposed funding would be allocated to service or enforcement efforts. But, at the federal level (the Internal Revenue Service), trust in the agency is significantly higher when the proposed funding is to hire additional service employees as opposed to hiring additional enforcement employees. We also find that the level of government moderates the mediating effect of trust in the agency on the relation between the use of funds and support for the funding.
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This paper aims to report on a study that aimed at analyzing the relationships between information security and records management (RM), both as programs/functions established in…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to report on a study that aimed at analyzing the relationships between information security and records management (RM), both as programs/functions established in organizations. Similar studies were not found in relevant literature.
Design/methodology/approach
The study used the classic grounded theory methodology. Pursuing the general curiosity about the information security-RM relationship in organizations, the study selected the United States (US) Federal Government as its field of entrance and followed the process of the classic grounded theory methodology that starts from the letting of the emergence of the research question to the formulation of a substantive theory that answered the question.
Findings
On the emergent question that why, despite the legislative establishment of agency RM programs and the use of the term records in their work, the US Federal Government information security community considered RM a candidate for deletion (CFD), the study coded the truncated application of the encompassing definition of records as the underlying reason. By this code, along with its three properties, i.e. limitations by the seemingly more encompassing coverage of information, insufficient legislative/regulatory support and the use of the terms of evidence and preservation in the records definition, the CFD consideration and the associated phenomena of unsound legislative/regulatory conceptualization, information shadow, information ignorance and archival shadow were explained.
Research limitations/implications
The study results suggested the data for subsequent theoretical sampling to be the operational situations of individual agency RM programs.
Practical implications
The rationale presented in the study regarding the encompassing nature of records and the comprehensive scope of RM program can be used for building strong RM business cases.
Originality/value
The study appears to be the first of its kind, which examined the RM–information security relationship in a very detailed setting.
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