Management Matters with James-Christian Blockwood

It's a special “Management Matters with James-Christian Blockwood” episode featuring highlights from the Academy’s Celebration of the American Public Servant 250 Gala at the Library of Congress during America’s 250th anniversary, including a Future of Public Service panel with D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser, Inspector General Michael Horowitz, retired Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force Joanne B...

Host James-Christian Blockwood discusses government performance and HR systems with Gabe Menchaca of the Niskanen Center and Academy Fellow and Government HR expert Steve Krauss.  Menchaca summarizes a Niskanen-Academy study describing wide variation in state civil service models, limited scholarship on state HR, and mixed early results from skills-based hiring due to assessment and measurement bo...

Host James-Christian Blockwood interviews Soraya Correa, President and CEO of  the National Industries for the Blind and former Chief Procurement Officer at the US Department of Homeland Security,  and Greg Giddens, of Potomac Ridge Consulting, and former Chief Acquisition Officer at the US Department of Veterans Affairs, on how federal acquisition enables mission outcomes beyond compliance.  Gidd...

James-Christian Blockwood discusses U.S. Office of Personnel Management's modernization of federal HR and retirement IT systems with OPM’s Rebecca Ayers and Academy Fellow Brodi Fontenot.  Building on a 2021 academy report urging congressional funding to modernize OPM systems, they describe the administration’s goal to build a merit-based workforce and modernize people management through the...

Host James-Christian Blockwood talks with Academy Fellow and McGeorge School of Law Professor Clark Kelso and American Enterprise Institute Senior Fellow Adam White about why public agencies struggle and what the executive branch does in response. They discuss how checks and balances slow action and make errors hard to undo, while polarization and congressional dysfunction push presidents toward u...

Host James-Christian Blockwood interviews Teri Gullo, former CBO Director of Budget Analysis, and Karl Maschino, former GAO Chief Financial and Administrative Officer, about why federal budget work matters amid scrutiny of spending, workforce cuts, and “DOGE”-style reforms.   They outline the normal OMB-agency-Congress budget timeline, emphasize GAO/CBO’s nonpartisan transparency and need to expla...

Acting Comptroller General of the United States and Head of the US Government Accountability Office Orice Williams Brown joined us in conversation at the Academy offices last month to talk about a hugely important document to everyone in the federal government: the GAO High Risk List. For more than three decades, the U.S. Government Accountability Office’s High-Risk List has identified programs vu...

Host James-Christian Blockwood interviews Diana Maurer, Director of Defense Capabilities and Management at the U.S. Government Accountability Office, and Kari D'Elia, Chief Product Officer at USAFacts, on managing public institutions amid declining trust and fast-changing information. Both address data gaps honestly and talk about rising distrust of both government and data. Management Matter...

Whether Americans realize it or not, federal oversight and watchdog organizations can be enormously impactful in how the government spends money, makes laws and builds for the future. So why don't more Americans know about the connections between lawmakers and oversight bodies?  Fellow Tim Persons, Principal at PricewaterhouseCoopers and Dan Lips of the Foundation for American Innovation join...

James-Christian Blockwood is joined by Michael Keegan, host of The Business of Government Hour and Dave Martin, host of The Good Government Show.  Michael and Dave have interviewed hundreds of public administrators, government workers, and agency heads in their careers, at every level.  What do the best public administrators have in common? Why is storytelling more important to public service work...

Host James-Christian Blockwood is joined this week by former U.S. Rep. and Secretary of Health and Human Services Donna Shalala and Norm Ornstein, emeritus scholar at the American Enterprise Institute.  Our guests will take a long look at how government is functioning now at the local, state and particularly federal level so that they can make some bold predictions about the future. The next 250 y...

On Wednesday, January 28, the Academy held the presentation of the 2025 Elliot L. Richardson Prize for Excellence in Public Service to Hon. Janet L. Yellen and Hon. Gary F. Locke, featuring a moderated discussion with Jenn White of NPR's 1A. The honorees spoke to a live audience about a range of issues in modern governance, and how their own experiences helped them see what was most important...

Academy Fellow David Powner, acting managing director for congressional relations at the US Government Accountability Office, joins host James-Christian Blockwood in this week's episode. They get into the details about the importance of GAO's role and the importance of Congress, what oversight can and should be in government, and what's next in the ongoing search for the comptroller...

With careers in public service under unprecedented scrutiny, David Wilson, Dean of UC Berkeley’s Goldman School of Public Policy, and Jodi Sandfort, Dean of the Evans School of Public Policy and Governance at the University of Washington, explain why it has never been more critical to reimagine how we prepare students for these roles. Management Matters is a presentation of the National Academy of...

Artificial Intelligence is no longer a futuristic concept. It’s a practical tool reshaping how we work, learn, and govern. Academy Fellow Alexis Bonnell of OpenAI and Karen Lee of FedsForward join host James-Christian Blockwood to discuss strategies for building AI literacy, how experts and public servants are incorporating AI, and what the challenges are today, and tomorrow.

As we approach the end of the year, we wanted to share a note of optimism for what lies ahead with our "Stories of Service: Reflections on Purpose, Progress, and the Path Ahead" panel from the 2025 Academy National Conference.  This panel opens with Academy President and CEO James-Christian Blockwood then features moving stories from former IRS Commissioner Danny Werfel, former Fiscal As...

In this episode of Management Matters with James-Christian Blockwood, we're giving you access to one of our most impactful panels from the 2025 Academy National Conference: Bridging the Gap – State and Local Capacity in a Shifting Federal Landscape The panel is moderated by Nisha Botchwey, Dean of the Hubert H. Humphrey School of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota, and features Dav...

In this in-depth panel discussion from the 2025 National Conference, moderator Norm Ornstein of American Enterprise Institute talks to an all-star panel including Loren DeJonge Schulman of the Federation of American Scientists, Mindy Romero from the Center for Inclusive Democracy at USC's Price School, Soren Dayton of Foundation for American Innovation, and Cecili Wake of Democracy 2076. The...

In this episode of Management Matters, host James-Christian Blockwood sits down with Romina Boccia , Director of Budget and Entitlement Policy at the Cato Institute and a leading voice on federal spending and entitlement reform, and Academy Fellow Rob Shriver , Managing Director of the Civil Service Strong and Good Government Initiatives at Democracy Forward and former Acting Director of the U.S....

This episode of Management Matters with James-Christian Blockwood features Frank Fukuyama, author, political scientist and professor at Stanford University, Vanessa Williamson of the Brookings Institution, and Philip Howard, founder and chair of Common Good for "The State of Public Administration" in front of a live audience during the 2025 National Conference in Washington, D.C. on Nove...

This episode of Management Matters with James-Christian Blockwood features Frank Fukuyama, author, political scientist and professor at Stanford University, Vanessa Williamson of the Brookings Institution, and Philip Howard, founder and chair of Common Good for "The State of Public Administration" in front of a live audience during the 2025 National Conference in Washington, D.C. on Nove...

US Office of Personnel Management Director Scott Kupor and Academy President and CEO James-Christian Blockwood sat down for a discussion in front of a live audience during the 2025 National Conference in Washington, D.C. on November 3.  The conversation covered a wide range of topics including ongoing plans for resizing and reshaping the federal workforce, how to attract early career people to pub...

Government data is having a moment, but you knew that already, because data is every moment! What's happening with how governments large and small keep track of how they're serving their people?  Nick Hart of the Data Foundation and Richard Coffin of USAFacts joined James-Christian Blockwood on the podcast this week to talk about what's new and exciting in the enormous and expanding...

In this episode of Management Matters with James-Christian Blockwood, Carol Weissert, Professor Emerita of Political Science at Florida State University, and Jonathan Womer, Director of the Department of Administration for Rhode Island, discuss the changing role of state governments and implications for policy, budgeting, and public service delivery. The conversation delves into issues of partisan...

This week's episode of Management Matters with James-Christian Blockwood features key selections from a recent Academy Standing Panel.  It is clear the federal government impacts local government, city and county leaders have always had to leverage federal resources, but can that continue given budget constraints and the increasingly partisan political environment?  Panelists highlight the im...