On May 20, 2013 the General Services Administration (GSA) announced the third company to become FedRAMP certified as Amazon Web Services. As part of the program, Amazon has been granted two Agency Authorities to Operate (ATOs) by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. CGI Federal and Autonomic Resources are the other two FedRAMP-certified providers.

If you recently had your GSA Schedule Contract canceled due to not meeting the minimum sales requirements, you might have been short changed. Since 2008, the General Services Administration (GSA) has failed to fulfill the Guaranteed Minimum Clause I-FSS-106, as reported by the U. S. House of Representatives’ Committee on Small Business. The clause serves to guarantee contractors within the Multiple Awards Schedules (MAS) Program a minimum of $2,500 in total orders. Should a contractor receive total orders for less than $2,500 at the expiration date of their contract or if cancellation is initiated by the government, GSA is to pay the difference. This minimum guarantee is essentially a payment by the government for the contractor’s promise to deliver the agreed upon goods and services at the agreed upon prices.

Leasing office space is a huge cost for Federal Agencies, so in this age of shrinking budgets we are experiencing the phenomenon of the shrinking office spaces, if not disappearing ones, to meet budgetary needs. The Feds have taken a cue from the likes of American Express, GlaxoSmithKline, and other private industry giants who have long embraced downsized communal office spaces in order to save on real estate costs.

Another chapter of the open government initiative has been written as the White House announced the implementation of the newly minted Open Data Policy. Designed to incorporate all forms of information, the policy dictates a new standard for maintaining data. The standard requires all data be “open and machine-readable.” By forcing all data to be maintained in open, machine readable formats, the federal government hopes to improve efficiency, reduce costs, and increase public access to the information, thereby upholding the ideals of the open government movement.

The line of communication between government and citizen is expanding with the recent emergence of social media. The 2012 presidential election was a testament to this, with Twitter playing a significant role in both democratic and republican campaigns. With websites like Facebook and Twitter becoming significant platforms for government communication, there becomes a need for these transactions to be officially recorded in order to comply with freedom of information and public record laws. With this in mind, the state of North Carolina has taken the first shot at a solution with the launch of their Social Media Archive.

Cloud Computing is revolutionizing business processes in organizations large and small by increasing efficiencies and decreasing expenses. The capabilities of the cloud have proven useful in many areas, including human resources. Many organizations purchase and use the majority of recruiting and hiring technologies separately. This practice results in higher costs of resources and time, as well as a greater chance of error by the Human Resources staff. Cloud computing software now works to solve this by integrating services together and allowing organizations to more efficiently research and select the best performing recruits and employees. Using the cloud as a platform for talent acquisition also improves security, data sharing, and flexibility of the Human Resources systems.