FCW Insider: April 26, 2021

Agency Profile: DISA

The Defense Information Systems Agency is driving cybersecurity, cloud and enterprise services across DOD, including the expansion of secure telework options. FCW takes a deep dive into people, plans and operations.

· Can DISA's CBII make DOD telework more secure?

· A single platform for the Fourth Estate

· DISA's key players

· Sunsetting CVR but keeping the collaboration

Union touts productivity gains from telework

Feds overwhelmingly want to keep the ability to telework additional days each week, according to the results of a survey released by the National Treasury Employees Union.

HASC chair calls for new incentives to reduce defense costs

Divesting of legacy systems to make way for new technologies is expensive and at the heart of the Defense Department's budget debate. But could new incentives for contractors make a difference?

ICYMI: OPM nominee plans focus on telework, IT, retirement

Kiran Ahuja, a veteran of the Office of Personnel Management, told lawmakers that she thinks that the lack of consistent leadership in the top position at OPM has taken a toll on the ability of the agency to complete longer term IT modernization projects.

Quick Hits

*** The Office of Personnel Management clarified on Friday that it's waiving the usual Title V biweekly premium pay cap for feds doing details at the border to help with surges in unaccompanied minors.

Last month, OPM announced a partnership with the Department of Health and Human Services allowing feds to volunteer for 120-day deployments at facilities in the Southwest. Usually, there's a biweekly cap on premium pay, but feds can be covered by an annual cap if they're working on "an emergency that involves a direct threat to life or property" wrote Kathleen McGettigan, acting OPM director, in a memo sent to agency heads.

"The presence of unaccompanied children at the southern border has given rise to an unusual set of circumstances that requires use of volunteers from other agencies," McGettingan wrote. "The unaccompanied children who are being assisted by HHS following entry are subject to conditions posing a direct threat to their lives, as they are need of food, shelter, supervision, and protection, and unable to provide such resources for themselves."

*** IBM won a five-year, $850 million task order on the Navy's Enterprise Resource Planning Technical Support Services (NETSS) contract to upgrade the service's financial management systems.