The Presidential Transition Year - Navigating the Perils and Opportunities Training Workshop for Government

Overview:

On January 20, 2017 there will be a new President of the United States, but beneath the surface the transition period really has already begun. The last year of a President’s term poses both great dangers and opportunities for career civil servants, and the higher rank of those civil servants, the greater are both the opportunities and the risks.

As outgoing political appointees focus intensely on both getting a new job outside of government and trying to achieve a small remaining number of legacy items for the outgoing President, career civil servants find themselves alternately ignored and driven hard by the outgoing political leadership. This is a period where morale often suffers along the entire agency chain of command, as the agency political leadership is distracted from much of the routine but essential work of government. Furthermore, career senior executives ponder their own future at the prospect of breaking in a new batch of appointees, most of whom will at best be new to government, or at worst openly suspicious of the career civil servants they are expected to manage.

After the brief euphoria of the election, comes the three-month race to prepare for the transition to the incoming Administration, but the reality is that pains of transition extend throughout out the first year of the new Administration. It is this first year where career civil servants face the greatest career opportunities and risks.

The workshop will present a survival guide on how civil servants can successfully navigate through the last year of a President’s second term of office, and the critical first year of a new Presidency, when many careers are made or broken.

What You Will Learn:

What to expect during the last year of a President’s second term
How to get and keep the attention of political appointees distracted by their own job search
How to keep the government functioning as political appointees rapidly exit their posts
How to be a loyal and effective civil servant for the outgoing Administration without damaging your credibility with the incoming Administration
How to structure your work to best get the limited attention of the outgoing political appointees
How to prepare transition papers for the incoming Administration
Understanding the role of the Transition Team
How to start off on the right foot with your agency’s new team of political appointees
How to educate the new political appointees on how the federal government works to help them adjust and to protect yourself
How to adjust emotionally and professionally to potentially dramatic changes in policy or priorities

Why You Should Attend:

The last year of a Presidency presents great opportunities and potentially great risks for career civil servants and you need to know how to manage them both effectively
The first year of a new Administration is crucial to your prospects for career advancement or career stagnation
Training new political appointees is a difficult and sensitive task, but you need to know how to do it
You want to be able to effectively communicate with new political appointees to help your program and yourself succeed

Who Should Attend:

Managers in politically sensitive programs
Managers in programs that are active topics of discussion by the Presidential candidates
Managers in programs that are ignored by the Presidential candidates
Managers who have never had to train new political leaders
Managers in HR, acquisition, IT, and budget, who have the most professional risk if their new political leaders make bad or illegal decisions
Chief Human Capital Officers
Chief Financial Officers
Senior Procurement Executives
Performance Improvement Officers
Chief Information Officers

Speaker and Presenter Information

Keynote Speaker:

Tom O’Neill

Mr. O’Neill as a part of HIPERTEX, serves as Director of e Discovery Solutions for SIGINT. Mr. O’Neill is a practicing Litigation Attorney, having been in practice for 38 years. For the past 32 years he has been in sole practice in Arlington, Virginia, and is Of Counsel to the law firm of Sher & Cummings. His general practice is in all state and federal courts, emphasizes litigation (involving court appearances for trial or motions daily) both criminal and civil; guardian ad litem for Virginia (emphasis on abused and neglected children); personal injury; etc.

Guest Speakers:

William H. Inmon

President and Chief Technology Officer,
Forest Rim™ Technology LLC Best known as the “Father of Data Warehousing”, Bill Inmon has become the most prolific and well-known author worldwide in the data warehousing and business intelligence arena. In addition to authoring more than 50 books and 650 articles, Bill has been a monthly columnist with the Business Intelligence Network, EIM Institute and Data Management Review. In 2007, Bill was named by Computerworld as one of the “Ten IT People Who Mattered in the Last 40 Years” of the computer profession.

Relevant Government Agencies

Air Force, Army, Navy & Marine Corps, Intelligence Agencies, DOD & Military, Office of the President (includes OMB), Dept of Agriculture, Dept of Commerce, Dept of Education, Dept of Energy, Dept of Health & Human Services, Dept of Homeland Security, Dept of Housing & Urban Development, Dept of the Interior, Dept of Justice, Dept of Labor, Dept of State, Dept of Transportation, Dept of Treasury, Dept of Veterans Affairs, EPA, GSA, USPS, SSA, NASA, Other Federal Agencies, Legislative Agencies (GAO, GPO, LOC, etc.), Judicial Branch Agencies, State Government, County Government, City Government, Municipal Government, CIA, FEMA, Office of Personnel Management, Coast Guard, National Institutes of Health, FAA, Census Bureau, USAID, National Guard Association, EEOC