In my first job after college, I was assigned to a project that helped manage the supply chain for a federal agency. One of the first rites of passage for all contractors and full-time employees alike is security orientation. Run by a very engaging and intimidating counterintelligence officer, it contained…

Dear Sundar, Our recent challenge with Unroll.Me has revealed another dimension to public concerns over Gmail data privacy: the rules governing access by third-party app developers. Whether it is fair or not, the reality is that Google will be the one who users and regulators ultimately hold accountable for the…

In its efforts to build and maintain a unified intranet site for the Harvard Kennedy School community, the KNET team has persevered in the face of challenges that have sunk many similar projects. The number and diversity of stakeholders — from degree programs to research centers to administrative offices —…

While working with an American state government on an IT modernization project, one of my colleagues loved to use the example — very real, he assured me — of the guy in a rural part of the state whose sole job (under state contract) was to remove deer carcasses from…