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a16zThe Person Who Runs HR For 2 Million Federal Workers
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At a glance
WHAT IT’S REALLY ABOUT
Rebuilding federal government talent, tech, and performance for AI-era readiness
- Kupor and Barbaccia argue the federal government is underprepared for rapid technology change—especially AI—primarily due to talent gaps, outdated processes, and procurement/contracting dynamics.
- They describe a pervasive culture of risk avoidance driven by political incentives, legal/oversight pressures, and compliance regimes, which suppress experimentation and slow modernization.
- Kupor highlights severe performance-rating inflation (99.7% rated “meets expectations” or higher) and outlines moves toward forced distributions and merit-based incentives to create a higher-performance culture.
- Both emphasize recruiting strategies that prioritize mission over compensation, target early-career technologists, and make public service a respected “tour of duty” that transfers back to the private sector.
- Barbaccia’s modernization goals focus on “one government” execution: breaking data silos, improving citizen experience across fragmented websites, and enabling consent-based, citizen-centric data sharing across agencies.
IDEAS WORTH REMEMBERING
5 ideasFederal tech modernization is constrained more by talent and incentives than by tools.
They contend the government’s inability to keep pace with AI stems from missing technical talent, non-technical management layers, and procurement/contracting patterns that substitute vendors for in-house capability.
Risk is treated as pass/fail, which blocks measured experimentation.
Kupor and Barbaccia describe a culture where fear of lawsuits, Hill scrutiny, GAO/OIG findings, and compliance box-checking discourages even low-stakes improvements; they advocate shifting to “measured risk” with explicit upside evaluation.
Performance systems are too inflated to reward excellence or address underperformance.
Kupor cites that 99.7% of employees receive a 3+ rating and 65–70% receive 4–5, leading to “peanut-buttered” bonuses/promotions and little accountability; OPM is starting with SES forced-distribution guidance (only 30% at 4–5).
Merit hiring requires real skills verification, not self-attestation.
They criticize resume screening by non-domain experts and reliance on candidate self-assessment; OPM guidance now pushes functional assessments (e.g., coding tests for engineers), enabled by exiting a decades-old consent decree tied to disparate impact concerns.
The contractor-heavy model is self-reinforcing and must be broken.
Because many government tech roles manage contractors instead of building, top engineers avoid applying, which further increases reliance on contractors; they argue adding technical middle management from industry can improve both hiring and contract adjudication.
WORDS WORTH SAVING
5 quotesTechnology continues to advance rapidly, and, you know, just to be blunt, the government is nowhere near prepared for it. We just don't have the right talent here.
— Scott Kupor
We've kind of just embedded in the culture this idea that risk is like this pass-fail thing. Like, you either have risk or you don't have risk, and if you have risk, God forbid, like, you should ever go there, basically.
— Scott Kupor
I have more auditors auditing my team than I have team members. Uh, and that's, uh, not hyperbole.
— Greg Barbaccia
While it's very hard for the government to compete with Silicon Valley on compensation and, uh, things like equity, and this is something Scott and I, uh, talk about at length, we do rule on mission. You get access to some of the world's hardest problems in the government. You get agency to affect potentially over 300 million people.
— Greg Barbaccia
We have this acronym inside of OPM. We say OPM stands for other people's money.
— Scott Kupor
SPEAKERS
Katherine Boyle
hosta16z partner and podcast host/interviewer covering technology, policy, and government innovation.
Greg Barbaccia
guestU.S. federal Chief Information Officer (CIO) discussing executive-branch-wide technology strategy, budgeting, and modernization.
Scott Kupor
guestDirector of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and former a16z partner focused on federal workforce and hiring reform.
High quality AI-generated summary created from speaker-labeled transcript.
