a16zThe Person Who Runs HR For 2 Million Federal Workers
CHAPTERS
Making government “cool again”: why tech leaders are joining federal service
Katherine Boyle frames the episode around a renewed push to modernize government and make public service attractive again. Scott Kupor (OPM Director) and Greg Barbaccia (U.S. CIO) tease the core tension: technology is moving fast, but government talent and processes aren’t ready.
- •Government modernization as a cultural and talent challenge, not just policy
- •Private-sector/tech leaders increasingly taking “tours of duty” in government
- •AI and technology preparedness as a national priority
- •Mission impact as government’s primary recruiting advantage
From a16z to OPM: Kupor’s motivation and the scale of federal workforce change
Kupor explains why he left venture capital to lead the federal government’s “talent shop,” citing fiscal pressures and rapid tech change. He also outlines current workforce sizing and how voluntary programs contributed to reductions.
- •Confluence of fiscal reality + tech acceleration + administration support
- •Government not prepared for rapid tech shifts—talent is a central bottleneck
- •OPM’s scope: ~2.4M civilian employees, trending toward ~2.1M
- •Voluntary programs (e.g., deferred resignation) as a major lever for reshaping headcount
What OPM actually does: hiring standards, performance, and retention at national scale
Kupor demystifies OPM as the federal government’s central talent organization, setting policies for hiring and performance management. He lays out a philosophy focused on attracting and retaining top talent to serve the public effectively.
- •OPM as government-wide talent policy and workforce management function
- •Hiring standards and performance systems as key levers
- •Goal: recruit and keep “the best people” for public outcomes
- •Talent strategy tied to national competitiveness and modernization
What the U.S. CIO does: tech policy, budgeting, and ‘one government’ alignment
Barbaccia clarifies that the federal CIO role is not a typical enterprise CIO; it’s cross-agency technology policy and budgeting across the executive branch. A central focus is breaking agency silos and coordinating the CIO community around shared priorities.
- •CIO role spans executive-branch tech policy and budget influence
- •“One government” approach vs. agency-by-agency silos
- •Need to galvanize a distributed CIO community
- •Modernization requires coordination more than isolated fixes
Culture shock in Washington: compliance complexity and the ‘cult of risk’
Both guests describe the biggest surprise as the extreme compliance and oversight environment, which shapes behavior toward avoiding any risk. Kupor argues risk is treated as pass/fail without considering magnitude or upside, reinforcing stagnation.
- •Regulatory/compliance complexity prevents “move fast” behavior
- •Risk treated as binary; upside rarely considered
- •Fear of lawsuits, hearings, and reputational damage drives decisions
- •Oversight volume (GAO, OIG, committees) discourages experimentation
Why government struggles with a ‘portfolio’ mindset: Solyndra and political incentives
Kupor explains how political dynamics punish failure as proof of incompetence, preventing experimentation and learning across a set of bets. The absence of a portfolio framework means single failures become political weapons, amplifying risk aversion.
- •Mistakes become partisan proof-points, discouraging innovation
- •No portfolio framing (some bets fail, others succeed)
- •Oversight culture compounds aversion to visible failure
- •Need to normalize measured experimentation for modernization
Performance management is broken: grade inflation, weak accountability, and ‘peanut butter’ rewards
Kupor shares striking performance-rating data showing nearly everyone is rated meeting expectations or above. He argues this undermines incentives, spreads bonuses/promotions without differentiation, and makes it harder to build a high-performance culture that attracts strong talent.
- •99.7% of employees rated 3+ (meeting expectations or better)
- •65–70% rated 4–5, creating extreme grade inflation
- •Consequences: undifferentiated rewards and stalled accountability
- •New guidance for senior executives: cap 4/5 ratings to ~30% to start shifting culture
Recruiting and retention: mission advantage, but contractor-heavy roles repel technologists
Barbaccia emphasizes government’s edge is mission and scale of impact rather than compensation. Kupor adds that many “tech” government jobs manage contractors instead of building, creating a vicious cycle that prevents attracting builders and deepening internal capability.
- •Government can’t match Silicon Valley pay/equity but can win on mission
- •High-impact problems affecting hundreds of millions of people
- •Many roles are contractor-management rather than hands-on building
- •Breaking contractor dependence is key to attracting real technical talent
Fixing the pipeline: early-career focus, age imbalance, and public-private tours of duty
Kupor argues government must target early-career talent due to both technology change and a demographic imbalance (few workers under 30). Both guests promote fluid movement between sectors—short stints in government that become prestigious in the private sector.
- •Only ~7% of federal employees are under 30; workforce skews older
- •Early-career recruiting prioritized to keep up with AI and modern tooling
- •Proposed secondments: bring private-sector tech managers into government temporarily
- •Reframing careers as fluid—government service as a valuable credential, not a lifelong track
The hidden blocker: non-technical screening, runaway contracts, and the missing ‘Suburban price test’
Barbaccia describes how non-technical staff screen technical resumes and approve contracts without deep understanding, enabling bloated solutions and systems-integrator sprawl. He uses an analogy: people know what a Suburban costs, but not what software should cost or how long it should take.
- •Non-technical resume screening fails to identify true technologists
- •Procurement decisions made without strong technical judgment
- •Contract sprawl enabled by lack of intuitive benchmarks for software
- •Need tech-literate middle management to adjudicate hiring and contracting
Merit hiring reset: functional assessments and moving past decades-old constraints
Kupor explains the federal shift away from functional exams decades ago and how that led to self-attested skills without verification. He highlights new “merit hiring” guidance requiring job-relevant assessments (e.g., coding tests) to validate capability and rebuild technical leadership layers.
- •Historical removal of civil service exams contributed to today’s assessment gap
- •Candidates often self-report skills that match job descriptions without verification
- •New guidance: functional assessments for roles (coding tests for engineers, etc.)
- •Goal: dismantle compounding cycle of weak screening → weak hires → weak managers
AI adoption in government: moving from process worship to outcome-driven modernization
The guests argue government often celebrates completing process rather than achieving mission outcomes—AI is a chance to reset incentives. They advocate practical, incremental deployments (automation of repetitive tasks, assistive drafting/research) instead of slow, white-paper-heavy transformation plans.
- •Government bias toward process/ritual over mission outcomes
- •AI as the next major modernization wave (like Excel and email transitions)
- •Start with low-risk, high-frequency use cases (drafting, summarizing, policy research)
- •Avoid 5–15 year plans that delay adoption; prioritize micro-projects and user adoption
Defining success: operational efficiency, one-government digital experience, and breaking data silos
Kupor’s success metrics center on making operational efficiency a first-class measure (not budget/headcount growth) and making government attractive to early-career talent. Barbaccia focuses on citizen experience—simplifying fragmented websites and enabling consent-based data sharing so citizens don’t repeatedly re-enter the same information across agencies.
- •Shift incentives from “bigger budget/headcount” to operational efficiency
- •Treat taxpayer dollars as scarce stewardship (“other people’s money”)
- •Create a unified citizen portal view of benefits, taxes, passport status, etc.
- •Break down inter-agency data silos responsibly to enable better decisions and services
Lightning round: myths to retire, high-leverage tweaks, and winning the future
In rapid-fire format, the guests challenge misconceptions about government innovation and tooling, propose small policy shifts with outsized impact, and share recommended books. They close with concise national priorities: win the AI race and stay focused.
- •Myth: government can’t/shouldn’t lead in tech deployment (Kupor)
- •Myth: government tools are always terrible (Barbaccia)
- •High-leverage tweak: treat risk as a spectrum; modernize pre-computer compliance rules
- •Metrics/books: operational efficiency + rework rate; Only the Paranoid Survive; The Goal / The Phoenix Project
- •Win the future: “Win the AI race” and “Remain undistracted”
