Shifting from linear to circular economies

Circular economic principles differ from the more standard linear economic process of take, make & dispose, and instead focus on adding value for customers through the entire product lifespan. Instead of centering strictly on reducing or abating the generation of carbon or other greenhouse gases, a circular economy reimagines waste as a new resource. Linear economies focus very little on the reuse or repurposing of products, whereas circular economies are centered on product reuse — rather than disposal.

A 2021 Presidential Executive Order on federal sustainability initiatives established a goal for federal agencies to minimize waste, advance pollution prevention, support markets for recycled products, and promote a transition to a circular economy. Specific benchmarks for this order note landfill diversion of at least 50% of non-hazardous solid wastes by 2025 and 75% by 2030.

Technology is nearly universal in government service delivery, and managers can relate to the inherent challenges in retiring and replacing old technology. The Victoria (Australia) State Government developed guidelines and an Application Lifecycle Rating matrix to help government officials identify which technology and programs are candidates for retirement and when to begin the transition process. Older software programs may pose integration issues, have limited vendor support or warranty provisions, and may exacerbate hiring challenges as legacy programs may not be a match for employee skills in the marketplace. Legacy systems also may pose cybersecurity threats or be poorly suited to be adapted to the changing needs of some government agencies or organizations.

Government leaders understand the importance of investing in tools and systems that allow for future growth, and which are modular in nature. Modular systems allow you to add on or expand in the future as your organization grows or its needs shift. Even before the global pandemic, for example, the IT Director for the City of Las Vegas noted that the organization struggled to keep pace with the demand for more connections and hardware. Similarly, the Sacramento Public Library found that while it had in the past simply upgraded with its previous technology vendor, a new bidding process was exploring relationships with new vendors and sourcing products that better suited the library’s current and future needs.

E-waste from technology obsolescence

Many technological devices simply aren’t built for longevity. The average laptop has a high likelihood of breaking within 3-4 years, and software upgrades make it increasingly difficult to utilize older models of smartphones. We exist in a technological mirage in which we buy new, but we don’t have to see the climatological impact of the upgrade-and-replace life cycle. It may be good to know, however, that 85% to 95% of a smartphone’s carbon footprint comes from the manufacturing process — in particular, the mining of rare earth elements for these devices. Mining of these elements is a dirty business, being highly toxic and damaging to local ecosystems. Lithium — the element in virtually every device battery — is often referred to as gray gold in reference to the unregulated labor practices, kidnapping, human trafficking, and violent conflict involved in the mining of this element.

Once a device is replaced, e-waste must be managed. E-waste generation globally has increased by 21% in the past decade, and it is estimated that just 12% of smartphone upgrades involve older devices being sold or traded-in for a new one. The United Nations has identified e-waste as one of the fastest growing waste streams, estimating that only 17.4% of e-waste globally is formally collected and recycled. Harmful elements — as many as 69 separate elements from the periodic table — can be found in electrical and electronic devices, particularly mercury, cadmium, and lead.

Why are we cycling through devices more quickly? Trends in edge-to-edge glass on phone and tablet screens mean that devices are increasingly breakable. Other causes include: intentional design elements such as batteries being glued in place; the use of proprietary screws in device cases to prevent opening; more sophisticated techniques such as slowing down older devices to spur replacement; and using federal agencies like the Department of Homeland Security to block independent repair shops from accessing replacement parts. Device manufacturers have gone to great lengths to ensure that individuals are more likely to replace rather than repair their devices.

Circular economic principles in practice

Due to their scale and leverage, government agencies have a unique opportunity to push for better environmental outcomes in their technology procurement including the ability to repair and increase device longevity and compatibility.

Some ways government agencies can make a difference by:

• • • • exploring bundled services that include devices, software, wi-fi, and a guarantee of a minimum battery life, as well as allow for older hardware to be used, including refurbished devices;
      • considering product lifespan in procurement decisions and, whenever possible, aim to purchase products that can accommodate in-house repairs;
      • prioritizing software systems that are modular in design and can be expanded upon in the future; and
      • engaging in competitive bidding processes to continuously seek out vendors that follow best environmental practices in procuring hardware and software.

Procurement decisions involving systems (software) and devices (hardware) that are made by government agencies are an important part of shifting away from a disposable culture to one that values waste as a resource. Extending the lifespan of both software and hardware and ensuring that when devices are retired that they are recycled responsibly further reduces the need for new raw materials, reduces e-waste generation, and opens up economic opportunity. Research estimates that $4.5 trillion in additional economic growth could be generated by 2030 through the advancement of circular economic principles.

For public legal departments — like the offices of district attorneys, public defenders, or city and county attorneys — that meant holding online meetings and virtual hearings. Beyond that, it meant that much more work was being done remotely using technology that may have been new to many government agency leaders. And now, as the worst of the pandemic ebbs in many regions of the country and the rest of the world, government agency law departments have had to adapt to the new reality again, deciding which innovations to keep and which to jettison in favor of more traditional ways of conducting business.

To examine these developments further, the Thomson Reuters Institute has published the new 2023 Government Law Agency Report, which summarize the findings of recent Government Trends Survey, conducted in 2022 by Thomson Reuters’ Market Research and Competitive Insights team with attorneys in public agencies at the Federal, State, and County/Municipal level. The objective of this survey is to gain some insight into the opportunities and challenges that legal professionals at public law departments are facing.

You can download a copy of the Thomson Reuters Institute’s new “2023 Government Law Agency Report” here.

In the report, we identify where the main challenges now are for government law agencies, what their current work processes involve (especially around technology use and outsourcing), how they are managing staffing issues, and what has been the ongoing impact of the pandemic.

Indeed, the report reveals that while many government law departments were resilient in handling a myriad of challenges, they were still vexed by some long-standing issues that were evident even before the onset of the pandemic, such as staffing and succession. Beyond staffing issues, many of the challenges government law agency leaders cited fell into several major areas of concern, including the growing complexity of the legal work they see, the ongoing challenges of remote working, problems of technology adoptions, and security fears.

How the leaders of government law agencies and other legal departments navigate their teams through these challenges will likely determine how effective and efficient their legal organizations will remain now and in the future.

Other important insights in the report include:

• • • Staffing issues were the top challenges cited for government agencies, while recruiting new talent (64%) and loss of institutional knowledge due to retiring staff (60%) increased dramatically as top concerns.
    • While 49% of respondents say tech investment within their agency has increased in the past two years, 59% say their technology resources lag behind the private sector. Worse yet, only 23% say they are confident that they have the necessary tools to do their job effectively.
    • On average, government law agencies report that more than one-third (37%) of their legal research issues are complex, and that there is less time to thoroughly research complex items. In fact, almost two-thirds of respondents said they have seen increases in the complexity of the legal issues they face, and 59% saw an increase in the variety of issues. However, only 17% said they have seen an increase in the amount of resources provided to address these needs, and hiring of outside counsel remains low.
    • Most respondents said their work environment contains either hybrid or remote arrangements, indicating that many of the changes made during the pandemic have remained.
    • At least 28% of government law departments or legal agencies have experienced security breaches or malware infections.

Even as government law departments and government legal agencies continue to adapt to the many changes and challenges brought by the pandemic, they look to forge a new future in which they can take the best of the new technology and innovative work processes they used during the crisis — such as virtual meetings and remote working, for example — to make themselves even more effective and efficient.

Yet, staffing issues, security concerns, and the growing complexity of their own work has made the jobs of many government legal professionals more difficult as easy solutions continue to be elusive.

That means, of course, that public investment in these agencies is necessary in order to give agencies the tools, technicians, and highly trained legal staff these teams will need to work to their maximum abilities on behalf of the American public.

The tsunami of current and forthcoming retirements from the public sector has been anticipated for decades, but many organizations have not had the capacity to plan for this talent shift. Some public organizations have indicated they have a lack of tools, resources, or leadership support to engage in succession planning, combined with the fact that departures from the public sector are presently outpacing hiring. In fact, key disadvantage held by the public sector (at least compared to private sector competitors) is that private sector organizations often provide the budgetary cushion for outgoing talent to mentor and train their successors before the retirees formally exit the organization.

Anticipating workforce retirements & turnover

One commonsense approach to managing organizational turnover means behaving in a proactive, anticipatory way rather than in a reactive manner. Conducting a comprehensive organizational needs assessment is a logical first place to start — both by identifying the tenure of your existing workforce and analyzing the anticipated future service delivery needs of your customers. Workforce tenure can be identified — both quantitatively and qualitatively — by calculating retirement eligibility measures for employees and through informal interviews of employees about their goals.

Beyond understanding individual goals, it is advantageous for agency leaders to inventory the skills and competencies needed for service delivery within the organization as well as those skills and competencies held by current employees. Performing a regular audit of job descriptions (even before positions open) can help departments and agencies understand where gaps exist within teams as well as what competencies are held by those employees who may be planning to leave the organization.

Succession planning processes open up opportunities to identify and develop talent within organizations in anticipation of turnover. Retirements often have advance notice in the public sector, but efforts to understand and cultivate talent at middle management levels can better prepare organizations when turnover comes at short notice.

Well-rounded leadership development emphasizes the leadership and learning styles of both managers and front-line staff. There is a risk that succession planning and talent development processes can alienate some within organizations. Processes such as these can help organizations to identify emerging talent, but may conversely identify talent that is no longer an appropriate fit for future organizational needs.

Benefits of internal process mapping

In addition to identifying skills and competencies within organizations, engaging in process mapping is a highly effective way to increase organizational efficiency and enhance service delivery. At a high level, process mapping removes departmental or agency silos and focuses on adding value to products and services while simultaneously reducing waste and inefficiency. Process improvement can reduce waste in public sector processes through clarifying standards, reducing unnecessary internal handoffs, eliminating redundancy in information sharing, while at the same time adding value by enhancing service and reducing customer wait times.

Process mapping is disruptive by nature as it challenges the status quo, so an empathetic approach that reduces team member alienation is important. Discussions around the risks and obstacles within process change, as well as a focus on high-level, sustainable solutions, can contribute to healthy and productive change processes.

Even the best designed processes should be routinely audited to ensure that they are being performed as intended by employees. Effective process implementation requires leadership buy-in from the top, solicitation of feedback from process users, and organizational training across teams on process norms in addition to process audits.

Documentation & employee cross-training

Where process evaluation and public sector turnover come together is through documentation and employee cross-training. In best-case scenarios, there is advance notice of employee departures; however, organizations should be prepared for worst-case scenarios. Cross-training of employees with an emphasis on understanding one another’s roles ensures organizational continuity during times of change.

Processes which are honed and refined through mapping exercises should be documented and stored in centrally accessible locations in order to better on-board employees new to the organization or new to their roles.

One critical facet of organizational turnover can be the loss of both institutional knowledge and subject matter expertise. In instances where knowledge gaps within teams relate to subject matter expertise, employees should be able to access these process change documents and not have to function within the limitations of their own organization.

Database tools are increasingly offering organizations access to templates, checklists, and sample documents, effectively closing the gap on employee subject matter expertise. These subscription-based tools provide on-demand resources to organizations and reduce the need to reinvent the wheel. Similar resources can often be accessed through professional associations at the state or local level, as well.

As government organizations and agencies prepare for industry-wide turnover and assess their service delivery, there is ample opportunity to involve both managers and front-line workers in the change management process. A holistic approach to inventorying skills and competencies organization-wide, as well as a focus on documenting processes, can better prepare organizations for transition, while ensuring continuity of service.

Option 1: Non-technical default

The U.S. Treasury has a couple different options if the “extraordinary measures” which are forestalling the crisis reach their breaking point. The Secretary of the Treasury could make the choice to continue paying bond holders, prioritizing them in order to avoid a technical default. Such an action would avoid the common meaning of default, as the U.S. would continue to fulfil its obligations to its lenders. This would also give the government cover to avoid the greatest harms to international trade and the currency regime, but it is unlikely to escape without significant harm to its standing and reputation.

While technically avoiding default, reaching this point would expectedly lead to downgrades in the country’s credit rating and increased interest rates more broadly, as was seen in the near default of 2011. The more significant impact this time would be to the domestic economy. Prioritizing bonds would result in substantial domestic spending cuts as the Treasury would divert its already insufficient cashflow to repay lenders. Payments to state programs, healthcare, Social Security, and military spending would thus see a larger contraction in funds than they would be otherwise. The U.S. would almost certainly enter a recession with high unemployment.

The U.S. plunging into recession would cause other fragile economies to enter into recession as well, pulling down global economic demand. However, this scenario would more resemble a traditional global recession, the type of which has been navigated and documented previously. While having its own unique challenges, non-technical default would be more familiar to organizations and businesses than Option 2.

Option 2: Classic default

In this circumstance, domestic spending has been given priority over bond holders and the U.S. government defaults on its debt. Immediately, the U.S. dollar experiences a sharp decline in value relative to other currencies, as last-minute hopes of a political compromise are dashed. Subsequently, import prices skyrocket and inflation could spike rapidly. Investors will then begin to sell off U.S. Treasuries at a high volume, likely at a loss that will hamper global access to liquid capital.

The U.S. plunging into recession would cause other fragile economies to enter into recession as well, pulling down global economic demand.

With the loss of the supposedly most safe and stable asset, financial institutions’ balance sheets would become fragile in a way that they haven’t since the Global Financial Crisis of 2007-’08. The Federal Reserve would need to immediately announce emergency measures to support financial markets and prevent a total collapse of the financial system.

This then would likely be followed by other countries reducing their dependence on the dollar as the international reserve and trade currency. The U.S. has greatly benefited from its place as the standard currency for international finances, trade, and economic stability. A default on its debt from something as innocuous as failing to raise the debt ceiling will end this status. Other countries, namely China but also potentially the European Union, India, and Japan will try to push their currencies as the new standard-bearer, but this process will be messy, and it will take time.

Meanwhile, the rapid exchange of currencies will cause chaotic fluctuations in exchange rates and make global trade immediately more difficult. Combined with the crisis in the international financial system that the Federal Reserve will be struggling to hold together, a liquidity crisis becomes possible, which would strangle global trade in the short term. Ships will be stuck in ports as companies and governments alike struggle to raise the funds to free them while valuable commodities lie frozen in the supply line as buyers work to stabilize their balance sheets and avoid illiquidity. The resulting seesawing of prices will only make trade more difficult and more expensive.

Bond holders will not be the only ones seeing their cash flows stop. State spending and major social programs in the U.S. will also see funds frozen, though to a lesser extent than a non-technical default would see. The combination of fiscal cuts combined with a financial crisis will still plunge the world’s largest economy into recession.

It’s difficult to do more than hypothesize what global trade would look like in a post-default world, but it would most likely be dramatically more costly and less accessible.

The price of oil and other commodities will experience significant fluctuations. Global inflation will probably reignite as the benefits of a sole global reserve currency are lost, and the additional costs of more expensive trade will be felt broadly. Countries will seek to reduce their reliance on the U.S. in as many ways as possible, including creating new trading blocs which would become more isolated from one another as the global economy becomes more splintered. The resulting barriers to trade and global supply chains will likewise make global trade more difficult and, again, more expensive.

The long-term impacts

In the medium- to long-term there would be a global recession and higher costs of doing business for everyone involved. Without a dominant global trade regime, trading blocs will vie for supremacy, perhaps erecting barriers to trade such as requiring business to be done solely in the bloc’s currency of choice, be it the euro or yuan. Money will be tight, and importers and exporters will face delays or maybe even find their jobs impossible for long stretches of time until the new global market dynamic has a chance to emerge.

Despite rising labor costs in countries such as China, the economic disruption may further hamper movement of manufacturing to lower-cost developing countries, further pushing up costs and hampering global economic growth. Yet, out of everyone impacted, the U.S. will be the one left the most scarred. Thrown into a deep recession, its financial system and credit facing the greatest challenge since not 2008, but rather 1929, the prosperous United States at the center of a global economy will become a memory.

It’s difficult to do more than hypothesize what global trade would look like in a post-default world, but it would most likely be dramatically more costly and less accessible. The good news is that default remains unlikely. As stated previously, the United States has always managed to raise the debt ceiling before reaching the default state. After all, countries tend to avoid courting economic collapse simply to score domestic political points. Given events such as Brexit however and the failure of some countries to properly respond to global crises like the pandemic, such cataclysmic events cannot be ruled out entirely. Companies and governments alike should be prepared for the previously unthinkable to possibly happen.

For many industries, the early days of the pandemic were a combination of services coming to a screeching halt and rapid innovation for delivery of services in new ways that prioritized safety. An assessment of state government Chief Information Officers (CIOs) from 2021 indicated that 94% of CIOs experienced a surge in demand for digital services in 2020 that was directly related to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Post-pandemic, we now have increased our use of technology as a society in new areas of our day-to-day lives — a fact which more than half of individuals interviewed as part of an analysis of digital governance viewed to be directly caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Participants in this analysis indicated that increased technology use had enhanced individuals’ experiences in banking, shopping, and accessing healthcare; however, experiences had not been enhanced at the same pace in accessing government services. Less than half of participants said they felt U.S. government agencies or organizations were using digital technology effectively for service delivery in the wake of the pandemic.

While the pandemic brought the desire for digital services to the forefront, the end goal of digitization in the years since has been to create better online experiences for citizens. This mindset shift has been reinforced at the federal level, too. A Presidential executive order from 2021 that focused on rebuilding trust in government noted that improving service delivery and customer experience should be “fundamental priorities of the federal government.”

Enhancing user experience through digital governance

Digital service delivery enhances user experience by allowing individuals access to information and services on-demand. Legacy service delivery previously limited response times to government business hours, but technology like artificial intelligence (AI) chat bots can respond to frequently asked questions and help guide users through transactions. This makes services more readily accessible, limits the need for redundant staff interactions, and can reduce wait times both by phone and in-person. Predictive software tools also can encourage users toward more self-service by, for example, generating auto-reminders for users in advance of license or application renewal dates.

Omnichannel service delivery has become ubiquitous in the post-pandemic retail environment. In a government environment, modernized service delivery methods prioritize customer preference and convenience.

A report on government digital transformation aptly describes the future of digital government as frictionless, one in which a proactive approach in understanding consumer needs puts customers at the center by predicting future service needs around life events, rather than putting the responsibility on a user to seek out certain services. It can be a base instinct for those working in government to assume that citizens know what solutions they need, but we must reshape this internal construct in order to appreciate that citizens often understand their unique problem, but not the solutions available to them. Government systems which focus on the citizen perspective of problem-solving are best positioned to deliver frictionless experiences.

At the local government level, an individual registering for a new state identification following a move may soon need services and information such as vehicle registration, voter registration, animal licensing, parking permits, or information on local waste and recycling management. These services are managed by different governmental departments (an internal construct), however, they are all a potential need for a new resident relocating from out of state (a common life event).

Managing customer trust & privacy

Data-driven service delivery within government can predict customer needs, enhance communication outreach, and help organizations measure policy effectiveness. In addition to enhancing customer user experiences, this can also help local governments realize cost savings. The benefits gained through collecting user data come at a price, however — users must trust their local governments to protect their data and to utilize it in a way that brings citizens a direct benefit. An analysis of digital governance found that participants overwhelmingly felt that data collected by governments should be kept private, even if sharing data could enhance service delivery or reduce costs.

Further, use of strong digital identifiers in government service delivery can bring multiple benefits to users. Governments in India, Argentina, and South Korea have deployed digital identifier programs across segments of their populations to better democratize access to pandemic resources. Digital IDs can reduce the need for in-person authentication, avoid the redundancy of providing the same data multiple times across government agencies, and can serve as an additional layer of verification and security to protect data privacy.

Ensuring customers are not left behind

A shift to digital-by-default service delivery risks leaving those without access to technology or those with low technological literacy behind. It is crucially important that customer service can always accommodate those lacking the technological resources or knowledge to navigate self-service or on-demand platforms. By enhancing the user experience and empowering self-service for the majority, the user experiences for those who require hands-on, human interaction in accessing government services will still share positive user experiences.

In summary, while the goal of digital governance is rooted in problem-solving and enhancing customer experience, the experience will look different for each unique customer. Past service delivery was a one-size-fits-all approach, but the future of government service delivery needs to be highly personalized to an individual’s unique problems and preferences.

Modernized learning & development

For example, learning & development (L&D) is a crucial part of the engagement process, which should have agency leaders asking what L&D looks like in their organization? Is it something rolled out during employee on-boarding and revisited once annually for compliance? Or is it something more comprehensive and on-going?

Organizations need to shift their perspective from seeing L&D as a sunken cost of employee on-boarding to seeing it as an investment in employee retention. When L&D is administered in a contemporary format at the correct frequency, employees respond with higher engagement and productivity levels. Research indicates that offering training once every 3-6 months is a sweet spot and that employees overwhelmingly prefer training to be delivered in an online self-paced format.

Employees rated opportunities to learn and grow as the #1 driver of great workplace culture (up from its position at #9 in 2019), according to a 2022 workplace learning report from LinkedIn.

In fact, employees across all ages are engaged by L&D, but for different reasons. Employees under the age of 35 see L&D as valuable for internal mobility or for reaching their future career aspirations; whereas employees over the age of 50 see L&D as valuable to staying up to date in the field. Employees aren’t seeking strictly work-related training either — professional and life skills training are desired, including leadership, mental health and well-being, and even self-management training.

Managers can enhance employee experience in receiving training by understanding their employees’ unique learning styles, offering personalized and flexible self-paced training, and working one-on-one with employees as a coach or mentor.

Moreover, up-skilling or re-skilling current employees to fill organizational vacancies among government agencies has never been more relevant given the tight labor market. Indeed, 51% of organizations said they prefer to manage skills gaps by retraining their existing employees, compared to 32% of organizations that manage these gaps through outside hiring, according to a 2022 report on learning and development trends. In some instances, this might mean hiring a new employee who meets the baseline hard and soft skills for the role, but who may need some additional skills training as a part of the on-boarding process.

Creating “smart” work environments

The deployment of smart home technology and the Internet of Things (IoT) continues to grow rapidly. From wearable tech to voice-activated speakers, Bluetooth home security cameras to smart heating and cooling systems, many Americans’ home environments feature more smart technology than their office environment.

Yet, that may be changing just as rapidly. IoT holds a functional opportunity to increase employee comfort and thereby productivity in the workplace. Smart offices use IoT to provide more comfortable (and healthy) working conditions (temperature, lighting, air purification systems) as well as more ergonomic working conditions (smart furniture, adjustable desks or workstations).

Beyond physical comforts, smart scheduling tools and room sensors can measure meeting room usage and report on organizational trends in meeting frequency, attendance, and the need for volume or size of communal spaces. Sustainability and cost-saving measures can be realized through IoT by tracking usage of high-energy appliances such as printers or coffeemakers, and then turning them off automatically during low-usage times.

IoT & asynchronous collaboration

Fully remote work or hybrid work have become engrained aspects of workplace culture for many organizations post-pandemic, and the ability to work in a hybrid format is an expectation with younger generations entering the workforce. Further, data shows that productivity is often higher for remote employees, but they can struggle to connect with team members or may feel isolated from colleagues. Teams need the equipment to collaborate effectively both in-person and remotely to drive employee engagement.

Asynchronous collaboration allows for team members to work on projects or assignments in real time, but not necessarily at the same time. While virtual meetings experienced a major uptick during the pandemic, longer work hours and less productivity also grew apace. To combat this, asynchronous collaborations seeks to replace some go-to workplace tools that encourage hyper-responsiveness (like email or instant messaging), with tools that actively discourage hyper-responsiveness (like shared project files, project management task assignment tools, project chat boards). This has been found to actually increase employee engagement and provide an important opportunity for team member autonomy.

Managers are likely to find that fostering a culture that reinforces an attitude that it’s okay to not be online all day and instead encourages the use of asynchronous tools will see a reduction in workplace stress and burnout.

Selling the value of technology

Implementing more technology in the workplace can be a double-edged sword, of course. The EY Work Reimagined survey of public sector employees indicated that 63% of government employees “believe extensive or moderate changes are needed to enhance [their] workplace digital tools and technologies in the future.” However, many feel that there can be hesitancy around how and why technology is being implemented. Is technology being used as a corporate surveillance tool by measuring keystrokes or ensuring an employee has not left their workstation?

Multiple generations of public service employees (and not just younger workers) may see corporate surveillance as having no tangible benefit for their work. The key for agency leaders is to reposition their agencies’ use of technology from being used strictly punitively to using technology to create more engaging and productive workplace environments and then sharing that benefit directly with employees.

Indeed, “Second Chance” or “Fair Chance” hiring — when done right — is good for business. Companies can fill workforce gaps and reduce turnover, increasing productivity and cutting on-boarding costs. This practice also has community benefits and is a place where corporate value and social values dovetail. When people with criminal records are employed, economic activity and new tax bases are created, and public safety increases.

A 2021 survey of human resources professionals found that 81% believed that the quality of workers with criminal records is generally the same or better than workers without records, with nearly identical hiring costs. Studies have also shown that retention rates are higher, turnover is lower, and employees with criminal records are more loyal to their employers once hired.

Recent job openings reports from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics showed thousands of open positions in accommodation and food services and in manufacturing — just two of the many industries in which talented people who happen to have criminal records could fill the labor gap.

Offering a second chance

Second-chance hiring is good for employers’ bottom lines in whatever industry they operate. Fortunately, many more business leaders are also recognizing the significant value in second-chance hiring. The Second Chance Business Coalition, led by Jamie Dimon, Chairman and CEO of JPMorgan Chase & Co., and Craig Arnold, Chairman and CEO of Eaton, has brought large businesses into the space.  Corporations such as Walmart, McDonalds, Verizon, Accenture, and Koch Industries are among more than three dozen companies that have been brought together by the coalition to work on this issue.

When I was incarcerated, no one asked me for money, but nearly everyone asked me to help them get a job after they were released. Today, I work with businesses to help them develop organizational and risk management strategies to better recruit and retain people with criminal records.

A 2021 report from the Alliance for Safety and Justice estimates that one-third of American adults — roughly 78 million people — have a criminal record. The problem is even worse for Black men. A University of Georgia study found that, as of 2010, 33% of Black men had a felony conviction compared to 8% for all adults.

Unemployment also has been an inescapable by-product of a criminal record. The Prison Policy Initiative calculated that the unemployment rate for people with criminal records is over 27%. By contrast, the country’s overall unemployment rate currently stands at just 3.5%.

Expungement as a risk management tool

Expungement, or record-clearing, is a powerful risk management tool for businesses, but the system can vary drastically among states. For example, a minor drug offense in Florida can stay on a person’s criminal record for life, while a much more serious offense that involved prison time may be expunged in another state. When an employer performs a background check, the Florida person who never served a day in jail will be classified as a “felon” while the person who did years in prison will not.

Fourteen states now broadly allow felonies and misdemeanors to be expunged, while another 23 states have narrower expungement criteria for felonies and misdemeanors. Five other states allow expungement only for pardoned felonies and certain misdemeanors, and three states and the District of Columbia allow only misdemeanor expungement. Five states and the federal system have no expungement law. Without broad record-clearing laws, a person with even a minor criminal conviction will always wear that scarlet letter.

Broader expungement laws have risk management benefits as well. This creates additional issues for chief human resources officers, corporate general counsels, and employment lawyers. Most businesses will never learn of an expunged record, which generally adds additional protections against negligent hiring cases and creates no additional work for corporate staff. In contrast, when a background check has a criminal conviction, the business may have to take additional steps before it can hire the person under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, applicable state laws, and its own risk management strategy.

Without expungement, the risk management landscape is largely governed by state law. For example, Colorado law prohibits an employee’s criminal record from being introduced as evidence in a lawsuit against an employer unless there is a direct relationship between the criminal history and the underlying facts of the claim (Colo. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 8-2-201(2)(a)(I)). Florida — a state without a record-clearing process — protects employers from a negligent-hiring presumption in cases in which the criminal-records check “did not reveal any information that reasonably demonstrated the unsuitability of the prospective employee” (§ 768.096, Fla. Stat.).

Hiring and retention are core business functions and are not an option for companies to achieve success. Unlocking this relatively untapped talent pool can help businesses grow and thrive, creating profits for the business and benefits for its stakeholders, employees, and surrounding community.

Hear more about John’s work, his former legal career, and his journey from prison to expert on re-entry into society after prison on Episode 108 of The Hearing: A Legal Podcast from Thomson Reuters.

Yet, what can managers in the federal government expect for future workplace attrition, and what best practices can they adopt to better attract younger workers to the public sector?

The retirement “tsunami” is still to come

The federal government weathered the COVID-19 pandemic with less volatility than state or local government agencies in terms of employee attrition. Indeed, record job vacancies in the public sector were largely seen as the result of the outflow of workers in local government and public education, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data from the 18-month period between February 2020 and August 2022.

And one 2021 assessment from The Partnership for Public Service, found that attrition rates hovered around 6.1% within federal agencies, with slightly more than half of those leaving left due to retirement. This number was a slight increase from 2020 numbers of around 5%, but in line with pre-pandemic attrition rates.

Of course, these stable numbers may mean that the tsunami of anticipated federal retirements has yet to really hit.

More concerning figures relate to federal workforce age and incoming federal employees. A 2021 White House report, Strengthening the Federal Workforce, reveals that the percentage of federal employees over the age of 60 continues to increase year over year, while employees under the age of 30 continually decrease as a percentage of the federal workforce.

Younger employees simply aren’t joining the federal workforce at the needed pace to provide adequate succession planning for upcoming retirements. A 2022 Qualtrics survey on federal recruitment of more than 1,000 recent college graduates showed that more than half of those surveyed would not consider a career within the federal government.

Is workplace flexibility the key?

Understanding why a public sector career is unappealing to younger workers is a necessary first step to address the issue. Perceptions surrounding how and where federal work takes place appear to be the culprit.

In the Qualtrics survey, the top three reasons given by respondents on why they wouldn’t consider a career in government included: perceived under-qualification, lack of work/life balance, and experience gaps in their resumés. While many recommendations have been made about enhancing federal recruitment practices to successfully attract a diverse candidate pool, federal agencies would be well-served to highlight the flexibility of work that is already offered within the public sector.

Flexibility in how and where work occurs can be a key factor for attracting and retaining younger members of the workforce within the public sector. Fortunately for recruiting managers, the federal workforce already offers significant flexibility to current and prospective employees.

The federal workforce has adjusted in the current post-pandemic environment to offer remote working options that are either fully remote or in a hybrid fashion. In fact, the Office of Personnel Management’s 2021 Government Wide Management Report found that 57% of federal employee respondents worked remotely at least once a week, up from 23% just two years earlier.

Employee experience matters

Cultivating a culture where employees have the flexibility that they desire to achieve better work/life balance, and where they can feel connected and valued by their managers may seem like a daunting task to many government agency managers. However, managers can ensure that their culture puts people first by implementing several recommend best practices, such as:

Focus on building and maintaining connection with team members through short, regular check-ins — For remote or hybrid employees, managers can pre-schedule intentional meetings with a clear focus area.

Establish “buddy” or mentor programs to link up new and veteran employees within an organization — Programs that match new employees with peers (rather than supervisors) acknowledges the fact that employees may feel more comfortable asking some questions of a peer rather than their direct supervisor. Likewise, the mentor can provide the new employee with valuable insights about organizational culture. Mentorship programs also can be redesigned for remote or hybrid employees.

Offer diverse learning and professional development opportunities — The rise of hybrid and remote work has contributed to “Zoom fatigue” for many. Offering professional development opportunities that are a mix of webinars, in-person, or self-paced learning modules reinforces that employees are valued, while not contributing to the exhaustion that overuse of virtual video conferencing tools can generate.

Understand how your employees learn — Hand-in-hand with the point above, not all humans learn in the same fashion. Four dominant learning styles include aural, visual, kinesthetic, and reading/writing. Implementing learning style assessments into employee pre-boarding can help managers best understand how to most effectively train and on-board new hires.

Remember that team bonding is still important, remotely or in-person — As full-time in-person work continues to decline, some organizations have empowered employees to spend time together outside of work by volunteering, socializing, or even sharing a meal together. A lunch traditionally spent together in-person can be recreated by supplying remote employees with a gift card for food delivery or to a restaurant of their choosing. Managers also can prioritize scheduling a shared meal for hybrid employees when they are in-office.

Finally, it’s important to understand that the federal workforce has not experienced the rapid outflow of workers to the same extent that state and local government organizations have in the post-pandemic era. Yet, that doesn’t mean critical challenges around talent have been avoided for good.

In preparation for the upcoming retirement of aging members of the federal workforce, managers should consider adjusting their management style to be more people-centric and considerate of increasing remote and hybrid work preferences.

In 2018, the International City/County Management Association (ICMA) released its Equity and Inclusion Toolkit, which provides resources to empower local governments with best practices in the interest of building inclusive organizations, and by extension, more welcoming communities. And while many DEI initiatives at the local government level are housed within human resource divisions and include enhancing DEI for current and prospective employees, they may not always factor in how to ensure that outsourced work (and the associated procurement processes for contracts) can be DEI-focused as well.

Simplifying procurement processes

Local governments are large users of request for proposal (RFP) processes, in which agencies define the services or goods desired, craft an evaluation criterion, and solicit responses. Municipalities and county-level governments have established price points that automatically trigger a formal procurement process, which can ensure against nepotism or corruption and discourage government waste in awarding contracts.

Some accessible means of streamlining and modernizing RFPs may include:

• • • allowing proposal responses to be submitted electronically;
    • ensuring that any required forms can be accessed as form-fillable PDFs;
    • utilizing a proposal tracker where vendors can check on the status of their RFP review. (For example, the City of Tacoma, Wash., has an embedded proposal tracker on its website that greatly increases vendor awareness and transparency throughout the procurement process); and
    • sharing, clearly and explicitly, the evaluation criterion and weighting for proposal review and using this criterion in the evaluation process.

Reducing barriers for applicants

An inclusive procurement process removes potential barriers that might discourage the widest slate of vendors from bidding. Removing steps that add significant time or cost to project proposals, often with little gain for the reviewer, or which allow for greater RFP exposure can attract a more diverse pool of vendor applicants.

For example, some methods government agencies can use to reduce these barriers and gain more proposal exposure might include: not requiring hard copy submittals for RFP responses, or removing notarized signature page requirements wherever possible. Also, RFPs should be advertised in free access locations, rather than exclusively being posted on pay-to-play vendor sites or bid aggregators. (State municipal league organizations often offer RFP postings at no or nominal cost for their members.) Agencies should also ensure that RFP timelines for response are long enough to garner response, such as three weeks at a minimum, but preferably one month. And they should share answers to all questions received by submitters in a public location — such as on a proposal tracker website — to ensure information is equal for all parties.

Setting benchmarks for data & tracking

If a local government’s goal is to increase the percentage of contracts granted to businesses owned by under-represented individuals, then the scope of the current awarding metrics must be structured in order to effectively measure change.

For example, government agencies should make sure that all contracts entered for local government services include a declaration page noting majority ownership and identifying diverse business characteristics. Where possible, agencies should evaluate majority ownership of past local government contracts to better understand necessary diversity benchmarks.

Further internal analysis may be required. Larger municipalities sometimes opt to have outside firms complete economic disparity studies in order to get a broader analysis of government efforts and contract-award history and to understand market opportunity within communities. While in municipalities with lower levels of contracting, this data may be able to be generated internally.

These efforts can pay dividends. A study into the economic disparity of city contracts undertaken by the City of Asheville, NC in 2018, found that less than 5% of the city’s non-construction projects were awarded to women- or minority-owned businesses. These findings triggered the update of the city’s Business Inclusion Policy and shifted contract awarding methodology from race-neutral to race-conscious.

Making meaningful connections

Collecting data through a study — such as the one done by Asheville or another done by as the City of Boston — can help municipal governments more fully understand the economic disparity of municipal contracts. The likely result are some key and specific actions that local governments can take to connect with diverse business communities, such as develop a landing page, such as the one created by Asheville to spell out the municipality’s business inclusion efforts.

Municipalities should also participate in state-run diverse-owned business registries and consider favorable weighting in the RFP process for registered businesses. In fact, some local governments opt to create their own business registries rather than using state registries.

Further, agencies seek to connect directly to these diverse-owned businesses by hosting small business open houses or standing calls to connect small businesses in the community with contracting or work opportunities. Municipalities should also forge collaborative partnerships with B2B organizations in their greater region or service area. For example, the Hispanic Chambers of Commerce, LGBTQIA+ business networking organizations, and others can help connect diverse businesses to local government opportunities.

Finally, more local governments are providing exclusive opportunities for minority-owned businesses to bid for municipal contracts. In Boston, for example, the city established a Sheltered Market Program in early 2022 for projects in key areas that were identified in their disparity study. Programs such as these help build the capacity of small, local, and diverse businesses to bid for larger government contracts down the road.

These actions, taken in total, can foster an improved state of equity in the government procurement process for diverse-owned business in the future.

As international efforts to slow down the effects of harmful greenhouse gases have been insufficient, the frequency and intensity of climate-related disasters have led to a call to action in both the public and private sectors. In the United States, new federal legislation funding broad initiatives to reduce greenhouse gas emissions has become law. At the state and local level, some governments have adopted climate action plans and net zero emissions targets.

Yet there remains much to do. Incorporating language into contracts and regulations governing procurement, project management, and land uses can dramatically improve a municipality’s environmental impact.

City attorneys as climate-change fighters

There is no one-size-fits-all approach for local governments to address climate change. Municipalities should identify both short- and long-term measures that will improve their ability to withstand adverse climate events. These measures will depend on geographic location and many other factors, but may include:

• • • improving public transportation and making communities more bike- and pedestrian-friendly;
    • using electric vehicles throughout the city’s fleet and installing charging infrastructure at convenient locations for motorists who live and work in the city;
    • building seawalls and upgrading drainage systems; and
    • creating tax abatements that encourage private sector businesses and property owners to take measures of their own.

Efforts to counteract the impacts of climate change should be an element of the local government’s comprehensive plan, zoning ordinances, and capital budget. Many cities also have a climate action plan (CAP) to guide their strategy for local mitigation efforts. Even without a CAP, developing contracts and regulations that address climate issues is a powerful first step in the local effort to fight climate change.

Incorporating climate goals into contracts and regulations

The municipal attorney should be mindful of the local government’s climate-related goals when drafting and reviewing proposed contracts and regulations. Integrating climate clauses into legal documents and laws can be a critical part of implementing a city’s climate action plan. However, even if the municipality has not yet adopted a CAP, contract terms and regulatory provisions that focus on environmental impacts can pave the way to a healthier future. City attorneys can incorporate a net zero mindset in contracts and regulations, with provisions specifically aimed at furthering progress toward net zero targets.

Establishing climate goals in construction contracts — In 2020, approximately 38% of global carbon dioxide emissions came from the construction and operations of buildings. However, the traditional standards of care found in construction contracts do not explicitly require contractors to incorporate climate change mitigation or adaptation measures. As a result, government entities and their contractors often build facilities without climate-related risks or decarbonization in mind.

Local governments should engage with the project team early on to determine how the project design, specifications, contract terms, and budget can address the government’s climate-related expectations. Examples of clauses municipalities can include in contracts for construction of public projects include:

• • • requiring the contractor to meet defined net zero objectives, including reaching net zero benchmarks at various stages of the project;
    • rewarding the contractor for meeting net zero objectives, instead of penalizing the contractor for failing to meet them; and
    • prescribing practices for management of construction waste associated with the project.

Climate goals in procurement contracts — To ensure that purchases made by local governments are environmentally responsible, municipalities should consider procuring equipment, supplies, and materials from sources that require less transportation, use materials or components that are recycled or responsibly sourced, and reflect the supplier’s or manufacturer’s commitment to sustainability.

Other local government contracts — Local governments sometimes operate facilities with high-energy usage or environmental impact, such as landfills, schools, jails, or convention centers. Attorneys may be involved in drafting stand-alone contracts or clauses that are part of broader contracts to address matters such as: retrofitting facilities with energy-efficient appliances, systems, and lighting; reducing single-use plastics by vendors in cafeterias and other dining facilities; and establishing landfill management practices that reduce harmful greenhouse gas emissions and other adverse climate impacts.

Climate goals in planning, zoning, and building codes

Many cities already include climate-friendly features in their planning and zoning, without necessarily having a coordinated approach to climate change mitigation. For example, municipal plans and zoning regulations often provide for: preserving open spaces and setting aside land for parks; planting new trees and protecting existing trees; and incorporating bike lanes, sidewalks, and other pedestrian-oriented features into street infrastructure.

Beyond these measures, some cities anticipate and encourage higher usage of electric vehicles with incentives such as: free parking on streets and in public garages; and designated parking spaces with charging stations at privately owned parking facilities.

To assure that buildings within the municipality are resilient and energy-efficient, the city attorney can assist in efforts like: ensuring that new building and property maintenance codes emphasize energy-saving construction and operational practices; crafting ordinances that set requirements for recycling of construction and demolition waste; and establishing landscaping standards that rely on trees and other plantings that, once established, will provide shade but will not require extensive irrigation.

With serious threats presented by rapid climate change, most cities will need to step up their efforts and be more intentional in using planning and zoning to focus on climate issues. Cities that have adopted climate action plans can use them as support for overhauling comprehensive plans and zoning ordinances. Municipal attorneys will need to assist in drafting and reviewing new zoning language to confirm that it is within the city’s authority, is enforceable, and carries out the city’s intentions.

Selling local government climate policies

Climate policies at any level of government can be a hot-button issue. Local government attorneys and officials can get around the political controversy that sometimes accompanies climate-related measures by de-emphasizing terms and references that trigger negative reactions while stressing that climate-related actions will result in long-term economic benefits to property owners, residents, and the community as a whole.

Municipalities and their city attorneys should continue to communicate that these steps are a clear pathway toward a healthier and safer living environment that preserves the community’s natural resources and scenic beauty for future generations.