In a Monday morning meeting, Thomas Shedd, the recently appointed Director Technology Transformation Services And Elon Musk ally, told Employees of the general service administration Sources Wired say that the new manager of the agency follows an “AI-first strategy”.
During the meeting, Shedd shared his vision of a GSA that operates as a ‘startup software company’, the automation of various internal tasks and centralizing data from the federal government.
The Monday meeting, held personally and measured on Google, comes days after Wired reported that much of it Musk’s employees have migrated to jobs At the highest levels of the GSA and the Office of Personnel Management (OPM). Before he came to TTS, that was housed in the GSA, Shedd was a software engineer at Tesla, one of the companies of Musk. The transition has caused mass confusion among GSA employees who were thrown in surprise, one-on-one meetings, forced to present their code-Often for young engineers who did not identify themselves– Anyway and wonders what the future of the technical task force of the agency will look like.
Shedd tried to answer these questions on Monday and provides details about a number of projects that the agency will pursue in the coming weeks and months. His specific focus, says sources, was an increased role for AI, not only at GSA, but at the agencies of government -wide.
In what he described as an “AI-first strategy”, say sources, shedd gave a handful of examples of projects GSA acting manager Stephen Ehikian wants to set priorities, including the development of “AI coding agents” that would be made available to everyone. Shedd made it clear that he believes that much of the work at TTS and the broader government, in particular around financial tasks, can be automated.
“This increases red flags,” said a cyber security expert who was given anonymity because of concern of retribution on Monday, who stated that the government automation is not the same as automating other things, such as self-driving cars. “People, people, people, especially people who are not experts in the professional, come into projects, often think ‘this is stupid’ and then discover how hard the thing is real.”
Shedd instructed employees to consider TTS as a software startup that had become financially unstable. He suggested that the federal government needs a centralized data repository and that he actively worked with others on a strategy to create one, although it was not clear where this repository would be based or if these projects meet the privacy laws. Shedd referred to these worries as a “roadblock” and said that the desk would still have to go forward to see what was possible.
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Sources say that during the call Shotd tightly connected TTs and the digital services of the United States – in the United States doge service of doge, under Trump – with ‘pillars’ of a new technological strategy with Trump withheld. Later in the meeting he said there was no plan to merge the two groups and that projects would flow through them, depending on the available staff and the expertise, but emphasized the upcoming cooperation between TTS and Doge.
Employees, say sources, also asked questions about the young engineers, who had previously not identified themselves in meetings. Shedd said that one of them felt comfortable enough to introduce themselves in meetings on Monday say sources, although Shedd added that he was nervous about their names that were publicly unveiled and their lives were performed.
Shedd was unable to answer many questions from the staff about the deferred retirement, the return to office mandate, or if the staff of the agency were to do with considerable cuts, according to sources. At one point, Shedd indicated that cuts on the staff were likely for TTs, but refused to give more details. (Similar questions were also asked to leadership of the Ministry of Public Efficiency In a Friday meeting for the first time reported by Wired.)
Towards the end of the call, sources say, asked a TTS employee or they are expected to work more than 40 hours a week to tackle all upcoming activities and possibly dismissed employees. Shedd replied that it was ‘unclear’.
