last year we developed a department-wide survey of civil servants. and by popular demand launched a pilot program for civil servants to deploy overseas. posts will obviously benefit from having skilled civil servants fill out their team. and the participants will gain greater experience about life at posts and a new set of responsibilities. if the program proves successful, we will look to expand it to more people and more posts. now these are just a handful of the steps we have taken in the past year. there are many, many more stories of the qddr in action. we've been tracking them on the website, qddr.state.gov. i encourage each of you to go there to check on the progress we have made, to share your ideas about how we make this first ever qddr real in your

office. and as we look ahead to the coming year, we need to keep up this momentum. now i know it isn't easy. there is just a lot to do every single day. it's hard to be, you know, inventing a new airplane when you're up in the air. but we are really together demonstrating how it's done. large bureaucracies like large organizations anywhere can often resist change. because it's new, it disrupts the orderly flow of the routines that have been already established. and it might be tempting to just sit and wait in the hope that a change will pass you by. but instead, so many of you have embraced the qddr and the ideas behind it. and i want to thank each and every one of you who have been involved in the process. if you're still working to implement the guidance, i encourage you to keep pushing forward. now many of the projects we have already started will need follow-up actions in coming

months. so we will be defining the next set of projects to take on. and i really invite all of you. we really welcome your ideas about how to bring these changes into reality, because implementing the qddr should not be an extra task on top of your real day job. should it be part of that job. and it should provide transformative thinking and tools to help you work better. and aside from the big institutional changes we're making, i want the qddr to do something else, encourage all employees at every level to really think hard and to kind of dream big about what more we can do on behalf of our country. for more than half a century, the world has benefitted from exceptional american leadership. and an international system that was designed and implemented by talented and dedicated employees

here at state and usaid. the sources of america's power are enduring and durable. our values, our global vision, our productivity, our ingenuity, our incredible demographic diversity. but none of these advantages is a birthright. every generation of americans has to reestablish their legitimacy and credibility, and has to reimagine how america will be going forward. so let's nurture those values. let's keep making the tough choices, and let's make sure we are part of securing american leadership well into this century. now i will be happy to take your questions. there are two microphones already set up in the audience. we've received a lot of interesting questions through the sounding board. we're not going to have time to

answer all of them, so i'll take a few online questions submitted from overseas posts today. i understand that we will take a few from the sounding board moderator, who has merged a few of the questions apparently so i could respond more directly to all of you. and i promise that all the thoughtful questions that you took the time to ask, which i don't get to right now will be answered either on the sounding board or the qddr site. so with that, pat, we should begin. [ applause ] >> madam secretary, thank you so much for being here. my name is kathleen cory and i work at sfi. many of us are very involved in working on qddr-related projects, and we're very excited about the document and want it to stay. so my question is what is the department doing to institutionalize qddr so

that regardless of who is secretary of state or regardless of which administration is in power, that the qddr will remain a cornerstone of u.s. foreign policy? thank you. >> first of all, thank you for your work at sfi and your work on implementing the qddr. we are hoping that it will prove itself so that no matter who comes next, not only in my position, but in all of the positions of leadership throughout state and aid will see it as the tool that it is. the defense department has been doing this for years, and it has really advantaged them. that's how i first thought of it. because i served on the armed services committee in the senate and every four years the defense department would come up with this really slick well manufactured brochure filled with pages and power points, you know how they are so good at that. and, you know, it just was daunting to see, because it just laid out here is what we want

and here is how we're going to get it. and we had nothing like that from state or aid. in fact, if you ask jack lew who has gone from d here to omb, now will become chief of staff for president obama, he said it was always so easy because state would come in with their priorities with their priorities, aid would come in different priorities. you could set one against the other so the end result was we got less than we should have gotten. so i don't like that as an operating principle. so we decided to launch the first qddr. we are expecting it to be legislated, because i think the congress are authorizing committees and appropriate rating subcommittees, found it really useful. you know, they used to come into meetings and all the dod appropriators would have their stacks of stuff from dod, and our guys would have little piece of paper with somebody called me and told me i needed to do this.

you know, we think on the merits should be continued and if it's legislated, it will be continued. so that's how we see it. yes. >> a question from the field or from the sounding board? >> thank you, madam secretary. the first question from the sounding board comes from michelle nichols in kabul. she wants to know what will the footprint of the department be in afghanistan as we progress through transition. >> well, that's a very good question. and just about ten days or so ago, i called our team in afghanistan, had a conference call with many, many of the really extraordinary people serving there, not just from state and aid, but from our whole government. and we are going through that process now to evaluate as the transition continues in afghanistan and the military footprint draws down and

transitioning areas are transferred to afghan lead. our civilian mission will have to shift its focus from stabilization and support to the military to long-term development and building afghan capacity. we have over 450 civilians right now embedded in nearly 80 locations with the military, primarily u.s., but also nato isaf forces. we will be gradually consolidating, our present thinking is, into four enduring state-led locations. and our staffing will be drawn down as the military draws down. we will have to be really thoughtful about how we reconfigure our mission in kabul and around the country. that process is just beginning, so michelle, i would welcome your insight and input as well

as those of others serving with you. ambassador ryan crocker runs a great mission in kabul. so he and his team is very much focused on this. but it is a work in progress because we don't know all the details about exactly how the transition to afghan-led security will occur. but we're starting that work right now. >> madam secretary, i'm on the board of executive women at state. fewer women are applying for senior positions in the department, and women at every level are having difficulty with maternity, child care and elder care issues, and some are resigning. workplace flexibility options are inconsistent from office to office. how can executive women at state and other concerned affinity groups work with you to help address these problems before you leave? thank you. [ applause ] >> well, this is a matter of

great concern to me because obviously balancing family and work responsibilities is challenging and the challenge falls disproportionately on women in the workplace. and it's no longer just a question of one's children, it's also one's aging relatives who are often part of the care-giving responsibilities that are assumed. and i really want to do more on this year. you know, i think we've got a variety of policies in place that are trying to make the department a more family-friendly work environment. i know some of you have raised on the sounding board and through your chains here the question about more telework. pat and i have talked about this. we have to determine which positions are eligible and which aren't. you know, a lot of the classified and confidential work

can't be outsourced so to speak to telework. so we are looking at that. we will continue to look at it. and we will try to support as much expansion of it as is possible. but i don't want to overpromise because there are inherent challenges. we also have a policy that provides for alternative work schedules. we support job sharing when it has been worked out with the office and the person willing to share the job with you. we have two day care facilities. we're about to have a third, one at fsi, one at sa-1, and one at a new building that is being revamped and readied for ca. we need more capacity. everybody knows that. and we're exploring everything we can do. i also have been made aware of the desire for more lactation

rooms. i think we have added numbers to that, and we are in the process of trying to develop a policy to increase the numbers. and i think there is a lot that practical and again maybe apparently small steps, but which could make a big difference in an individual's ability to balance family and work. so i hope that we'll keep, really, stretching the envelope on this. obviously on, you know, for our lgbt community, we have really broken through and done a lot in terms of improving family-related policies. so we're very sensitive to this. we'll try to do as much as we can within the confines of the kind of, you know, specific constraints that we have to work with. so keep the ideas coming, and keep encouraging talented women to move up the ranks. we don't want there to be any

stagnation in numbers. there should be no glass ceiling or any other kind of court of appealing that prevents women from going forward in so far as we can make the work environment successful for you. so we'll keep working on that. [ applause ] >> good morning, madam secretary. my name is doris mcbride. i'm in the bureau of economic and business affairs. as you know, even though there are some agencies that are growing, we are not the only agency that is facing difficulty in terms of resources. you mentioned earlier, for example, the department of energy as well, but you didn't mention the department of commerce are among the agencies that we work with closely that are having resource issues. and i'm wondering what your thoughts are about that and how that affects their ability to engage in diplomacy with us

overseas. >> that is a really good question because, you know we have worked hard to make the case for state and aid resources. and i'm knocking on wood. but we've done better than many would have ever expected because we've been really focused on making the congress understand that all the things that they want done, like increase the numbers of people processing visas in china and brazil and shorten the time takes money and takes people. but it's harder for us to make the interagency argument about our colleagues. we do work closely with commerce, with energy, with usda. you go across our government, we now have representatives from so many different agencies in country under chief of mission authority. so we do have to help our

colleagues and other parts of the government understand the role that they play in our 21st century state craft. and that's particularly true in e. because in order to practice what we do call economic statecraft, we want a team. we want the american team out there working for us. and i think that it's going to be challenging because the number of positions that commerce is able to fund, for example, in the arab spring region has dropped. and so we've been scrambling to try to help commerce keep personnel experts in north africa so they can work with us in order to be able to promote economic opportunity. you know, in a globalized world like the one we're in, the tools of foreign policy are not just

within this department or even development just within usaid. so we have to be smarter about how we make a broader case. and so it's a very good question. one of the reasons we consolidated what we did inside e was to try to get everything in one place so that we're more effective in putting forth our positions and then from that i hope we can in this new alignment of economic growth, energy, and the environment, be more effective in working with our colleagues across the government. but it's a challenge. and i appreciate you for raising it. >> madam secretary, this next question is probably one of the most discussed topics on the sounding board. todd schwartz asks are there any steps that can be taken to accelerate the upgrade of internet explorer on department systems. [ laughter ]

>> i remember the first time i did a town hall, and i think i was asked about this. i hope you agree we've made progress. we continue to make progress. we know how important this is for all of you. as i recall, it seems so long ago. but three years or so ago, we really didn't -- we really were not in the 21st century. let me put it that way. but under, you know, great leadership from pat and our team, we have made progress. so today i'm happy to -- [ laughter ] -- we really do read the sounding board, that google chrome will be deployed worldwide on february 14th. [ applause ]

that's my valentine's president to all of you. internet explorer 8 will be deployed on march 20th. [ applause ] and for more details, you can go to state cable 7330, which officially announced this january 25th. now google chrome is intended to be an optional browser. it may not work with all the department internet sites or applications, but we believe it will greatly improve the accessibility and performance with external sites. internet explorer 8 has been tested with department enterprise applications. it's precisely this sort of quality control testing that delays the deployment of newer versions of explorer. pat's informed me that it's the

assessment of our incredible crack information systems team that will skip internet explorer 9 completely and deploy internet explorer 10 on or before february of next year. so we're moving, moving, moving. and we appreciate the constant prodding, prodding, prodding that we get from the sounding board. >> good morning, madam secretary. my name is virginia benninghoff. i work in iap in the office of european affairs. and i have a question on our foreign policy, if i may. regarding the atrocities that happened in the beginning of the 20th century that some would label the armenian genocide, i am wondering why it is that we do not recognize it as such and if it has to do with our classification of what a genocide is or more to do with our relationship with turkey? and given the recent legislation that was classification of what a genocide is or more with

our relationship with turkey. my understanding is that under secretary sherman was there recently and i wondered if that came up and what our position is. >> >> well, first, one of our great strengths is we do not criminalize speech. people can say nearly anything they choose and they do in our country. other countries, including close friends and allies, like france, have different standard, different histories but weep a i hope, never going to go down that path to criminalize speech. i think it's fair to say that this has always been viewed and i think properly so, and a matter of historical debate and conclusions rather than political. and i think that is the right posture for the united states

government to be in because, you know, whatever the terrible event might be or the high emotions that it represents, to try to use government power to resolve historical issues i think opens a door that is a very dangerous one to go through. so the issue is a very emotional one. i recognize that and i have great sympathy for those who are just so incredibly passionate about it, but i think the free market of ideas, the academic community, the open architecture of communication that is even greater now than it was in the past are the proper fora for

this kind of engagement and i hope that it's worked out and eventually people will have their own conclusions, which needs to be respected, but we need to encourage anyone on any side of any contentious historical debate to get into the marketplace of ideas. muster your evidence, put forth your arguments and be willing to engage. that's what i think should happen on that, too. [ applause ] >> good morning, madam secretary. the last time i was before you, i was an intern and now i'm a program analyst so it's quite an honor to be here before you today. >> good, good. >> my question is regarding foreign policy if i may. as a kurdish american, much of my interest focuses on the kurt state of iraqi political affairs. given what's been going on since the man troop withdrawal, i was

wondering what the role of u.s. diplomacy is with that situation and what you hope you will see in the future to ensure iraqi security and democracy and stability continue. >> well, first i'm delighted that you've gone from intern to full fledged employee in such a short period of time. and we're delighted and that's exactly the kind of movement of young people into our ranks that i'm thrilled to see. there is no -- there is no doubt all one has to do is follow the media, that there's a lot of political contention in iraq right now. the united states, led by our very able experienced ambassador jim jeffrey, i don't know that man has a sleep of more than an hour or two because he is constantly, along with his able team, reaching out, meeting with, cajoling, pushing the

players starting with prime minister maliki not to blow this opportunity. let me be very clear. this is an opportunity for all areas of iraq, of all religious affiliation, of all backgrounds, this is an opportunity to have a unified iraq. and the only way to do that is by compromising. and one of the challenges in new democracies is that compromise is not in the vocabulary, especially in countries where people were oppressed, brutalized over many years. they believe that democracy gives them the opportunity to exercise power and even though it's not the specific individual, saddam hussein is

gone, he oppressed the shi'a, terribly abused the kurd, chemical attacks, he's gone but people's minds are not yet open to the full potential of what this opportunity can mean for them. unfortunately there's a lot of line drawing and boundary imposing between different political factions. so we are certainly conveying in as strong a message as we can that these political difficulties and disagreements have to be peacefully resolved for the good of all iraqis and that everyone has a chance to grow the pie bigger to have more freedom, more economic prosperity by working together. it's not easy. it's unfortunately one of the

challenges we face everywhere in the world right now. with the great movement toward democracy, which we welcome and applaud, it has upended a lot of the historical experiences that people have held on to and there is a need to get moving beyond that. but it will take time. the united states will be firmly in the role of advising and mentoring and playing the go between in every way that we possibly can. but at the end of the day iraq is now a democracy but they need to act like one and that requires compromise. so i'm hoping that there will be a recognition of that and such a tremendous potential to be realized. iraq can be such a rich country. it's already, you know, showing that with the oil revenue starting to flow again but problems have to be resolved. they cannot be ignored or

mandated by authoritarianism. they have to be worked through the political process. [ applause ] >> madam secretary, we received two very similar questions that ask you about your vision for us. from the most senior employee to the most junior, in an era of limited resources, what is the one thing that we can do every day in our work and you're attitude to make sure we reflect the vision within the reality of the resources that we have. >> well that, is a very important question that would probably deserve a much longer answer but let me just say that part of the vision is in the

qdtr. that is what drove our doing the qdtr and asked so many of you to participate in help thinking through what the vision is for employee development, to have an openness to chang, to learn new skills, to be willing to collaborate and listen to one another, not to defend the past. if the past is worth defending in the values and the practices that we used, then make the case for them. not a reflexive this is the way we've always done it, this is how we expect to do it forever, i'm too old to change -- i relate to that. [ laughter ] it's both institutional and personal attributes that we are

trying together to examine. there's a opportunity -- i always believe that the best change comes from the bottom up. it comes from empowered employees saying, look, i've got this great idea. [ applause ] so to everyone, feel that empowerment. and then to supervisors, managers, et cetera, be open to those ideas. not every idea is a good one. you have to say that. because even if you believe it and you've spent a long time working on it, doesn't necessarily mean it will carry the day. but how do you know unless you ask, unless you deliver and not just stand to one side and say, well, you know, if they only did what i would have them do or why are they doing that? well, that's not helpful to anybody. i am sure that we'll find it increases stress levels and all kinds of health problems. so come forward w