Diversity at the Top

In light of the news that the Senior Executive Service and its feeder pools are getting somewhat more diverse, I think Phil Rucker's point here is well-taken: Obama has appointed an unprecedented number of women and minorities to fill national security roles in his Cabinet, but he has not broken the generational barrier in any significant way.

I think this is going to be an interesting question for the Obama administration. The president-elect himself is in an interesting position. I've heard him called both a late Boomer and an early Gen-Xer, depending on which year range you're using to determine the generations. Either way, he represents a generational turnover. But whether there's space at the top for a new and younger generation of leaders to join him, and whether those younger leaders are considered ready to advise the president at the highest level, are issues only Obama can decide. At the same time, the administration has to reckon with the fact that it activated a new generation of voters at higher levels of enthusiasm than ever before. And those young voters could be powerful lobbying voices for an Obama administration, but they also are the people that Obama will need to begin recruiting to serve in the federal government in his role as the executive branch's CEO. Obama appealed powerfully to a sense that America needed to turn the page when picking their president; I wonder how he'll reconcile that with the need to pick experienced hands, and also provide symbols of youth and the future in his administration's leadership.