During the Obama administration, he put out an executive order for Federal Gov't agencies to open up their datasets. There were hardcore standards set, APIs, certain formats, etc. This is the same initiative that created data.gov. It was revolutionary and groundbreaking, and the various federal agencies essentially ignored it, and were allowed to.

I'm talking about a full executive order, and I had a lot of expertise and was being tasked with helping agencies, including the VA and DOE, open up their data. HHS was also part of this.

I was immediately blocked in all of these agencies with foot-dragging, and a complacent, "I couldn't give a fuck" attitude. They didn't care about enacting the order, because unlike me, they all knew that there would be no consequences for not doing so. They didn't do it, and there were no consequences.

I voted for Obama twice, but one of the things I noticed about his administration was that they weren't willing to strike fear into the hearts of bureaucrats who undermined their objectives. Another executive program he pushed, for properly integrating military health systems with the VA's health systems, was also actively ignored by the VA, with zero consequences. That experience was the final straw for me to leave and join the private sector, and get out of DC permanently.

That sounds very accurate. Thanks for your efforts, and I bet you actually had a bigger long term impact than you realized. In my past experience with big orgs, it takes people like you to get the ball rolling, and eventually it does pick up momentum, just takes a long long time (not sure what the best way to forecast timeframes is).

Just out of curiosity, what would that look like in concrete terms? Can the president credibly threaten to fire people or mess with their funding?

I would imagine you do so indirectly -- you threaten the income sources (e.g. federal funding to the departments/tax allocation, or killing loopholes), the politics (you publicly advocate for the other guy, or lobby against their prioritized initiatives), or the system itself (advocate for new laws/rulings/governing bodies that would make their lives more painful/goals more difficult to achieve)

It's the presidency -- just playing favorites carries a lot of weight. Or even threatening to cockblock anything they're looking to do for the next 8 years, by swinging party support.