Max Stier, president and CEO of the non-partisan “Partnership for Public Service” joins Tom Temin to discuss what the first few days and weeks look like for appointed employees of a new administration. Topics covered range from administrivia and building relationships at the offset to identifying possible landmines.

The last vestiges of the Trump presidency will be swept away on Wednesday, as the Bidens move into the White House. Desks will have been cleared out, rooms scrubbed clean and the president’s aides will be replaced by a new team of political appointees. It’s part of the massive transformation that a new presidency brings to the heart of government. Even in the best of times, the logistics of a transition are daunting, involving the transfer of knowledge and employees on a massive scale.

President-elect Biden’s transition team faced unprecedented hurdles but still set new marks for staffing and fundraising. When Biden takes the oath in two days, he will have an administration with more key positions filled than some of his recent predecessors had and a policy process ready to tackle the multiple challenges he will face. David Marchick, director of the Center for Presidential Transition, said Biden’s team will have two to three times the resources that previous administrations have had in place.

President-elect Joe Biden is on track to take office without key Cabinet members being confirmed on the day of his inauguration, a result of the Republican-led Senate moving much more slowly to schedule confirmation hearings and votes than it has for previous presidents. “There’s never been a more important time to get confirmed nominees in place because we’re dealing with an economic crisis, a health crisis and a political crisis,” said David Marchick, the director of the non-profit Center for Presidential Transition at the Partnership for Public Service.

President-elect Joe Biden plans to swiftly alter the shape of the U.S. government with an aspirational inauguration speech, a legislative package aimed at coronavirus recovery and a burst of executive orders designed to signal an immediate break from President Trump. Biden’s team is expected to begin work Wednesday, and many aides will start their tenure working from home.

The three top federal agencies responsible for protecting the nation — the Departments of Justice, Defense and Homeland Security — are all being run by acting officials, as the United States endures one of its most sensitive national security crises. When acting officials run critical agencies, they have reduced standing at the White House, according to former top officials, who say that can preclude uncomfortable but necessary discussions with the president.

The Washington Post and Partnership for Public Service today announced the launch of the Political Appointments Tracker to follow and analyze the progress of President-elect Biden’s Senate-confirmed political appointments. The tracker, first launched in 2016, will allow readers to track more positions than ever before, and provide historical comparisons to past administrations, starting with the Trump administration, and data visualizations that reveal key confirmation and nomination trends.

President-elect Joe Biden’s Cabinet picks are beginning to work through the confirmation process in the Republican-controlled Senate as transition officials and Democrats press to avoid delays in putting key people in place amid the pandemic.

President-elect Joe Biden has steadily added to his list of prospective Cabinet nominees. What reception can they look forward to in the Senate? In all likelihood, a rough one.

A series of recent moves involving the Office of Personnel Management is reinvigorating concerns the agency has become increasingly politicized at a time when it’s supposed to help agencies oversee the ongoing presidential transition.