He served as the United States Secretary of the Interior from 1923 until 1928 during the administrations of Warren G. Harding and Calvin Coolidge.

Work was active in the Republican Party and served as the Colorado state chairman in 1912.

This was Colorado's first Senate election by popular vote under the Seventeenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

During World War I, Work served in the U.S. Army Medical Corps and attained the rank of lieutenant colonel.

He served as the U.S. Secretary of the Interior from 1923 to 1928, under the administrations of President Warren G. Harding and Calvin Coolidge.