IRMCO 2010

This week the General Services Administration (GSA) is hosting its 49th annual Interagency Resources Management Conference.    An estimated 300 Chief Acquisition Officers, Chief Financial Officers, Chief Information Officers, Chief Human Capital Officers, Inspectors General, program managers and other senior executive leaders are attending.   It is the most well known government-wide, government-only conference where leaders delve into emerging management issues and how they are being confronted.  You can learn more about IRMCO at www.irmco.gov

This morning I moderated a panel “Expanding on the Management Agenda” with the four senior Office of Management and Budget officials who are leading the Obama Adminstration’s management efforts:

• Vivek Kundra, Chief Information Officer and Administrator for E-Government and Technology,
• Danny Werfel, Controller, Office of Federal Financial Management,
• Dr. Shelley Metzenbaum, Associate Director for Performance and Personnel Management, and
• Daniel Gordon, Administrator, Office of Federal Procurement Policy

Together they addressed the 6 strategies that according to OMB’s Jeff Zients “offer the greatest potential to improve performance”

1. Eliminate waste,
2. Drive top priorities,
3. Leverage purchasing scale,
4. Close the IT performance gap,
5. Open government to get results, and
6. Attract and motivate top talent.

Importantly, they did not dwell on each of the 6 strategies so much as explain how they are working together, in what I would describe as a pragmatic, problem-solving approach – looking to take the best of what works – in other governments, the private sector and recent federal efforts – to transform the way government works.   It is apparent from their individual priorities as well as the way they describe how they are working together that the current OMB team is operating in a very coordinated and integrated fashion – where fixing problems and improving mission performance is no longer “someone else’s  job,”  but instead, everyone’s  job.

“Desperately Seeking a Watchdog”

Today, in an editorial, the New York Times called for a presidentially appointed, Senate-confirmed leader of the Government Accountability Office (GAO).   Noting that the interim Comptroller General, Gene Dodaro “has served ably,” the Times editorial concludes that “without a presidentially appointed and Senate-confirmed leader, the agency lacks the power and validation to pursue its mission to the fullest.   Mr. Obama can choose form the names he has been given, or request more.  The important thing is to keep the process moving.   Public interest in Washington is already high enough.  For true accountability, the government needs a strong GAO.”

But will it work?

The Congress has passed and the President has signed the new health care reform legislation.  But, will it work?

This is the question that The Brookings Institution’s R. Kent Weaver raises in a new Issue Brief:  “But Will It Work?: Implementation Analysis to Improve Government Performance.”  According to Weaver, even though many implementation problems occur repeatedly across programs and can be predicted in advance, legislators often pay little attention to them when programs are being enacted or overhauled.    Weaver’s solution is to have the Government Accountability Office (GAO) perform implementation analysis for major legislative proposals in Congress, much like the Congressional Budget Office does with budget scoring.

Weaver’s Issues in Governance Studies Issue Brief outlines major elements of  Implementation Analysis and argues that it could lead to major improvements in policy performance.   He identifies a number of problems that are likely to be highlighted by Implementation Analysis:

–  Interpretation  (i.e., leaving legislation open to later interpretation)

–  Organizational mission issues (potential conflicts between established organizational missions and new tasks)

–  Organizational and coordination issues (where cooperation of several organizations will be needed)

–  Resource and organizational capacity constraints (a realistic assessment of financial, workforce and technology resources)

–  Time lines (underestimating organizational and resource challenges involved in policy change)

–  Political interference (mechanisms to insulate decisions from inappropriate interference)

–  Program operator issues (problematic  behavior of front-line workers)

–  Target compliance issues (the “targets” of government policies may fail to behave in ways that were anticipated)

Kent Weaver concludes his very thoughtful set of recommendations with sensible modesty, acknowledging that “Implementation Analysis is certainly no panacea to avoid government problems.”   He concludes, however, that “Implementation Analysis offers a potentially powerful new tool to ensure that governments make informed decisions and that government policies live up to their promise.”

5 (not just 4) names to be Comptroller General

On Tuesday, Congressional Democrats sent President Obama a list of four candidates to nominated as the next Comptroller General.  The four are Rep. Todd Platts, Linda Bilmes at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, Acting Comptroller General Gene Dodaro, and former Assistant Comptroller Ira Goldstein.  Today Congressional Republicans sent their own letter to the President recommending Stuart Bowen, the special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction.   The letter was signed by House Minority Leader John Boehner, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs ranking member Susan Collins and House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform ranking member Darrell Issa.

Final Four to lead the GAO?

It is looking more and more as if we may soon see a nominee for the position of Comptroller General.   CQ staffer David Clarke is reporting that the Congress will soon forward President Obama four candidates to be CG and lead the Government Accountability Office.

The four names are:

Linda J. Bilmes – currently a professor at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government,

Gene Dodaro – who is acting CG since David Walker left nearly two years ago,

Ira Goldstein – who leads Deloitte Consulting’s federal government practice, and

Todd Platts – Republican Congressman serving York County, Pennsylvania.

Stay tuned!

“Performance” in the FY 2011 Budget

Given what we have learned from experience and careful research, the performance management approach the Obama Administration lays out in the Analytic Perspectives section of the FY 2011 budget is very promising and represents a more aggressive, more coherent, and more comprehensive approach than that of past Administrations.   We know that when leaders focus on a few priority goals, we see tremendous performance improvement on those goals.   We are also learning (in fact, there is an interesting note on this in the most recent issue of the Harvard Business Review) that a sense of progress is the greatest employee motivator.

So, I am very hopeful about the Administration’s decision to emphasize ownership of the goals by agency leaders and to report performance trends, not the percentage of targets met and program PART rating done on a five-year cycle.  The Obama approach is likely to be more effective at engaging the Federal workforce, improving performance, and making government more accountable to the public.

TWOFER

A “twofer” is when you get two of something at once – sort of two for the price of one. That’s what you would have gotten if you were at the National Press Club yesterday morning. At 9:00 am, the Partnership for Public Service released their new report: “Ready to Govern: Improving the Presidential Transition.“ The report outlines steps to improve the presidential transition process – a process that relies too much on “hope and luck” according to the Partnership’s Max Stier.  At 10:00 am, the National Research Council and the National Academy of Public Administration released a joint report “Choosing the Nation’s Fiscal Future” offering U.S. leaders ways to address the nation’s fiscal problems and confront its rapidly growing debt.  Two sets of thoughtful reports with sensible recommendations for dealing with two sets of important public policy issues.

Debt Commission in the FY 2011 Budget?

Late in December 2009, the Senate increased the federal debt limit to a record $12.4 trillion – boosting chances for the establishment of a bipartisan commission to look for ways to force Congress to make painful spending cuts and tax increases.  The Washington Post reports that even though such commissions have had a mixed record in the past, 35 senators from both parties support creating a commission to force a vote on budget cuts and tax hikes.

Senators Kent Conrad (D-ND) and Judd Gregg (R-NH) introduced legislation to create a bipartisan fiscal task force to address the nation’s long-term budget crisis.  The bill establishes an 18-member task force comprised of ten Democrats and eight Republicans.   According to Senator Conrad’s press release, the panel would have bipartisan co-chairs.  It would consist entirely of currently serving members of Congress as well as the Treasury Secretary and one other administration official selected by the President.  The task force recommendations, which would be submitted to the Congress after the 2010 elections, would be considered by Congress under expedited procedures.

President Obama is expected to include a proposal for a debt commission in his fiscal year 2011 Budget which will be sent to Congress the first week in February.  CNN’s White House correspondent Ed Henry reports that President Obama is seriously considering an executive order to create a bipartisan commission to consider sweeping tax increases and spending cuts to popular entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare in an effort to slash the soaring federal deficit.

Groups such as the Concord Coalition and the Peter G. Peterson Foundation continue to press for action to bring the deficit under control, while senior budget officials from Member countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development are drafting a report with strategies for countries to transition from current levels of fiscal imbalances to more sustainable levels.

Performance Reporting: Rhetoric vs. Reality

"Performance Reporting . . ." by Richard Boyle

Recent years have seen a growing emphasis on the reporting of the outputs and outcomes of government programs. Yet there is limited information on what outputs and outcomes are actually reported on in practice.  A new report by Richard Boyle, Head of Research for the Institute of Public Administration in Dublin, Ireland, finds that there is surprisingly little information on the nature and quality of output and outcome indicators that are actually used and presented in performance reports.  He further notes that there is an almost total lack of information on cross-national comparative practice.

What types of indicators are actually being reported on? Does reality match the rhetoric?  Boyle provides empirical evidence of what is actually happening in output and outcome reporting by government departments.  He examines four countries regarded as among those at the forefront of performance reporting: Australia, Canada, Ireland, and the United States.  His report provides cross-national comparative data on good and bad practices in performance reporting, shares good practices across these countries, assesses the state of performance reporting, and provides directly relevant assistance to program managers in both central and line agencies.

According to Boyle, there is a clear distinction between performance reports in the US and those in other countries he examined.   On the whole, indicators contained in US reports are more likely to report on outcomes, be quantitative in nature, meet data quality criteria, and have associated targets and multi-year baseline data.  To learn more, read the full report just released by the IBM Center for The Business of Government.

Happy Birthday GPRA

The Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA) was enacted in 1993 to bring about a greater focus on results in the federal government.  GPRA’s requirements have built a strong foundation for results-oriented performance planning, measurement, and reporting.

Prior to the enactment of GPRA, federal agencies generally lacked the infrastructure needed to manage and report on results of federal programs in a way that was transparent to Congress and the American people.  Today, the federal government has outcome-oriented strategic plans, performance measures, and accountablity reporting that have significantly improved over time.

Last evening, former Office of Management and Budget (OMB) staffer Walter Groszyk hosted his annual GRPA birthday party at the oyster bar in the historic Old Ebbitt Grill, just steps from the White House in downtown Washington, DC.  President Clinton signed GPRA on August 3, 1993, so this year’s off-season event celebrated GPRA’s 16^th birthday.

Missing, because of a trip to California, was John Mercer, who calls himself the “father” of GPRA.  Others in the group also claim paternity, but until there is a reliable legislative DNA test, they all will have to share credit.  David Plocher, a self-described “mid-wife” of GPRA, was in attendance.  No one yet has stepped forward claiming to be the “mother.”

There seems to be little doubt about the Obama Administration’s intention to “use” GPRA’s performance goals and measures to set priorities, monitor progress and diagnose problems.   For example, just over a month ago, Shelley Metzenbaum joined the Office of Management and Budget to lead the Administration’s performance measurement and management effort.

Her boss, Jeff Zients, who is OMB Deputy Director for Management and the Administration’s Chief Performance Officer, recently testified that “The test of a performance management system is whether it is used.”  According to Zients, the Administration is enlisting Cabinet and subcabinet appointees with experience in using performance goals and measures in States and local government to work together as a vanguard for federal performance management.