Federal Management Agenda - Is "discontinuity" one word or two?
The January 7th 2008 issue of Federal Computer Week features the work of the Bush Administration's Management Agenda. The basic principles of the President's Management Agenda are: 1-strategic management of the workforce; 2-competitive sourcing; 3-improved financial performance; 4-expanded e-government; 5-budget and performance integration. Regardless of one's personal views, there are some key achievements and issues in this work, with significant implications for the next administration. Many of these relate to the work that quality improvement practitioners do both in and out of government.
Here are a few of the issues that were discussed in a panel interview with the senior team at the U.S. Office of Management and Budget:
Competitive Sourcing- While it was noted that government employees' winning "83% of those competions" is "not good enough," there is no discussion of the process for establishing competitive sourcing criteria. But it is important to note that the current administration has worked to implement processes that can validate the savings of outsourcing actions. While the results are not yet in, there seem to be diligent efforts to make indepependent assessments of results.
Human Capital Management - there has been much talk about the "coming crisis in human capital" in government. The demographic patterns of hiring and aging are resulting in significant public sector retirements. Data shows that young people do not view public service as highly as they once did for a career choice. OMB has worked to implement an intern program, and other expedited processes for a scalable response to this dynamic need.
Performance Improvement- The folks at OMB note that they have worked to "clarify definitions of success for more than 1,000 programs." Their data shows that they have made very significant gains in the numbers of agencies able to measure their results. OMB notes that programs have "clear, aggressive, annual and long-term goals with aggressive targets and aggressive plans to improve their performance every year." What we do not see in this article is a discussion of how plans are made, or measures of performance defined. Who are the key stakeholders? Are front-line employees and middle managers involved in the planning and measure definition processes? What processes are in place to review the measures and planning perocess, and improve them over time? No matter what agenda an administration wants, they keys to success may lie in applying the kinds of analysis and improvement methods that quality improvement practitioners have long advocated.
for more frm Federal Computer Week, check their web site at www.fcw.com It is a very good source for articles on general management and improvement issues.
