Booz Allen’s work with FedScoop has resulted in a Government Reform Study. The study reveals that reform is necessary and welcomed by senior decision-makers in government and the private sector, but implementing reform is often met with challenges. The study highlights five key recommendations around ways senior decision-makers can navigate the complexities of reform.
2. 2
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Our Approach ....................................................... 4
Part I ..................................................................... 9
Part II ..................................................................15
Part III: ............................................................... 24
Conclusion ........................................................ 30
About FedScoop ............................................... 34
3. 3
THE QUESTION
In today’s climate of reform, how do federal
agencies succeed in implementing reform
and how do they know when they are
successful?
THE SURVEY
This survey explores attitudes and
challenges related to government reform
implementation and offers case studies
and best practices from those who have
experienced major reform efforts
5. 5
OUR APPROACH
Nearly 85% work in government and more than 15% work in industry:
Civilian
Defense
Intelligence
Not applicable
1%
Secretary/SES or industry CEO/president
Component head/industry CXO
Program manager or industry senior management
Non-management employee
14%
8%
33%
45%
6. 6
RECOMMENDATIONS
DON’T REINVENT THE WHEEL.
When you’re faced with reform, or mandated change, you need to make a lot of decisions
and some can have unintended consequences. The key to dealing with the complexity
and uncertainty of mandated change is to understand the journey that many have walked
before. Reform follows a common lifecycle – a lifecycle that, once understood, can drive
your success. Take the time to understand the lifecycle and seize the opportunity of
reform.
INNOVATE AND ACCELERATE.
Business accelerators have helped quickly launch successful start-ups, and government
agencies are exploring how to use those principles to inject speed and innovation
into reform implementation. Partner with experienced organizations to jump-start and
accelerate your reform journey and achieve success by focusing on key ingredients,
including strategy, resources, talent, and engagement.
7. 7
RECOMMENDATIONS
EMBRACE CONSTRUCTIVE DISRUPTION.
Make today’s social and technological disruptive trends work for you. Invest and build
a digital ecosystem that takes advantage of the potential of today’s technology. Use
predictive modeling and other analytics to test ideas that can save time and money.
Move beyond traditional communications approaches and change behavior by creating
engagement through social and digital technologies.
CREATE AND TAP INTO A BROADER NETWORK OF RESOURCES.
To keep pace with the increasing volume, variety, and velocity of reform, government
agencies need to explore and champion alternate sourcing strategies for talent, solutions,
and resources. Establish a broad network, including other government agencies, industry
leaders, and academia, to advise and provide support (e.g., mentoring). Use your
network to pursue alternate approaches, such as challenges and hack-a-thons to develop
and procure talent and solutions. These alternate approaches harness the power of
innovation to provide cost-effective solutions in a short amount of time.
8. 8
RECOMMENDATIONS
CREATE A CHIEF REFORM OFFICER.
Today’s reform expands beyond the purview of one agency and reform implementation
isn’t getting any easier. Identify a leader, or perhaps a network of leaders, to ensure
the right knowledge is focused on the right challenge, coordinate reform planning and
implementation from a big picture perspective, and promote transparency across the
public, business community, media, administration and Congress.
9. 9
BACKGROUND
For the past few decades, the government has taken several steps to become
leaner, more effective and less bureaucratic. Back in the early 1990s, the
Clinton administration saw the genesis of an interagency task force aimed at
reforming how the federal government works. That was hardly the first time
the public sector saw such an ambitious revamp, as it was the 11th of its kind
in the 20th century created for a reform purpose.
10. 10
BACKGROUND
In more recent years, since President Barack Obama took office, the spotlight
has been on major overhauls including education, information technology,
intelligence, financial, immigration and health care. All those efforts have required
-- and continue to require -- time commitments, stakeholder buy-in, clear,
top-down communication and realistic expectations, with a sharp eye toward the
final results.
11. 11
BACKGROUND
Regardless of where and when a successful reform effort takes place, leaders
today must be capable of leveraging the common lifecycle all successful reform
efforts share. They must be keen to recognize the various triggers that often point
to the need for reform, including technological, financial, political factors. And
once the need for reform has been identified, leaders can embark upon detailed
work of rethinking and retooling the enterprise.
12. 12
BACKGROUND
Reform today is viewed by many as the
new normal. It’s no longer defined by
episodic change, but by the continuous
evolution of technologies, policies,
procedures and strategic thinking.
Today’s reform leaders approach reform
not as a one-time fix, but as a normal
part of their organization’s day-to-day
mission.
13. 13
SENTIMENTS ABOUT PAST AND CURRENT
GOVERNMENT REFORM EFFORTS:
“Government is instituted for the common good; for the protection,
safety, prosperity, and happiness of the people; and not for profit,
honor, or private interest of any one man, family, or class of men;
therefore, the people alone have an incontestable, unalienable, and
indefeasible right to institute government; and to reform, alter, or
totally change the same, when their protection, safety, prosperity, and
happiness require it.”
(President John Adams)
“Accomplishing major reform will not be easy, but streamlining
our obsolete approach to federal IT is essential to providing a
better value for the American taxpayer dollar.”
(Rep. Darrell Issa on IT reform, September 2012)
14. 14
SENTIMENTS ABOUT PAST AND CURRENT
GOVERNMENT REFORM EFFORTS:
“Independent economists say immigration reform will grow our
economy and shrink our deficits by almost $1 trillion in the next two
decades. And for good reason: when people come here to fulfill their
dreams – to study, invent and contribute to our culture – they make
our country a more attractive place for businesses to locate and
create jobs for everyone.”
(President Barack Obama, January 2014)
“There remain no clear, easy answers to what intelligence reform
looks like. All four directors have taken significantly different
approaches to their role and responsibilities. It remains very much
driven by the individuals involved.”
(Michael Leiter, former director of the
National Counterterrorism Center, December 2013)
15. 15
WORKFORCE PERCEPTION
95%of government respondents have experience
with reform, yet more than ½ don’t know if those
efforts were effective.
The #1 source driving reform is organizational
leadership – whether it is a change in vision
from existing organizational leadership or new
organizational leadership all together.
16. 16
WORKFORCE PERCEPTION
50% of government respondents said improved service to customers
was the #1 sign of successful and effective reform.
54% of respondents found reform laws and regulations hard to
understand.
56% of respondents expressed difficulty in planning for reform
implementation.
17. 17
WORKFORCE PERCEPTION
Although 3/4 of respondents believe that finding the money to implement
reform is a challenge, the same number agree that reform is an
opportunity to rethink the mission and rediscover the purpose of the
organization.
18. 18
THE INGREDIENTS FOR SUCCESSFUL REFORM:
65% of government respondents say enhancing
talent is critical to successful reform.
70% of government respondents agree the
#1 skillset needed for successful reform is
communication.
19. 19
TOP 5 SKILLS AGENCIES CURRENTLY NEED TO
ENHANCE FOR SUCCESSFUL REFORM ADOPTION:
Communication channels with employees affected by reform
Strategic planning
Talent planning, training and implementation
Resource and implementation planning and overall program
schedule
Creating new processes and integrating mechanisms
20. 20
CRUCIAL VS. LESS IMPORTANT
Respondents’ opinions differed on which skills were important to
successfully implement reform:
CRUCIAL:
- Communication channels with employees affected by
reform
- Strategic planning
- Resource and implementation planning and overall
program schedule management
21. 21
CRUCIAL VS. LESS IMPORTANT
LESS IMPORTANT:
- Effective relations with the Hill
- Effective relations with other government offices
22. 22
HOW ORGANIZATIONS GAUGE IF REFORM EFFORTS
HAVE BEEN SUCCESSFUL:
“It’s time to fundamentally change the way that we do business in
Washington. To help build a new foundation for the 21st century,
we need to reform our government so that it is more efficient,
more transparent and more creative. That will demand new
thinking and a new sense of responsibility for every dollar
that is spent.”
(President Barack Obama)
23. 23
HOW ORGANIZATIONS GAUGE IF REFORM EFFORTS
HAVE BEEN SUCCESSFUL:
Half of respondents said the implementation of a reform is effective when
their agency improves service to customers
Improved service to customers
Visible change in culture
Cost savings in the organization
Increase available resources
to other mission priorities
Decrease external
scrutiny/criticism
Positive change in public
sentiment toward the organization
Increased productivity
24. 24
CASE STUDY: INNOVATION CAN DRIVE REFORM
Injecting innovation into reform
efforts is critical to success. Just
ask the Energy Department.
When the agency wanted to
come up with new, revolutionary
tools that would have an impact
on the nation’s energy use, it
held a technology development
contest. In just 48 hours, the
winning team developed an app
that enabled citizens to track
and monitor their home energy
use.
25. 25
DOE’s innovative approach to solving an important energy challenge turned
the traditional government approach on its head. What would have taken the
government months to issue a statement of work, and even more time to
conduct a competition and review proposals, took a small, innovative team of
developers one weekend to deliver.
CASE STUDY: INNOVATION CAN DRIVE REFORM
26. 26
Another example of how government is using innovation to overcome
traditional contracting obstacles to reform is Challenge.gov, which
allows agencies to post problems that they are dealing with and
award cash prizes to the most innovative solutions.
CASE STUDY: INNOVATION CAN DRIVE REFORM
27. 27
HOW CAN AGENCIES SPEED UP REFORM
PLANNING AND IMPLEMENTATION?
Obtain outside subject matter expertise to provide insight to staff on area of reform
interest and/or implementation.
I would suggest working with outside organizations that can objectively analyze our
processes and provide constructive feedback. There’s too much tunnel vision and
denial in our agency.
Commission a professional review of current practices and solicit professional
recommendation for moving organization forward along the policies articulated by
overarching enterprise leadership.
28. 28
HOW CAN AGENCIES SPEED UP REFORM
PLANNING AND IMPLEMENTATION?
Provide accountability at all levels. Senior management should be accountable to
communicate the message and vision for agencies and expect consistency across
the regions.
Select and use contemporary methodologies and best practices to standardize and
add discipline to processes.
The vision and goals for reform have to be from the top down. If the top doesn’t
support it, lower-level employees are not able to make change happen. There are
currently no incentives or support for improvement/change in my organization.
29. 29
HOW CAN AGENCIES SPEED UP REFORM
PLANNING AND IMPLEMENTATION?
Take away resources from ineffective programs, keeping them on life support until they
can be replaced or shut down altogether.
Acquisition streamlining! Current process is wasteful and not agile.
We need to conduct a realistic assessment of staffing resources, current skill sets, and
potential training needs before attempting to implement any level of reform. In addition,
reform efforts frequently result in added bureaucracy and burden on workers without any
assessment of what processes can be eliminated or modified before we overlay another
initiative.
SESers should consult early with their GS-15 staff who often have highest direct
knowledge of the processes to be reformed (and may also have industry best practices
experience, too.)
30. 30
CONCLUSION
This survey found that reform in
government is both needed and
expected.
More than 93% of the respondents
said they’re expecting their organiza-
tions to embark upon one or more
reforms in the next 1-2 years. RESPONDENTS
31. 31
CONCLUSION
But the road to a successful implementation is often fraught with challenges. A lack
of vision from leadership and poor implementation are pervasive, major obstacles
to a desirable outcome. In many cases, communication, strategic planning skills,
talent planning, training and implementation also need work.
32. 32
CONCLUSION
Many organizations still treat it as an ad-hoc process. Leaders must connect organizations
and agencies, build partnerships and inject innovation into their reform efforts if they want
them to succeed. Organizations shouldn’t have to reinvent the wheel when it comes to
finding new, innovative approaches to reform. Understanding the common lifecycle shared
by all successful reform efforts can significantly increase the chance of success.
33. 33
A SUCCESSFUL REFORM SHOULD
- Provide better services to customers
- Improve the organization’s culture and increase morale
- Lead to greater organizational efficiencies
- Reduce negative outside perceptions
But it depends on whether it is effectively managed.
34. 34
ABOUT FEDSCOOP
FedScoop features up-to-the-minute breaking government tech news
and is the government IT community’s platform for education and
collaboration. FedScoop engages top leaders from the White House,
federal agencies, academia and the tech industry both online and in
person to discuss ways technology can improve government, and
to exchange best practices and identify how to achieve common
goals. Our websites include: FedScoop, FedScoopEvents,
FedScoopRadio, FedScoopTV and FedMentors.