Data doesn’t make decisions; people do. Data can inform decisions. I say this in response to the person who told me this week that performance measurement, like accountability, “only works on paper”. Well, if your performance measurement strategy only works on paper, than it isn’t working at all. Here are a number of factors aboutRead… Read more »
In anticipation of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Earth Day 2010 today, we worked with GovLoop last week to poll community members on workplace habits related to energy efficiency. I was pleased and encouraged by the over 150 responses to our poll, which consisted of the following three questions: 1) How does energy efficiency influenceRead… Read more »
Calls for more government efficiency come not just from the public, but also from the public servants who make government’s day-to-day operations possible. Some of the best ideas come from the people who intimately know the processes that could be improved. However, implementing those ideas often requires jumping several, tall hurdles. In an unfortunate caseRead… Read more »
This document refers to a publication which focuses on English local authorities (i.e. municipal government), but I think the same arguments hold and it also features a number of international examples. There are a lot of really good, really valid reasons why local government is not always an early adopter when it comes to newRead… Read more »
I was talking to a co-worker about our office’s reconfiguration plans, which involve merging divisions and training employees to handle a wider variety of customer needs. It’s a nice plan, and it is likely to benefit our customers by removing the layers they have to dig through to get to the services they need. InRead… Read more »
In recent hearings before the House Budget Committee, both Peter Orszag (OMB Director) and Jeffrey Zients (OMB Chief Performance Officer) have acknowledged the need to scrutinize “tax expenditures” — i.e. special tax breaks aimed at achieving specific policy goals. Mr. Zients even went so far as to express “100% agreement” with the notion of evaluatingRead… Read more »
It’s time for the federal government to finally follow through on its long-unfulfilled promise to evaluate the usefulness of special tax breaks. Does the research and experimentation tax credit, for example, actually encourage research? Or does it simply enrich high-tech firms? Does the mortgage interest deduction increase homeownership, or does it only reward people whoRead… Read more »
A previous post laid out the Focus on Efficiency Framework: Plan – Decide – Implement – Review – Repeat. In this post I’ll spend some time talking about Deciding. In many cases the Decision to Implement is made in the blink of an eye, even before Planning. And after investing resources in the Planning phaseRead… Read more »
A previous post laid out the Focus on Efficiency Framework: Plan-Decide-Implement-Review-Repeat. In this post I’ll spend some time talking about Planning. In the Plan phase you’ll plan to become more efficient by working toward an established goal or taking advantage of some new opportunity, to ensure your limited resources are used to the best possibleRead… Read more »
Focusing on Efficiency is about making a concerted effort to utilize our limited resources to the best possible advantage to accomplish our mission. Sounds good right, but how? Over the next several posts I’ll be laying out a Plan-Decide-Implement-Review-Repeat framework you can use to help your organization use your limited resources to the best possibleRead… Read more »
