ASPA Center for Accountability & Performance

Performance Management
The White House’s Original Sin: A Failure of Effective Management
Norm Ornstein, Government Executive
Commentary on challenges related to administration and execution within the executive branch.
Senate Confirms OMB Management Deputy
Charles Clark, Government Executive
The Senate approved Beth Cobert, President Obama’s nominee to be deputy director for management at OMB.
Approaching Public Administration from a Complexity Perspective
Peter K. Marks and Lasse M. Gerrits, Public Administration Review
Events are complex when they are not comprehensible, generate unexpected outcomes, or have different impacts on multiple levels and change over time. Over the past two decades, ideas, concepts, and theories from the complexity sciences have been adapted to public administration.

Analytics/Evaluation
State’s Use of Cost-Benefit Analysis: An interview with Gary VanLandingham, Pew-MacArthur Results First Initiative
Andy Feldman, GovInnovator Blog
Interview with Gary Van Landingham on the Results First initiative, launch in 2011 to help states strengthen their ability to use cost-benefit analysis.

Performance Management
Moving from Process to Practice in Performance Management
Robert Shea, Government Executive
Agencies are showing they get how to leverage performance data.
How agency heads are measuring to manage
Steve Kelman, Federal Computer Week
Kelman’s research suggests that performance management is finally becoming ingrained in federal agencies — especially those with outstanding leaders.
Local perspectives on PerformanceStat: An interview with David Gottesman, Montgomery County, Maryland, and Greg Useem, City of Alexandria, Virginia
Andy Feldman, GovInnovator Blog
The “stat” approach, also called “PerformanceStat,” is a results-focused leadership strategy probably best known from CitiStat in Baltimore, but also used by dozens of local, state and federal offices and programs.
Baltimore’s Outcome Budgeting Approach
John Kamensky, Business of Government
Budgets, and budget reform, are sensitive topics at the moment, but it might be worthwhile to take a longer view of the issue to see what might be possible in the future, given the experiences of states and cities that have undertaken significant reforms.
What Does Performance Management Look Like in India?
John Kamensky, Business of Government
India has designed a performance management system with interesting parallels and differences from the U.S. performance management system that has evolved under the Government Performance and Results Act.

Analytics/Evaluation
Important tools for evidence-based decision making: An interview with Margery Turner, Urban Institute
Andy Feldman, GovInnovator Blog
What are some of the key tools that that policymakers and practitioners can draw on to to inform and strengthen decisions?

Collaboration
Four Elements That Promote Effective Coordination
John Kamensky, Business of Government
The successes and failures of U.S civil-military reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan serve as the basis for lessons learned in creating effective inter-agency coordination.

Open Government
The Future of Online Citizen Services
Gadi Ben-Yehuda, Business of Government
Which types of online customer-support tools currently used by the private sector will be adopted by government agencies?

Performance Management
Performance Management: Moving from Process to Practice in Performance Management
Partnership for Public Service
Results of a new survey that found PIOs at most large agencies have advanced their performance management efforts, setting up the building blocks of a performance improvement culture and gearing up to make better use of data for decision making. But most of the action is taking place at top agency levels and has not filtered down.
What Is Successful Government
Patrick Ibarra, Governing
It’s not easy to determine what constitutes quality public-sector performance. Finding the answers to some crucial questions is the most important step toward a disciplined approach to high-performance government.
Brookings Launches Center to Improve Public Management
Charles Clark, Government Executive
Its “Democracy Hub” will link academics and policy influencers in a new peer-to-peer network for the sharing of ideas and data. And a “FixGov” online blog will offer recommendations from Brookings scholars and outside contributors while incorporating “crowd-sourced information from the federal workforce on best practices and areas for government improvement.”

Analytics/Evaluation
3 ways big data is transforming government
Bill Cull, Federal Computer Week
The technology of big data is important, but openness and stakeholder input are what really make a difference.
Predictive Analytics: How to Prevent Crime from Happening
John Kamensky, Business of Government
Police departments across the U.S. are piloting crime prevention programs that rely on a smart analysis of historical crime data in neighborhoods across their cities.

Open Government
DATA Act gains Senate ally
Adam Mazmanian, Federal Computer Week
A bill to standardize and structure government spending data, a version of which has already moved through committee in the Republican-led House, is getting an assist from a prominent Democrat.
Enhancing Accountability and Increasing Financial Transparency
Senate Budget Committee
Senator Warner noted that the GAO recently released a report that called for Congress to pass legislation to improve federal financial transparency. The report stated that with more than $1 trillion awarded by the government annually through contracts, grants, and loans, “improving transparency of spending is essential to improve accountability.”

Performance Management
Performance Budgeting, Texas-Style
John Kamensky, Business of Government
Back in June, Texas Congressman Henry Cuellar spoke at a conference where he declared that he wanted to embed performance measures in each agency’s appropriation bill. What could this look like?
Performance Metrics – Are they the missing link in government procurement?
Emily Jarvis, GovLoop
The metrics around procurement are murky at best. But the National Association of State Chief Information Officers is trying to clear up some of the confusion.

Analytics/Evaluation
What not to do with your data
Troy Schneider, Federal Computer Week
Two new books help map out the danger zones of data visualization, and of the datasets themselves.

Collaboration
Collaborating to Make a Difference
John Kamensky, Business of Government
Recent reports suggest that VA is reducing its backlog. One factor: greater collaboration with veterans service organizations.

Efficiency/Reorganization
The Case for Lightweight Government
William Eggers and Paul MacMillan, Governing
In the information age, getting better results needn’t always mean massive spending and heavy infrastructure. There are innovative ways to get the same results at a fraction of the cost, or even at no cost.

Innovation
Government of the Future – How Competitions Create Innovation
Emily Jarvis, GovLoop
Each year Governing Magazine hosts a competition for university students looking to change the way government works. It’s called thePublic Policy Challenge and it’s goal is to think through the entire process of an idea, from concept to budget to implementation.

Open Government
Agencies can learn from stimulus’ data transparency
Adam Mazmanian, Federal Computer Week
GAO recommends other agencies adopt the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board practices of using single government-wide identifiers, and of standardizing data reporting requirements.
Telling Citizens What Exactly Government Does Would Cost $100 Million
Eric Katz, Government Executive
Proposed legislation to meticulously track every federal program and contract would cost $100 million over five years, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
White House asks for feedback on second National Action Plan for Open Government
Alex Howard, E Pluribus Unum
As the annual Open Government Partnership conference draws near, the White House would like the people to weigh in on building a more open government.

Performance Management
Obama Nominates Consulting Executive to Fill Management Chief Void
Charles Clark and Amelia Gruber, Government Executive
President picks McKinsey & Co. official as deputy director for management.
Analysis: Cobert must avoid second term pitfalls
Jason Miller, Federal News Radio
Experts say Beth Cobert, President Obama’s nominee for deputy director of management, must bring energy and new ways of thinking to old problems.
4 easy steps to re-boot performance management
Emily Jarvis, GovLoop
Interview with Tom Fox, Vice President for Leadership and Innovation at the Partnership for Public Service.

Innovation
Revamped innovation agenda focuses on people power
Jack Moore, Federal News Radio
The architects of President Barack Obama’s second-term management agenda say changing the culture of the federal workforce — not just technology — is driving the administration’s efforts to make government more innovative.
The Process of Innovation
Innovategov
You can foster innovation in your organization by implementing some basic processes to help generate, solidify and evaluate innovative concepts for products, services or internal improvements.

Open Government
Push for more federal data transparency gaining momentum on Capitol Hill
Jason Miller, Federal News Radio
House lawmakers will take another crack at improving federal data transparency laws in the next few months.