ASPA Center for Accountability & Performance

Six Questions to Help You Measure Anything

Adura Strategy

 Great measures don’t just happen, and software is unable to solve this problem for you. The main problem with the lack of useful measures happens much earlier in the process than visualizing data and building dashboards.

Using Evidence

Barrett & Greene (Video: 6 min.)

Zack Markovits shares the ways that Results for America has worked with leaders across the country, across the partisan divide, to help make sure that the billions of dollars heading from federal programs to the states and local governments have been used for evidence-based programs that have been shown to work.

Strategic Planning for Public and Nonprofit Organizations – 6^th Edition

John Wiley Publishers

This revised and updated Sixth Edition of John Bryson’s classic work (now with co-author Bert George) contains new literature cited, new cases, more information on international public and nonprofit concerns, and a more extensive discussion of design and agile methods of strategy development and implementation.

Resource of the Week: Safeguarding the Future: A Strategic Foresight Handbook for National Security & Defense Professional

Archipelago of Design

This practical foresight handbook was conceived to empower leaders and their teams with future-ready mindsets. It provides detailed information on a range of foresight methods that are suitable for the defense and national security realms.

Data-Driven Decisions Act (HR 8751)

Data Foundation

This proposed legislation authorizes $41 million each year through Fiscal Year 2028 to support states in improving their information technology systems, adopting advanced analytics and artificial intelligence technologies, and strengthening data security and privacy protections. (text of bill not yet available)

Quarterly Progress Update of Agency Priority Goals

U.S. Office of Management and Budget

These updates mark reporting from the second quarter of the FY 2024 performance period covering January 1 through March 31. These updates inform the public about the progress being made in major federal agencies and highlight significant milestones or barriers along the way.

Webinar: President’s Management Agenda: Driving Results for All (Wed., July 10 – 1 p.m. Eastern)

U.S. Office of Management and Budget

Speakers from across partner agencies will discuss tangible efforts to improve customer experience — examples include implementing IRS’ Direct File Pilot, expanding hiring through the Pathways Program, and reducing barriers for small businesses to advance equity in procurement.

Updated Trust Dashboard for Federal Services

U.S. Office of Management and Budget

Between January and March 2024, agencies asked over 288,000 customers whether they trusted the agencies involved to meet public needs. For 23 of 33 services surveyed, at least 75 percent said “yes.” Details, data, and definitions are included.

Book Review: The Government Analytics Handbook

Public Administration Review

At a whopping 760 pages, the Government Analytics Handbook, edited by Daniel Rogger and Christian Schuster, is a monumental effort to provide an overview of the many sources of data from and on government and how analyzing these data can help strengthen public sector management.

Resource of the Week: Tennessee’s Office of Evidence & Impact

TN Department of Finance & Administration

The Office of Evidence and Impact (OEI) promotes and facilitates program evaluation to build evidence for state programs and policies. OEI’s program evaluation initiative has three main components: managing the Statewide Learning Agenda, enabling program evaluations, and communicating evidence.

Rakesh Retires

Idaho Capital Sun

CAP Board Member Rakesh Mohan retired this past week. His 21 years as the director of Idaho’s Office of Performance Evaluations was praised by Gov. Brad Little: “Rakesh and his team have set a high standard for providing impartial analysis of complex issues and evidence-based recommendations. Rakesh’s efforts have prompted major improvements to state services and meaningfully impacted Idahoans.”

Crime Data Lags, Thwarting Accountability & Decisionmaking

Washington Post

When the FBI next releases nationwide crime data this fall, the numbers will be up to 18 months old. That’s a problem for policymakers and for the American public. “As a democratic society,” said John Roman, director of the Center on Public Safety and Justice, NORC at the University of Chicago, “we need to know what the facts are, so elected leaders can solve the problem as it exists, not as it’s messaged.”

The Federal Chief Data Officers Council Awaits Guidance

FedScoop

Five years into its existence, the federal organization charged with helping agencies establish best practices for the use, protection and dissemination of data is a year away from sunsetting and still waiting on the release of White House guidance critical to its advisory mission. 

Harnessing State-Local Evaluations Post-ARPA

RouteFifty

The 2021 American Rescue Plan Act provided $350 billion to state and local governments to pilot new interventions to tackle the country’s most critical issues and collect evidence on how well their solutions perform. . . . Governments have until the end of this year to decide how remaining ARPA funds will be spent (and until 2026 to spend the funds). Now is the time for local governments to use this funding to set up evaluations of key programs and policies made possible by ARPA.

Mission Critical: Statecraft for the 21^st Century

University College London

Just as missions call for new accountability metrics, they also invite a break from top-down approaches that have sometimes characterized major government undertakings, including those from local governments. Instead, report author Mariana Mazzucato sees government’s role here as that of an orchestrator taking a light-touch approach that creates space for actors to come together under a unified purpose. 

What Motivates Localities to Use Performance Management?

Barrett & Greene

In a guest column, Bloomberg Center chief of staff Rudy de Leon Dinglas writes: “my research found that transparency is generally closely linked to the motivations found in engaging in performance management practices. . . This alignment between transparency and performance management practices is seen as an enhancement to the legitimacy and credibility of government operations.”

Federal Lead for Customer Experience Has Exit Interview

Government Executive

Departing OMB executive Amira Boland says: “We have to get better about having the accountability system be oriented toward the ends of: ‘What are the outcomes of our programs? Are our programs delivering on the mission that they were statutorily created to do?’”

Resource of the Week: Do We Really Know What Works?

David E.K. Hunter (238 pp.)

This final book by program evaluation pioneer David Hunteris intended for social program practitioners, evaluators, funders, consultants, and advocates.  It contrasts two major evaluation approaches: Randomized Controlled Trials (RCTs) and realist evaluations. It offers a series of concrete proposals for improving the quality of program evaluations and refining how to use program evaluation to help improve the lives and prospects of social programs’ intended beneficiaries.

Dustin Brown’s Impact at OMB Over the Past Two Decades: Episode 63

GovNavigators Show (Podcast – 30 min.)

Former OMB Executive Dustin Brown joins the GovNavigators Show to talk about his over two decades at OMB, serving for four different presidents (and developing the Fedeal Performance Framework), and why he left to help improve one of the most important federal agencies in the government – the Social Security Administration.

O’Malley’s Sprint to Use SecurityStat Save Social Security

Government Executive

SecurityStat takes issues at the heart of the agency’s customer service crisis; including call center performance, benefits processing, disability processing and appeals, and over- and underpayments; and requires agency officials to brief O’Malley—and one another—on their progress every two weeks.

Conquering Improper Payments

Government Executive

The solution, according to Doug Criscetello, lies in more precisely defining the various types of such payments and prioritizing those demanding immediate attention. Policy makers should rethink the entire improper payments challenge by dividing the topic into manageable components of 1) fraud; and 2) everything else.

A Toolset for Identifying and Managing Emerging Risk

Partnership for Public Service

Enterprise Risk Management and strategic foresight proactively identify emerging risks and elevate them to the necessary stakeholders for risk-informed strategic decision making. A panel of experts identified three key takeaways.

Nine Cities Recognized for Exceptional Use of Data

Results for America/Bloomberg Philanthropies– What Works Cities

Nine cities – 4 in the US and 5 in Latin America – were recognized by the Bloomberg Philanthropies What Works Cities Certification community for using data to make a difference in their communities. For example, the City of Dallas’ use of data includes disaggregated data to inform budget decisions that address inequities based on race and income, resulting in all 42 city departments contributing to the allocation of $40 million of equity investments and establishing 220 metrics that are tracked publicly.  

Resource of the Week: Public Management and Governance Review

Vienna University

This is a new peer-reviewed, open-source academic journal – Vol. 1, No. 1! It distinguishes itself by focusing on concrete management and policy challenges with an emphasis on solutions that lead to more accurate decision-making.

Give Congress the Data It Needs

The Hill

 Soon, the Supreme Court will decide a case that could severely limit the discretion Congress can give the executive branch in the policymaking process.The fallout from this decision could have a lasting impact on the administrative state and how Congress approaches policymaking. It also raises questions about the ability of Congress — which would be required to adopt a more comprehensive approach to its lawmaking process — to assess the performance of federal programs it is responsible for overseeing when our separation of powers keeps much of the relevant information about these programs within the executive branch.

Resource of the Week: The Sludge Daily

GovNavigators (aka Robert Shea)

A fun one-stop website of news and resources to satisfy the urges of even the most federally-focused government geek. . . . It’s not quite living up to its Daily name, but it is worth periodic visits for updates.