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Contracting
How Can Bid Protests be Reduced in Government Contracting?
Monday, June 11th, 2012 - 14:08
Monday, June 11, 2012 - 13:57
Government administrative processes often receive criticism for focusing on inputs and not outcomes. A specific example of this criticism has been registered by members of the acquisition community regarding source selection processes used for contracting that could be improved to reduce bid protests, the appellate process for contracting. Protests do not occur frequently, but when they do occur the costs are significant—and when sustained, they can impact the process for many subsequent contracts. Bid protests and source selection processes cont
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570 recommendations
Improving Government Contracting: Lessons from Bid Protests of Department of Defense Source Selections
Friday, June 8th, 2012 - 14:32
Government administrative processes often receive criticism for focusing on inputs and not outcomes. A specific example of this criticism has been registered by members of the acquisition community regarding source selection processes used for contracting that could be improved to reduce bid protests, the appellate process for contracting. Protests do not occur frequently, but when they do occur the costs are significant—and when sustained, they can impact the process for many subsequent contracts.
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IBM Center 2011 Call for Research Report Proposals
Sunday, September 11th, 2011 - 11:14
Since creation of the IBM Center for The Business of Government more than 13 years ago, it has been our goal to help public sector executives and managers address real-world problems by supporting leading researchers who produce empirical evidence to inform the debates about whether particular management approaches will improve government performance.
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JKamensky
Beth - We hold the copyright but we give authors the right to republish the material in other forums without restriction, as long as they credit the IBM Center for supporting their research. JOHN K.
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Seven Management Imperatives
Saturday, June 4th, 2011 - 14:36
Periodically the IBM Center staff steps back and reflects on the insights provided by its authors of more than 300 research reports and by some 300 senior government executives interviewed over the past 13 years. Through our research and interviews, we identified several broad societal trends that we believe are changing the game for successful leadership at all levels of government.
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Using Prizes as Innovation Engines
Tuesday, February 8th, 2011 - 10:46
Tuesday, February 8, 2011 - 09:42
As promised in an earlier blog post on this topic, the IBM Center now has a report, “Managing Innovation Prizes in Government,” by Luciano Kay, with the School of Public Policy at the Georgia Institute of Technology.
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OMB IT Strategy: What's Different This Time?
Wednesday, December 15th, 2010 - 16:50
Wednesday, December 15, 2010 - 15:46
As announced by OMB last Thursday and widely reported since then, the Obama Administration has issued an implementation strategy for IT reform over the next 18 months. Much attention has been focused on key elements of the plan, including using budget authority to change or stop major IT systems, incentives for modular development of technology, improved communications among stakeholders across government and with industry and the establishment of program management as a professi
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1874 recommendations
Improving IT Management – 25 Principles Unveiled
Tuesday, December 14th, 2010 - 12:43
Tuesday, December 14, 2010 - 11:40
Key principles include: reducing the number of data centers by at least 800 by 2015; adopting a “cloud first” program that requires agencies to determine three opportunities to move support to the cloud; developing career paths for government IT management; and reforming review and guidance bodies, like the IRB, CIO Council, and TechStat process. Procurement reform and contract vehicle changes are also components of the reform.
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Strategies for Supporting Frontline Collaboration: Lessons from Stewardship Contracting
Monday, November 22nd, 2010 - 15:23
The Obama administration’s Open Government initiative places a strong emphasis on increasing collaboration— among agencies as well as with citizens and other stakeholders— to achieve more effective program and mission results. Agencies have developed their required Open Government Plans, but many of these plans lack details on how to successfully conduct collaborative efforts, especially on the front lines of government.
Did Los Angeles spend $2 million per job?
Tuesday, October 12th, 2010 - 5:17
Thursday, October 7, 2010 - 08:03
The media went hog wild over two recent audits from the City of Los Angeles Controller’s office that dealt with stimulus act spending at two agencies, Transportation and Public Works.
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921 recommendations
Finally, a Name!
Tuesday, September 14th, 2010 - 14:59
Tuesday, September 14, 2010 - 14:52
The six initiatives were announced back in July with little fanfare, but today’s memo provides high level visibility and press that “review our approach to performance management, detail our strategies and key initiatives, and describe the early progress we have achieved.”
2 comments
John—
Thanks, as always, for your informative and timely summary of the Administration’s plans and progress. The Accountable Government Initiative is another step in what seems to be an important and well thought out management improvement program. In that spirit, a couple of questions on which I would be interested in your take:
Does the Initiative underplay the importance of collaboration and governance strategies? I do not want to go too far here since collaboration will clearly be critical to achieving many of the initiatives, but I was struck by the lack of a direct and explicit attention to what many consider to be the overwhelming public management issue—how to get organizations (federal agencies, levels of government, sectors) to work better across organizational boundaries. Much of the collaboration language in the memo seems to focus on sharing best practices, which is all very good, but seems to miss the essential point that to achieve any meaningful national outcome, organizations must form networks with other organizations and not just coordinate actions.
Is “accountability” the right brand? I am not convinced that at root the problems we face are the result of the failure to hold agencies and individuals accountable for what they do. Rather, the problem is a lack of tools, processes, resources and authorities. It seems that the accountability brand picks up only half of the mantra from the 1990s (make managers manage) and neglects the crucial other half (let managers manage). I recall Steve Kelman had an article a year couple of years back on the pitfalls of working management improvements from an accountability angle.
JKamensky
Thanks for your questions. Here's my take:
In your comment about the lack of any emphasis on interagency collaboration -- I agree. The memo is largely silent on this crucial point. Charitably, you could read "collaboration" into the sections about setting high priority goals, and appointing the goal leaders, but the Administration has not put down an ambitious marker on the importance of cross-agency collaboration as a strategy for achieving outcomes the American people care about.
And as to your question about branding the initiative as "accountability," every presidential memo, especially one like this, has two audiences -- the general public and government employees. That's why the Clinton Administration's reinventing government mantra was "works better" (something government employees cared about) and "costs less" (something the public cared about). President Obama's message touches on these: "open and responsive," "efficient and effective," and "cut waste and modernize" . . . but the overall heading does stress "accountability," which is something the public cares about but is not a rallying point for government employees. Public servants don't get out of bed and go to work so they can be "accountable" (well, other than the folks at the Government Accountability Office).
The Obama Administration has yet to find a way to broadly and personally connect with federal employees in a way that inspires them to make a difference in their own work place, for the people they serve. For example, the SAVE Award generates thousands of ideas, but is a top-down program that only recognizes and acts on a tiny fraction of these ideas. There needs to be a way to broadly engage -- even empower -- the workforce to innovate, cut red tape, and serve the public. Being more accountable or increasing productivity are not the kind of clarion calls to service to deliver results Americans care about.
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