These and other GAO products have led to hearings and legislation, billions of dollars in taxpayer savings, and improvements to a wide range of government programs and services.

Gene L. Dodaro became the eighth Comptroller General of the United States and head of the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) on December 22, 2010, when he was confirmed by the United States Senate. He was nominated by President Obama in September of 2010 and had been serving as Acting Comptroller General since March of 2008.

Federal agencies now use dashboards both for internal organizational management and to disseminate performance measures for transparency and accountability.

Earlier this month, OMB Director Jacob Lew released a memorandum for the heads of all Federal Departments and Agencies, which focused on four areas for which all Federal Chief Information Officers (CIOs) have authority and “a lead role”: Governance, Commodity IT, Program Management, and Information Security.  The Memorandum further reinforced responsibilities of the Federal CIO Council to manage the Federal IT portfolio across agency boundaries.

Government leaders are deluged with thousands of streams of data about the performance of their agencies and programs. One approach the Obama administration has latched onto to make sense out of the deluge of data is the use of on-line “dashboards” of performance data that track the key performance metrics of various federal agencies and programs.  The administration has touted the benefits of dashboards as a way of organizing and filtering performance data so it makes sense to decision makers so they can understand and act on it.

James H. Svara is a professor of public affairs at Arizona State University and the director of the Center for Urban Innovation. He specializes in local government leadership, management, innovation, and ethics. He is a Fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration, a member of the board of the Alliance for Innovation, and an honorary member of ICMA. His book, co-edited with Douglas Watson, More Than Mayor or Manager: Campaigns to Change Form of Government in America’s Large Cities, was recently published by Georgetown University Press.

Based on these insights and trends, this forum presents seven management imperatives that government leaders and public managers must pursue in order to successfully manage in this new environment.

  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.

For the most part, the management section of the budget reflects a continued commitment to initiatives initially detailed in last year’s budget: “Building a government that works smarter, better, and more efficiently to deliver results for the American people is a cornerstone of the President’s Accountable Government Initiative and a key focus of this Administration.”

Cutting edge technology and innovation is more important today than ever before, as NASA develops missions of increasing complexity to understand the Earth, our solar system, and the universe. We spoke with Dr. Bobby Braun, Chief Technologist at NASA, who was a guest on The Business of Government Hour about NASA’s space technology program, its focus on research and development, forging disruptive innovation, and making a difference for the future. I share with you some of his insights from our conversation.