b'Conversations with LeadersEvaluating and Improving the Performance ofGovernment: A Conversation with Gene L. Dodaro, Comptroller General, U.S. GovernmentAccountability Office By Michael J. KeeganFor over 100 years, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) has helped Congress to improve the performance of government, ensure transparency, and save federal funds. Today, GAOs work spans all federal programs and spendingfrom agriculture to space programs, banking regulation to public health, and cybersecurity to international aid. It also does financial audits of the U.S. government and assessments of its fiscal outlook. The mission of GAO continues to evolve from establishing its science and technology work, to growing its cybersecurity expertise, to developing quick-read products. GAO seeks to anticipate and respond to changing congressional needs and emerging issues, challenges, and opportunities laying the foundation for the next 100 years. GAO performs a range of oversight, insight, and foresight-related work, explains Gene L. Dodaro, Comptroller General of the United States and head of the U.S. Government Accountability Office, to support the Congress in meeting its constitutional responsibilities and to help improve the performance and accountability of the federal government fordebt. Until the end of World War II, GAO primarily checked the benefit of the American people.the legality and adequacy of government expenditures. Comptroller General Dodaro joined me on The BusinessAfter World War II, as government responsibilities and of Government Hour to discuss the evolving mission ofprograms grew specifically with the Depression, the War GAO, how GAO is innovating the way it conducts itson Poverty, and the Great Society programs. So did our oversight mission, and what the future holds for the agency.responsibilities. The focus of our work shifted from not The following is an edited excerpt of our discussion,only doing financial management reviews but also doing complemented with updated and additional research. performance audits to make sure that federal programs were operating efficiently and effectively. On the Evolving Mission of the Government AccountabilityOffice During the last twenty years, weve strived to improve Last year, GAO marked its 100th anniversary. The organizationaccountability by alerting policymakers and the public to was established following World War I with the passage of theemerging problems throughout government. Today, GAO is a Budget and Accounting Act of 1921 when Congress realizedmultidisciplinary organization equipped to handle Congresss the need to control growing government expenditures andtoughest audit and evaluation assignments. We evaluate 16 www.businessofgovernment.org The Business of Government'