Improving Government Performance
by Anna Lafferre
Improving government performance. It’s the mission of The Performance Institute, the goal of our new series of events called Innovations in Government and the overall objective of the Obama Administration.
Like many things, improving government performance is easier said than done. In order for the federal government to perform well as a whole, each agency must perform well individually. For that to happen, each agency leader must consider performance an important goal and so on down the line.
Recently, Senator Daniel Akaka (D-HI) introduced legislation that would require agencies to provide all managers with regular, ongoing training on management skills, employee rights and general leadership. The goal of the Federal Supervisor Training Act of 2009 (S.674) is to improve accountability and leadership in the federal supervisor ranks. The Act has three major requirements: new supervisors must receive training in the initial 12 months on the job, with mandatory retraining every three years on how to work with employees to develop performance expectations; mentoring for new supervisors and training on how to mentor employees; and training on the laws governing and the procedures for enforcing whistleblower, collective bargaining and anti-discrimination rights. The bill would also set new performance expectations for managers. Based on the results of their own evaluations, managers would receive training in areas identified for improvement.
“The performance of our federal employees and managers is essential to the success of our government. We will do well to invest in them through training and professional development,” said Senator Akaka, Chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on Oversight of Government Management, the Federal Workforce and the District of Columbia.
The Institute is a proud supporter of the Federal Supervisor Training Act and hopes that government will continue to support the training of its managers to deliver superior services to taxpayers.
July 16th, 2009 at 8:14 am
Is there funding available to help small county governments put a performance management system into practice?