Improving IT Performance

The White House on Jan. 14 held a forum on modernizing government with more than 50 of the nation's top chief executive officers. As Wired Workplace noted last week, federal labor groups were also involved in the conversation, offering insight into how the government can streamline operations, improve budgeting for technology projects, and become a better employer.

Chief Performance Officer Jeffrey Zients on Tuesday highlighted some of the recommendations from last week's forum, and there are a few that pertain to the federal workforce that seem worth mentioning.

For example, forum participants flagged the need to improve customer service at agencies, and in order to do so, agencies must hold managers accountable for paying attention to customer service calls and feedback, create a culture of customer service within their workforce, and empower frontline workers to resolve customers' problems quickly.

Forum participants also recommended the government streamline IT operations, in part by dedicating and rewarding top performing staff to complex IT projects. For example, agencies should put their best performing employees on important projects and free them up from their day-to-day activities, allowing them to dedicate 100 percent of their time. At the same time, agencies should not isolate employees who are working on long-term IT projects.

Union leaders also noted the need to focus on the difficulty federal agencies face in funding long-term technology projects, in part because of the government's annual budget cycle, and the need to provide federal workers with the appropriate equipment, such as laptops, in order to work remotely on a regular basis or in times of emergency.

As federal IT workers, what is your response to the recommendations? Are they a step in the right direction for streamlining government operations and improving service to the taxpayers? Are there any reforms that were overlooked?