The Public Manager: The New Bureaucrat articles from March 1995

The Public Manager: The New Bureaucrat archives from March 1995

The context of management reforms. (federal government agencies)
March 22, 1995... GPRA will strengthen Congress. Its success will depend upon the ability of the executive and legislature to cooperate in the public interest. My purpose is to put the Government Performance and Results Act of 1993 (GPRA) into a broad...

GPRA: mission, metrics, meaning, and marketing. (Government Performance and Results Act of 1993)
March 22, 1995... A results-oriented program can ultimately focus on creative and effective policy performance. The Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA), P. L. 103-62, was enacted on August 3, 1993 following a turbulent three-year journey through...

GPRA: early implementation. (Government Performance and Results Act of 1993)
March 22, 1995... Implementing GPRA will require political leadership, dedicated resources, training an d technical assistance for affected staff, and continuous guidance from OMB. The implementation of the Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA) is...

The achieving organization: federal managers face a great challenge but have an equally great opportunity to provide leadership.
March 22, 1995... The earth has shifted for federal managers, but most have not yet felt the tremors - the "Contract with America" notwithstanding. The Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA) of 1993 has the potential to create more revolutionary change in...

Coalition for Effective Change: an update.
March 22, 1995... The Coalition of 28 associations of federal managers and professionals has become an integral player in reinvention. The Coalition for Effective Change (CEC) has been busy in 1995, and the year promises to get even more hectic. Never has it...

Less middle management = more effective government. Or does it?
March 22, 1995... Only time to assess the long-term consequences of increasing span of control will reveal whether proponents or critics are correct. According to the National Performance Review (NPR), reducing the number of federal middle managers and...

USDA plans for improved field-level customer service. (Department of Agriculture)
March 22, 1995... A cornerstone of the plan to reorganize the US Department of Agriculture is the creation of field service centers where USDA customers receive "one-stop service." By consolidating field offices and sharing resources, USDA can provide better, more...

Restructuring in DOT. (Department of Transportation)
March 22, 1995... Last December 19, President Clinton announced a major restructuring of the way government delivers services to the American people. Sharing the platform with the president that day was the secretary of transportation, Federico Pena, who announced...

Building a distributed work platform: federal telecommuting plans.
March 22, 1995... For agencies to distribute work, the telecommuting infrastructure must expand significantly over the next several years. This article is the second in a series on the changing American workplace. In the Winter 1994-95 edition of The Public...

Clear air turbulence in the careerist/political appointee zone.
March 22, 1995... By changing the way we develop and utilize federal executives there is at least the potential for improving the way our government works at the federal level. One of the most often discussed aspects of the US federal government is the poor...

The limits of cultural diversity.
March 22, 1995... We do not yet know how to create "wholesomeness including diversity," but we owe it to the world, as well as ourselves, to keep trying. I'm engaged just now in an effort to think through the most intellectually interesting, and morally...

Teams make it happen: only through teams can we eliminate the hierarchy, bureaucracy, and waste-of-time oversight that prevails.
March 22, 1995... It is no secret that government workers are struggling to balance growing program demands with a diminishing workforce. Our individual-based systems for doing work and for distributing rewards rely on micro-direction and hierarchical oversight....

Teams don't make it happen; teamwork does. (response to article by Adam D. Silverman in this issue, p. 40)
March 22, 1995... Teams are not inherently more effective and productive than properly functioning organizational branches or divisions. All young professionals know the drill - you have been assigned to yet another ad-hoc team to address a "crucial" issue...

Giving with a twist. (Federal Employee Education and Assistance Fund)
March 22, 1995... FEEA's motto is "Federal Employees Helping Federal Employees," proof of the image of public employees as people who care. Public employees have a longstanding reputation for donating their time to worthy causes. In homeless shelters, humane...

Top ten ways to burn out as a bureaucrat.
March 22, 1995... Being a bureaucrat these days certainly has its risks and pleasures. Although the landscape changes with every administration, the pace seems to be accelerating. As we enter the information age, we become increasingly time urgent. There are...

The Rebirth of Federalism: Slouching Toward Washington.
March 22, 1995... There are very few scholars or practitioners today who have the breadth and the depth of knowledge of the intergovernmental system to write a book as comprehensive as this one. Walker has spent most of his professional career deeply involved in...

Thickening Government: Federal Hierarchy and the Diffusion of Accountability.
March 22, 1995... Why would anyone want to read a 217-page volume about the growth of layers of management in the federal government and on how increasing numbers of political appointees and senior executives sort themselves out in these layers? The reason lies at...

Introducing reengineering to government.
March 22, 1995... "We are determined to move from an industrial age government, from a government preoccupied with sustaining itself to a government clearly focused on serving the people." Vice President Al Gore May 24, 1993 The following primer was developed...

A primer on process reengineering.
March 22, 1995... A central premise of reengineering is that the goals are so ambitious that they can only be accomplished by completely rethinking and redesigning the way work is performed and the methods by which outputs are delivered. Reengineering, perhaps...

Importance of the interviewing process in the public sector.
March 22, 1995... A thoughtful approach to the hiring process decreases the number of times a position has to be filled - more productivity with fewer dollars. Public sector employees are protected from arbitrary dismissals and have various methods of appealing...