Agencies are making effort and making progress in instilling a culture of performance under the GPRA Modernization Act of 2010, those involved give their agencies an average grade of C and an eighth of them assigned failing grades, in response to a study sponsored by the Partnership for Public Service.
The study, done with an outside consulting firm, said another point of concern is that only slightly less than half of respondents indicated that that top leadership uses performance-driven data to a great or a very great extent, indicating that the leaders “are making decisions without considering the analytical work that performance staff are leading.”
It said that agencies need to:
Connect program activities to agency priorities through creating clear priority goals that are clearly communicated, developing simpler strategic planning documents and soliciting employee input and suggestions.
Get analytical talent needed by recruiting employees with experience in communications, team-building or graphic design and train them in not only data analysis, but also how to clearly present and communicate insights from the analysis.
Build meaningful relationships between headquarters and subcomponents and bring together performance and program staff who serve diverse roles in the organization to learn and work together.
Move from data to information by reaching out to other organizations that collect data that could inform or complement the information currently available to agency staff.
Demonstrate return on investment.
