Couple of articles below from Paul Light on the need for bureaucratic reform. Could not agree more with the statement attributed to Al Gore that “federal employees are not the problem in poor performance. It is the bureaucracy in which they are trapped.”

In my federal career, I’ve been involved in numerous change management initiative undertaken by new administrations and have yet to see any significant sustained and systemic improvement regarding reforms within the bureaucracy.  It’s not that we don’t have the solutions, its that we lack the leadership within the bureaucracy with support by Congress and the American People to lead the needed change. For example, the Baldrige criteria for performance excellence is a proven approach that provides a systemic method for continually improving and assessing performance. Results in applying the criteria is assessed on a scale from zero to 1,000 points.  I would estimate that a typical bureaucratic system would be consistently assessed every year in the 250-300 point range which may equate to a cost of poor quality at approximately 20% of budget.  Delegating authority to Senior Executive Service (SeS) employees to apply the Baldrige framework as the method for continually improving performance should be part of any major change instigative.

A bureaucracy is a system, the system determines the majority (94-98%) of the results, management owns the system.  Successfully changing a system requires a basic knowledge on the interrelationships  between all the stakeholders, systems, variability and knowledge. These components are an integral part of the Baldrige criteria.  Variability, e.g., knowing the distinction between common and special cause variation, stable and unstable systems, and the two types of mistakes, is the most critical of the components. 

W. Edwards Deming, whose work with the Japanese was considered one  the best calls in business history by Fortune magazine, remarked that if he was to reduce his message to management to just a few words, it all had to do with reducing variation. Unfortunately, this simple but powerful concept is relatively unknown in the U.S. culture as is evidenced by the troubles of the Detroit Big 3.

I’m always optimistic when a new administration takes over but the odds are usually with the status quo. If you always do what you always did, on average, you will usually get what you always got.  Let’s hope this time is different.

Fast Track to Efficiency, New York Times, By Paul C. Light, November 11, 2008

BARACK OBAMA is about to inherit a deeply dysfunctional government: the appointment process is nasty, brutish and not at all short; departments are clogged with red tape and reporting chains to nowhere; the civil service system fails at nearly every task it undertakes; and contractors roam freely under the loosest oversight. To carry out the large-scale bureaucratic reform that is badly needed, Mr. Obama should revitalize the president’s fast-track authority to get reorganization plans through Congress.

Obama Has A Chance To Reverse Long Erosion Of The Federal Service, (Washington Post)…Paul C. Light, Nov 19, 2008. …The past eight years have been a horror to many federal employees. The Bush administration has rarely missed an opportunity to criticize, cut and meddle, and it dismissed the notion that federal employees need more freedom to innovate and learn.

As former vice president Al Gore rightly argued, federal employees are not the problem in poor performance. It is the bureaucracy in which they are trapped.

The Bush administration, however, decided that the best way to reform government was to outsource it. From 2001 to 2005, civilian employment remained at 1.8 million, more or less, while the estimated number of contractor jobs surged from 4.4 million to 7.6 million.

Paul C. Light is a professor at New York University’s Robert F. Wagner School of Public Service and author of “A Government Ill Executed.” He is writing an occasional column on the transition for The Washington Post.