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MANAGING FOR RESULTS
Taxpayers in America don’t want us spending their money on something that’s not achieving results.
President George W. Bush
February 7, 2005

Through their implementation of the President’s Management Agenda, Federal agencies are adopting the management disciplines that help them focus on and deliver results. They are performing
better and working to spend taxpayers’ money better each year.

PERFORMING BETTER
Managing for results and achieving them requires three key elements:
• A clear definition of success for every program and activity;
• A clear action plan for achieving success; and
• A system of accountability that ensures that programs perform as promised.
The Administration is systematically assessing the performance of each Federal program with
these elements in mind. Since 2001, 80 percent of Federal programs have been assessed; the remaining 20 percent will be assessed this year.
Many programs are demonstrating improved results.
• The Department of Veterans Affairs is reducing the time veterans wait to get medical appointments. From 2001 to 2005, the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) substantially reduced
the number of new veteran enrollees unable to schedule an appointment for medical care from
a high of 176,000 to 22,494. VHA remains a leader in customer satisfaction with an inpatient
satisfaction score of 84 (out of 100) on the American Customer Satisfaction Index, slightly higher
than the score of 79 for comparable private sector services.
• The Employee Benefits Security Administration protects private employee pension, health, and
other benefits plans against fraud and abuse. The program has successfully closed civil cases
and referred criminal cases for prosecution while simultaneously improving customer satisfaction and obtaining over $1.6 billion in monetary benefits for employees. In 2005, the program
referred 45 percent of its criminal cases for prosecution and closed 76 percent of its civil cases.
This represents a 13-percent improvement for criminal cases and a 10-percent improvement in
civil cases since 2003. Over the same time period, the program’s customer satisfaction score
increased from 59 to 67 (out of 100).
• To reduce fatalities from automobile accidents, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration promoted greater seat belt use among high-risk groups such as younger drivers, rural
populations, pick-up truck occupants, 8-15 year-old passengers, occasional safety belt users, and
27

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MANAGING FOR RESULTS

motor vehicle occupants in States with secondary safety belt use laws. As a result, nationwide
seat belt use increased from 73 percent in 2001 to 82 percent in 2005, an all-time high.

Results at the Department of Labor
By using the disciplines of the President’s Management
Agenda, the Department of Labor has:
• Reduced improper unemployment insurance payments by $600 million through strong partnerships
with States;

Agencies are also identifying the
steps they will take to improve each
program’s performance. All programs,
regardless of whether they perform
poorly or well, should strive to perform
better each year.

The Federal Government should
be accountable to the public for its
• Conducted public-private competitions that are estiperformance. Along with the release of
mated to save nearly $19 million over the next five
the 2007 Budget, the Administration
years.
is launching a new website, Expect• Kept 96 percent of its major information technology
More.gov, to provide candid information
projects on time and within budget;
on how programs are performing and
• Provided more than 17 million visitors to GovBenwhat they are doing to improve. Exefits.gov with access to information about Federal
pectMore.gov will include information
benefits for which they may be eligible; and
about every Federal program—what its
• Reduced their vehicle fleet by 15 percent or
purpose is, how it performs, and what
691 vehicles.
it is doing to perform better. Visitors
to the site will be able to compare
programs’ performance and find out
more details.
By making program
performance information more accessible to the public, this site aims to explain how tax dollars are
spent and increase public demand for better performance from the Federal Government.
To improve the results the Executive Branch
achieves on behalf of the American people, the
Administration transmitted the Government
Reorganization and Program Performance
Improvement Act to the Congress in June
2005. The proposed Act authorizes the creation
of two types of commissions—Sunset and
Results—to regularly review the performance
of Government agencies and programs and
make recommendations for improvement. The
Administration will work with the Congress to
enact this important legislation that aims to
improve agency and program performance and
reduce unnecessary costs for taxpayers.

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29

IMPROVING HUMAN CAPITAL MANAGEMENT
To improve performance each year, Federal agencies must have the right people in the right jobs at
the right time, with good managers to help them grow professionally. Federal agencies are strengthening their performance appraisal systems, nurturing future leaders, ensuring their employees have
the necessary skills, and reducing how long it takes them to hire new staff.
• The Social Security Administration (SSA) successfully recruited over 2,200 employees in
mission-critical positions to support the Medicare Prescription Drug Improvement and
Modernization Act. Using a full range of hiring flexibilities, in total SSA successfully recruited
over 4,600 new hires in 2005 while reducing their hiring time and steadily improving the
retention rate of new hires.
• As a result of agency workforce planning efforts, the Department of the Treasury, Office of the
Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) identified a critical need to hire entry-level bank examiners
to fill projected senior bank examiner vacancies (approximately 25 percent of their workforce)
over the next several years. Employing an aggressive and innovative strategy of using experienced bank examiners as recruiters, the OCC has recruited 255 new entry-level examiners since
June 2003—of which 54 percent are women and 42 percent are minorities.
• The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) awards $36 billion in grants annually to States
for highway and bridge projects. To increase control of project costs and to address deficiencies in
financial oversight, the FHWA deployed a variety of strategies to ensure they will have people
with the right skills in place to provide critical financial oversight. The FHWA conducted a
skills gap analysis, targeted their recruitment program for those identified skills, refined their
entry level Professional Development Program, and implemented work-life flexibilities to reduce
attrition. As a result, over 35 percent of the financial management staff has been trained in the
Financial Management Improvement Program, and the staff attrition rate was reduced from 6.5
percent in 2004 to 5.2 percent in 2005.
• The Department of Agriculture (USDA) employed targeted recruitment strategies and used
hiring flexibilities to reduce vacancy rates and shorten hiring time in its 19 mission critical
occupations. As a result of these efforts, USDA increased from 12 to 18 the number of mission
critical occupations that now have less than three percent of their positions vacant.
The Government needs additional tools to ensure that it is using its workforce to its maximum
potential. Designed in the late 1940s for a largely bureaucratic organization, the current personnel
system is no longer appropriate for today’s mostly professional workforce that performs a wide range
of roles, at different proficiency levels. The current system does not sufficiently recognize employees
for their work or hold managers accountable for how well they manage employees. The Administration has developed draft legislation, the Working for America Act, to require that agencies better
manage, develop, and reward employees to serve the American people better. The reforms in the
legislation that have been developed with Chief Human Capital Officers and congressional staff, are
based on what the Government has learned implementing alternative pay systems over the past 25
years, and focus on what is good for Federal employees and American taxpayers. The Administration will work with the Congress to enact this important legislation to allow Federal employees to be
thought of and treated as the professional public servants they are, and to enable the Government
to make better use of its human capital resources to produce results for the American people.

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MANAGING FOR RESULTS

USING INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY MORE EFFECTIVELY
By investing in information technology (IT) strategically, agencies are better positioned to provide increased access to Federal Government information and to deliver superior service to citizens.
Additionally, agencies continue to work together and pool resources around Government-wide lines
of business and software acquisition initiatives that improve services to citizens.
• Regulations.gov allows citizens, businesses, and other organizations interested in regulatory
development to obtain free and easy access to Federal rulemaking information. The initiative
increases public access to the rulemaking process by providing the opportunity to contribute
views via the Internet. By the end of 2005, Regulations.gov enabled more than 1.6 million people
to use the Internet to search, view, and submit comments on proposed Federal rules.
• Since February 2004, through the Expanding Electronic Tax Products for Businesses initiative,
over 20,000 electronic Internal Revenue Service 1120 and 990 forms have been submitted. Additionally, through this initiative new business owners can apply for and immediately receive an
Employer Identification Number (EIN) online or by telephone. Before this function was available, people had to fill out and mail a paper version of the EIN form, waiting up to two weeks to
receive their EIN from the Internal Revenue Service.
• Grants.gov, a single, online portal for all Federal grant customers, makes it easier for potential
recipients not only to obtain information about Federal grants, but also to submit applications for
those grants. In 2005, 994 funding opportunities for discretionary Federal assistance, 44 percent
of all grant opportunities, were available for electronic application submission via Grants.gov.
Grants.gov currently provides Federal grant-seekers with access to over 1,000 Federal grant
programs.
• Since its inception in 2002, the E-Payroll initiative has reduced the costs for agencies to process
payroll services by consolidating 26 Federal payroll processing systems into four approved
E-Payroll providers. For example, by migrating to the Department of Defense’s Defense Finance
and Accounting Service in April 2005, the Department of Health and Human Services has
reduced its annual costs for payroll processing for its more than 65,000 employees from $259
to $90 per employee, a reduction of 65 percent.
• SmartBUY, the effort to leverage the Federal Government’s purchasing power and establish
Government-wide mandatory software acquisition vehicles, is helping the Government reduce
IT costs. An agreement for an Oracle database signed in April 2005 generated $174.5 million in
savings in the first five months.
The Federal Government spends almost $65 billion on IT each year. Federal agencies are working
to ensure this investment produces the expected results.
• Federal agencies are working to ensure that all IT systems are properly secured and data are
appropriately protected. Currently, 85 percent of Government systems have been certified as
secure, up from 77 percent last year.
• For 69 percent of IT projects, there is documentation that the benefits derived from the investments exceed the costs. While this represents an improvement from the 45 percent reported in
2002, more work is needed to ensure that IT projects demonstrate they are producing intended
results.
• Thirty-two percent of agencies have fully implemented processes to plan and monitor their IT
investments, and on average are achieving at least 90 percent of their costs, schedule, and performance goals. While this may represent an improvement from the past, it falls significantly

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31

short of acceptable performance levels. The Administration will devote particular attention over
the next year to improving the performance of Federal IT investments.

IMPROVING REAL PROPERTY MANAGEMENT
For the first time, the Federal Government has inventoried its real property and is making sure
it is put to the best use. The goal for the next few years is to liquidate $15 billion worth, or five
percent, of the properties that are no longer needed and put the money toward needed real property
investments.
• The General Services Administration (GSA) is increasing occupancy rates for buildings, improving the condition of buildings in its inventory, and disposing of unnecessary buildings. Between
2001 and 2005, occupancy rates increased in Federal owned-space from 90.6 percent to 93.2 percent. GSA was able to increase the occupancy rates by enhancing systems to match available
vacant space with tenant needs and by disposing of unnecessary buildings and reducing disposal
time. In 2005, GSA disposed of 27 surplus properties, exceeding its target of 15.
• The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is reducing vacant space, disposing of properties, and
working to reduce facility maintenance costs. Within the last year, vacant space at VA declined
15 percent. VA also disposed of or demolished 16 non-mission critical properties. VA expects
to realize additional cost savings through campus consolidations, building enhancements, and
demolitions.

INCREASING EFFICIENCY
The Administration is particularly focused on how much is spent to achieve the desired results.
All programs are developing and using efficiency measures to deliver more for the same amount of
money.
• By replacing manual inspection sites with fully automated weather and water supply data collection, the Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service reduced the
unit cost of producing water supply forecasts in the western United States from $1,011 to $890
per forecast in 2005. This savings allowed the agency to increase the number of forecasts from
11,281 to 15,356 and to provide more timely and accurate information on potential spring and
summer stream flows from melting snow packs.
• The Small Business Administration increased the number of loans guaranteed under its small
business guaranteed loan program by 95 percent while at the same time reducing the costs of
guaranteeing a loan from $3,545 in 2002 to $559 in 2005. It accomplished this by streamlining
the delivery system, introducing an Internet loan origination solution, and reducing the program’s credit subsidy cost to zero.
• By using technology such as the “e-designate” pilot—a paperless, electronic offender transition
process that allows the courts, U.S. Parole Commission, U.S. Marshals, Bureau of Prisons, and
Immigration and Customs Enforcement to move paperwork electronically between offices and
agencies—the Department of Justice’s Office of the Federal Detention Trustee has reduced the
amount of time offenders in Arizona spend in detention awaiting trial, sentencing, or assignment
to a Federal prison from 147 to 118 days. This results in savings of $28 million annually.
Agencies are also reducing costs through strategic sourcing, the collaborative and structured
process of critically analyzing an agency’s spending to leverage buying power within and among
agencies.

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MANAGING FOR RESULTS

• The Department of Homeland Security determined that it could achieve significant savings in
its acquisition of express mail and package delivery service and entered into a departmental
contract that will reduce costs for these services by 37 percent.
• Consolidation of contracts for cell phone service has saved the Internal Revenue Service nearly
20 percent (close to $1 million) in just the first year of its restructured contract.

ELIMINATING IMPROPER PAYMENTS
Agencies are improving the accuracy of Federal payments by ensuring that dollars are properly
accounted for and are going to the right person in the right amount.
• The Government-wide improper payments total dropped approximately $7.5 billion from last
year’s total of $45.1 billion. The 17-percent reduction was largely the result of advances in the
Medicare program. This program reduced improper payment dollars from $21.7 billion to $12.1
billion by strengthening documentation requirements to support payment claims. Payments
that were previously considered improper due to lack of proper justification now have appropriate documentation and are known to be accurately paid.
• By promoting best practices and simplifying the program, the Department of Agriculture has
reduced improper Food Stamp payments by $1.4 billion over four years since 2000, and reported
a 5.88 percent improper payment rate in June 2005, the lowest in the program’s history.
• In 2005, improper unemployment insurance payments were reduced by approximately $600
million. Implementation by the States of the National Directory of New Hires cross-match program over the next two years will allow them to ensure that people who have returned to work
no longer collect unemployment benefits, providing an additional tool to reduce improper payments.
• By expanding and strengthening its income verification program, the Department of Housing
and Urban Development reduced gross improper rental assistance payments by over 60 percent
since 2000—from $3.2 billion improper payments in 2000 to $1.3 billion in 2004.
• After conducting internal reviews of agency-wide commercial payments, the Department of
Defense recovered $414.9 million in incorrect payments from a possible recovery total of $469.5
million, a nearly 90-percent success rate.

USING COMPETITION TO REDUCE COSTS
Agencies are determining the most effective and efficient way to perform commercial tasks and
developing tools to track implementation and ensure results are realized. Competitive sourcing (i.e.,
public-private competition) motivates Federal employees to propose more efficient ways of performing their commercial-oriented activities, while making it possible for contractors to offer new ways of
performing these functions—all of which promotes taxpayer savings and better government management. Savings continue to increase as more competitions are completed and cost control is brought
to a larger number of Government tasks, including technology support, financial services, human
resources, and logistics.
Competitions completed in 2003, 2004, and 2005 will save taxpayers more than $5.2 billion. These
savings, most of which is expected over the next three to five years, are being generated through
operational consolidations, better use of technology, and other re-engineering efforts.

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33

• The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is dramatically improving the delivery of flight
services—such as in-flight weather briefings, flight planning and emergency assistance—to
general aviation pilots, and saving taxpayers $2.2 billion. These improvements are the result
of a public-private competition completed in 2004 that allowed FAA to select a contractor who
will replace antiquated systems and labor intensive processes with state-of-the art technology,
modern facilities, and high-quality customer service.
• The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) used public-private competition
to consolidate human resources, procurement, financial management, and information technology activities performed at 10 NASA centers to one shared services center. The elimination of
redundant systems and processes will improve efficiency and reduce agency costs by more than
$40 million over 10 years.
Most competitions have been won by Federal employees and have not required large scale reductions in the Federal workforce. For those who are affected by the competition process, agencies have
made concerted efforts to reassign employees to priority programs within the agency, employ them
with another Federal agency, or have them shifted to the payroll of the winning contractor.
The Administration continues to work with the Congress to remove legislative restrictions on competitive sourcing, such as those that require agencies to choose the cheapest providers. While cost
will always be a key consideration in every decision, agencies must be able to look at innovative solutions and enhanced services that can provide better value to the taxpayer. Elimination of these
legislative constraints will allow taxpayers to get the best results possible from competitive sourcing.

STRENGTHENING FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT
To ensure managers have the current and accurate financial information they need to make timely
and well-informed decisions, we are managing our finances with more discipline, to a degree that
was considered unattainable several years ago.
• 2005 was the first year that all 24 major agencies subject to the Chief Financial Officer (CFO)
Act submitted their Performance and Accountability Reports by November 15th, only 45 days
after the end of the year. This is a significant improvement from the five months it took agencies
to submit these same reports in 2001.
• Nineteen of the 24 CFO Act agencies received unqualified audit opinions for 2005, an increase
of two from 2001.
• Improvements in Federal financial management practices have increased the reliability of data,
as shown in the decrease in auditor-reported material weaknesses, from 57 in 2001 to 48 in 2005.
The Federal Government, as one of the world’s largest lenders, will work to improve how it manages its credit programs. At the end of last year, the Government had $247 billion in direct loans outstanding, and over $1.5 trillion in loan guarantees; administrative costs for the five largest agencies’
programs total over $1 billion per year. Through the new Improved Credit Management initiative,
agencies will strengthen the way they award and service loans, manage their portfolios, and collect
their debt. This initiative will be supported by the Federal Credit Council, consisting of representatives from the participating agencies and the Office of Management and Budget. The Council will
work to find ways to lend, or guarantee private loans, at the lowest risk and cost to the taxpayer,
while still achieving program goals. Anticipated results of this initiative are savings on the nearly
$70 billion delinquent debt portfolio, improved efficiency, and lower cost of doing business.

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MANAGING FOR RESULTS

MANAGEMENT SCORECARDS
With the help of the President’s Management Agenda, agencies have become more disciplined and
results-oriented about the way they manage their programs, people, costs, and investments. For
each management area, agencies identify clear goals and timeframes. They develop plans, identify
responsible individuals, and apply resources to achieve these goals. An agency earns green status
when it has successfully achieved all the desired disciplines in the initiative.
All agencies have shown steady improvement in achieving the overall goals of the President’s Management Agenda. While 85 percent of the status scores were red on the first scorecard, today more
than 75 percent of status scores are green or yellow.

Explanation of Status Scores
Green—Agency meets all the Standards for Success.
Yellow—Agency has achieved intermediate levels of performance in all the criteria.
Red—Agency has any one of a number of serious flaws.

Explanation of Progress Scores
Green—Implementation is proceeding according to plans agreed upon with agencies.
Yellow—Slippage in implementation schedule, quality of deliverables, or other issues requiring adjustment
by agency in order to achieve initiative on a timely basis.
Red—Initiative is in serious jeopardy. It is unlikely to realize objectives absent significant management
intervention.

The most recent scorecard as of December 31, 2005, follows. Quarterly scorecards are also available
at www.results.gov. A discussion of each agency’s implementation of the President’s Management
Agenda is included in the relevant agency chapter of this volume.

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35

Executive Branch Management Scorecard
Current Status as of
December 31, 2005
Human
Capital

Competitive
Sourcing

Financial
Perf.

E-Gov

Progress in Implementing President’s
Management Agenda
Budget/
Perf.
Integration

Agriculture
Commerce
Defense
Education
Energy
EPA
HHS
DHS
HUD
Interior
Justice
Labor
State
DOT
Treasury
VA
AID
Corps
GSA
NASA
NSF
OMB
OPM
SBA
Smithsonian
SSA
Arrows indicate change in status since evaluation on September 30, 2005.
Double arrows indicate that the status rating was either upgraded from red to green
or downgraded from green to red.

Human
Capital

ComFinancial
petitive
Perf.
Sourcing

E-Gov

Budget/
Perf.
Integration

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MANAGING FOR RESULTS

Program Initiative Scorecard
Initiative
Faith-Based and Community Initiative:
Agriculture......................................................................
Commerce .....................................................................
Education .......................................................................
HHS..................................................................................
HUD .................................................................................
Justice .............................................................................
Labor................................................................................
VA .....................................................................................
AID....................................................................................
SBA ..................................................................................
Real Property Asset Management:
Agriculture......................................................................
Defense ..........................................................................
Energy .............................................................................
HHS..................................................................................
DHS..................................................................................
Interior .............................................................................
Justice .............................................................................
Labor................................................................................
State.................................................................................
DOT ..................................................................................
VA .....................................................................................
AID....................................................................................
Corps ...............................................................................
GSA..................................................................................
NASA ...............................................................................

Status

Progress

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37

Program Initiative Scorecard—Continued
Initiative
Eliminating Improper Payments:
Agriculture......................................................................
Defense ..........................................................................
Education .......................................................................
HHS..................................................................................
HUD .................................................................................
DHS..................................................................................
Labor................................................................................
DOT ..................................................................................
Treasury ..........................................................................
VA .....................................................................................
EPA ...................................................................................
NSF ..................................................................................
OPM .................................................................................
SBA ..................................................................................
SSA ..................................................................................
Privatization of Military Housing .................................
R&D Investment Criteria ...............................................
Housing and Urban Development Management
and Performance .........................................................
Broadening Health Insurance Coverage through
State Initiatives .............................................................
A “Right-Sized” Overseas Presence.........................
Coordination of VA and DOD Programs and
Systems ..........................................................................

Status

Progress