Building the Enterprise - Booz Allen Hamilton

“The portfolio approach willilluminate the strengthsand weaknesses of existingprograms and identifyduplication as well as gaps.achieve it, determine their effectiveness,and be empowered to recommendchanges to the PMC, OMB andthe White House (see Strategy 3).Those leaders, in turn, must be willingto back the integration of programsand help in overcoming institutionaland jurisdictional barriersand other vested interests to furtherthe common mission objectives.Here’s an example of an enterprisegoal and its accompanyingprogram portfolio, drawn from theGAO’s March 2013 list of duplicativeand overlapping programs. Thegoal—reducing the scourge of illegaldrugs—is supported by a host offederal drug abuse prevention andtreatment programs fragmentedacross 15 federal agencies. Of the 76programs, 59 showed evidence ofoverlap. Even more telling is the lackSTRATEGY 3DESIGNATE AND EMPOWERENTERPRISE GOAL LEADERS”of integration and alignment. 4Drug prevention and treatmentare supposed to be coordinated bythe Office of National Drug ControlPolicy (ONDCP) and could serve asa model of the enterprise approach.But the GAO observed that ONDCPhas not conducted a systematic assessmentof prevention and treatmentprograms to determine theextent to which they overlap andwhere opportunities exist to pursuecoordination strategies to more efficientlyuse limited resources. Thus,while a portfolio-based approach isnecessary to executing the enterpriseperformance plan, it is not sufficient.It also takes leadership. •4 Government Accountability Office, Officeof National Drug Control Policy: Office CouldBetter Identify Opportunities to Increase ProgramCoordination, March 2013.Performance plans and portfoliosare important tools to define enterpriseobjectives, but it is strongleadership that will truly move theenterprise. Successful execution ofan enterprise performance plan dependson the designation of experiencedsenior officials to serve asenterprise goal leaders. As a formerCabinet member told us, “There area lot of great plans out there, but ifyou don’t have the right people toimplement them, they’re not goingto get done.”Executive leadership is crucialand, with rare exception, it mustbe focused and full time. The administration’srecent effort to betterintegrate the various agencies overseeingthe export of sensitive technologiesprovides an object lesson inthis regard. Despite an initial pushfrom several Cabinet secretaries andcommitment from the White House,the effort has floundered. Whileinitial steps were taken to improveoversight and streamline the interagencyprocess, the status quo remainsfirmly in place, and the systemis still plagued by poor coordinationand inefficiencies. The GAO concludedthat the agencies involveddid not work collectively in a unifiedway, and it faulted the Obamaadministration for not assigning responsibilityto one agency or leaderfor addressing the challenges of theentire portfolio of export controlprograms.Enterprise goal leaders musthave the skills and savvy—as wellas the gravitas—to lead multiagencyinitiatives or missions andcoordinate interagency teams. Ourrecommendation builds upon thecurrent GPRAMA construct. Underthat framework, the president hasdesignated goal leaders for each ofthe cross-agency priority goals, andthose goal leaders are responsiblefor establishing governance councilsand reporting on progress. However,we would go further, providinggoal leaders with sufficient bureaucraticmuscle over their programportfolios.Specifically, enterprise goalleaders must be expected and encouragedto take a holistic view oftheir portfolios, independently assessthe portfolio’s constituent programsand provide hard-hitting,honest-broker recommendationsthrough the PMC to OMB and, insome cases, to the president onwhich programs should be contin-12 PARTNERSHIP FOR PUBLIC SERVICE | BOOZ ALLEN HAMILTON