IRMCO 2010

This week the General Services Administration (GSA) is hosting its 49th annual Interagency Resources Management Conference. An estimated 300 Chief Acquisition Officers, Chief Financial Officers, Chief Information Officers, Chief Human Capital Officers, Inspectors General, program managers and other senior executive leaders are attending. It is the most well known government-wide, government-only conference where leaders delve into emerging management issues and how they are being confronted. You can learn more about IRMCO at www.irmco.gov

This morning I moderated a panel "Expanding on the Management Agenda" with the four senior Office of Management and Budget officials who are leading the Obama Adminstration's management efforts:

• Vivek Kundra, Chief Information Officer and Administrator for E-Government and Technology,
• Danny Werfel, Controller, Office of Federal Financial Management,
• Dr. Shelley Metzenbaum, Associate Director for Performance and Personnel Management, and
• Daniel Gordon, Administrator, Office of Federal Procurement Policy

Together they addressed the 6 strategies that according to OMB's Jeff Zients "offer the greatest potential to improve performance"

1. Eliminate waste,
2. Drive top priorities,
3. Leverage purchasing scale,
4. Close the IT performance gap,
5. Open government to get results, and
6. Attract and motivate top talent.

Importantly, they did not dwell on each of the 6 strategies so much as explain how they are working together, in what I would describe as a pragmatic, problem-solving approach - looking to take the best of what works - in other governments, the private sector and recent federal efforts - to transform the way government works. It is apparent from their individual priorities as well as the way they describe how they are working together that the current OMB team is operating in a very coordinated and integrated fashion - where fixing problems and improving mission performance is no longer "someone else's job," but instead, everyone's job.