**[Introduction to Adaptive Management and the Interior Technical
Guide]{.underline}**

The Department of the Interior recently released "Adaptive Management:
The U.S. Department of the Interior Technical Guide." The Guide defines
adaptive management, identifies the conditions in which it is
appropriate, and outlines the process for implementing adaptive
management.

Natural resources management involves making decisions with uncertain
outcomes. A structured decision-making process, adaptive management
embraces uncertainty, enhances learning, engages stakeholders, increases
accountability, and promotes deliberative resource management. Active
learning is a key component of adaptive management, contributing to good
management through improved understanding. Adaptive management is useful
to both small-scale projects and large multi-stakeholder projects.
Several attributes make it appropriate for many resource management
decisions at Interior. Adaptive management:

-   Involves stakeholders at the outset, incorporating diverse
    viewpoints in hypotheses and models;

-   Promotes iterative and flexible decision-making within an objective,
    science-based framework;

-   Emphasizes monitoring and evaluation of the effects of management
    decisions; and

-   Recognizes the contribution of natural variability to ecological
    resilience and productivity.

**[SES/SL Role in Expanding the Use of Adaptive
Management]{.underline}**

The success of the Guide depends on achieving two objectives: (1)
familiarizing Interior employees with the concepts and applications
described in the Guide so adaptive management becomes a ready tool for
management of natural resources, and (2) ensuring that applications of
adaptive management are collaborative, rigorous, science-based, and that
they anticipate future adjustments to management.

The Senior Executive Service is vital to integrating adaptive management
into Interior decision-making. You are the best placed individuals in
Interior to ask these questions:

-   What natural resource management challenges, from broad planning
    processes to specific projects, would benefit from an adaptive
    management approach?

-   Who in your bureau or office would gain from learning more about
    adaptive management?

-   What would be the most effective means for integrating adaptive
    management into Departmental and bureau cultures?

**[Where to Find Additional Information]{.underline}**

-   **The Guide** is available at
    <http://www.doi.gov/initiatives/AdaptiveManagement/TechGuide.pdf>

-   **The AM website** provides information, contains electronic copies
    of the guide and other adaptive management resource materials,
    details case studies, and provides information about training
    opportunities: <http://www.doi.gov/initiatives/AdaptiveManagement>

-   **Training**

-   A 90-minute broadcast orientation to the Adaptive Management
    Technical Guide will be given on May 24 at 12:00 noon EDT. Details
    will be made available.

-   Another broadcast is planned for late August 2007 on the
    implementation of adaptive management. A third broadcast will
    utilize case studies to examine adaptive management applications in
    depth.

-   Bureau training courses on adaptive management are also being
    planned and made available.

**Adaptive Management Operational Steps**

***Set-up phase***

*Step 1 - Stakeholder involvement*

Ensure stakeholder commitment to adaptively manage the enterprise for
its duration.

*Step 2 - Objectives*

Identify clear, measurable, and agreed-upon management objectives to
guide decision making and evaluate management effectiveness over time.

*Step 3 - Management actions*

Identify a set of potential management actions for decision making.

*Step 4 - Models*

Identify models that characterize different ideas (hypotheses) about how
the system works.

*Step 5 - Monitoring plans*

Design and implement a monitoring plan to track resource status and
other key resource attributes.

***Iterative phase***

*Step 6 - Decision making*

Select management actions based on management objectives, resource
conditions, and enhanced understanding.

*Step 7 - Follow-up monitoring*

Use monitoring to track system responses to management actions.

*Step 8 - Assessment*

Improve understanding of resource dynamics by comparing predicted vs.
observed change in resource status.

*Step 9 - Iteration*

Cycle back to Step 6 and, less frequently, to Step 1*.*

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height="4.221527777777778in"}

> For decades, there has been concern about the ecological impacts of
> the operation of Glen Canyon
>
> Dam on downstream resources, particularly the riparian areas along the
> Colorado River in the Grand
>
> Canyon, Arizona. In recent years efforts have been made to evaluate
> and adapt management actions
>
> for resource protection through experiments that are monitored for
> their effects in the Grand Canyon.