Performance and

Accountability Report

Fiscal Year 2018

SERVING CONGRESS AND THE NATION
Source: Comstock. | GAO-19-1SP

SERVING THE CONGRESS

M i s s i o n 

GAO exists to support the Congress in meeting its 

constitutional responsibilities and to help improve the 

performance and ensure the accountability of the federal 

government for the benefit of the American people.

Treated Fairly

Valued

Respected

Integrity

Reliability

Accountability

Core Values

MISSION VALUES: PEOPLE VALUES:

Accountability 

Enhance the economy, efficiency, 

effectiveness, and credibility of 

the federal government

Integrity 

Conduct professional, objective, 

fact-based, non-partisan, nonideological, fair, and balanced work

Reliability 

Produce timely, accurate, useful, 

clear, and candid products

Valued

Seek out and appreciate

each person’s perspectives

Respected

Treat everyone with dignity

Treated Fairly

Foster a work environment that 

provides opportunities for all

Source: GAO. | www.gao.gov

S c o p e o f Wo r k 

GAO performs a range of oversight-, insight-, and 

foresight-related engagements, a vast majority of which 

are conducted in response to congressional mandates or 

requests. GAO’s engagements include evaluations of federal 

programs and performance, financial and management 

audits, policy analyses, legal opinions, bid protest 

adjudications, and investigations.
Did you know?

In fiscal year 2018: 

—The Congress used GAO’s work extensively 

to identify legislative solutions to emerging 

problems, achieve cost savings, and enhance 

efficiencies in federal agencies and programs. 

—GAO’s work yielded a record $75.1 billion in 

financial benefits—a return of about $124 for 

every dollar invested in GAO.

—GAO also identified 1,294 other benefits—those 

that cannot be measured in dollars, but led to 

program and operational improvements across 

the government. 

—GAO reported on 35 areas designated as 

high risk due to their vulnerabilities to fraud, 

waste, abuse, and mismanagement or because 

they face economy, efficiency, or effectiveness 

challenges. This work resulted in 166 reports, 49 

testimonies, $46.8 billion in financial benefits, 

and 526 other benefits.

—GAO received requests for work from 90 

percent of the standing committees of the 

Congress and 43 percent of their subcommittees.

—Senior GAO officials were asked to testify 98 

times on a wide range of issues that touched 

virtually all major federal agencies.

—GAO also remained an employer of choice. 

In December 2017, the Partnership for Public 

Service ranked GAO as second among mid-size 

federal agencies as one of the best places to 

work in the federal government, and first for its 

diversity efforts. 

GAO’s Fiscal Year 2018 Snapshot 

A Fiscal Year 2018 Performance and Financial 

Snapshot for the American Taxpayer

Accountability  Integrity  Reliability

GAO-19-1SP 2018 Performance and Accountability Report i

Government Accountability Office

Who We Are: GAO is an independent, 

nonpartisan professional services agency 

in the legislative branch of the federal 

government. It was created in 1921 to 

investigate how federal dollars are spent. 

What We Do: Commonly known as the 

investigative arm of the Congress or the 

“congressional watchdog,” we examine how 

taxpayer dollars are spent and develop 

nonpartisan, objective, and reliable 

information to advise lawmakers and agency 

heads on ways to make government work 

better.

Our Results: Since 2002, GAO’s work has 

resulted in over $895 billion in financial 

benefits and more than 21,600 program and 

operational benefits that helped change laws, 

improved public safety and other services, 

and promoted better management throughout 

the government. 
ii 2018 Performance and Accountability Report GAO-19-1SP

GAO’s Fiscal Year 2018 Snapshot 

Figure 4: Percentage of New Products with 

Recommendations

Percentage

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Actual Target Actual

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2018

63% 63% 64% 60%

66% 68% 64%

Figure 5: Testimonies

0

50

100

150

2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2018

Number

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Actual Target Actual

120 114 119

109

99 98

129

Figure 6: Timeliness

Percentage of products on time

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Actual Target Actual

90% 94% 95% 98% 94% 96% 97%

0

20

40

60

80

100

2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2018

Figure 1: Financial Benefits GAO Recorded

Dollars in billions

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Actual Target Actual

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2018

$51.5 $50.0

$63.4

$74.7 $73.9 $75.1

$54.4

Figure 2: Other Benefits

0

300

600

900

1200

1500

2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2018

Number

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Actual Target Actual

1,200

1,314 1,288 1,234 1,286 1,280 1,294

Figure 3: Percentage of Past 

Recommendations Implemented

Four-year implementation rate

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Actual Target Actual

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2018

79% 80%

73% 78% 79% 76% 77%

Note: See Part V for detailed information on data sources that we use to assess each of these measures, as well as the steps 

we take to verify and validate the data.
GAO-19-1SP 2018 Performance and Accountability Report iii

GAO’s Fiscal Year 2018 Snapshot 

Figure 7: GAO Reporting Summary

Fiscal 

Year 

2018

Fiscal 

Year 

2017

Clean opinion on financial statements Yes Yes

Clean opinion on internal control over 

financial reporting Yes Yes

Timely and accurate GTAS reporting Yes Yes

Material weaknesses in internal control None None

Significant internal control deficiencies None None

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Table 1: GAO’s Financial Summary (Dollars in millions) 

Fiscal Year 2018 Fiscal Year 2017

Total Assets $160.9 $106.1

Total Liabilities $81.7 $78.7

Total Net Position $79.2 $27.4

Net Cost of Operations by Goal

Goal 1: Well-being / Financial Security of American People $222.8 $215.5

Goal 2: Changing Security Threats / Challenges of Global 

Interdependence 151.8 148.4

Goal 3: Help Transform the Federal Government to Address 

National Challenges 144.1 144.2

Goal 4: Maximize the Value of GAO 14.9 15.7

Other Costs in Support of the Congress 49.4 45.7

Reimbursable services not attributable to above cost 

categories (14.0) (10.3)

Total Net Cost of Operations $569.0 $559.2

Actual full-time equivalents (FTE) 3,015 2,994

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Figure 8: Use of Fiscal Year 2018 Funds by 

Category 

Percentage of total costs

Facilities

Salaries 

and benefits

5.2%

84.5%

IT services and 

equipment 6.0%

Contract services 

(non-IT)

Other 2.8%

1.5%

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

More information on GAO’s performance is included in Part I and Part II of this report. Detailed 

information on GAO’s financials are included in Part III. Part V provides details on how we set and 

calculate our performance measures. 
iv 2018 Performance and Accountability Report GAO-19-1SP

GAO’s Fiscal Year 2018 Snapshot

areas such as artificial intelligence, medical 

care, disease prevention, and cybersecurity. 

Our work will also include technology readiness 

assessments of complex acquisitions, such as the 

Columbia class ballistic missile submarine and a 

modernized nuclear arsenal. 

Assisting the Congress in Overseeing and 

Transforming the Department of Defense 

(DOD): DOD faces significant challenges in 

responding to a complex and rapidly evolving 

national security environment. Our work will 

include five key challenges and DOD’s efforts 

to (1) rebalance forces, rebuild readiness, and 

modernize for the future; (2) address cyber 

threats and build cyber capabilities; (3) control 

program costs; (4) address human capital 

management challenges, and (5) improve business 

operations.

Assisting the Congress in Addressing Health 

Care Challenges: Americans’ health needs 

are growing in volume and complexity and 

increasing the challenge of federal oversight. 

Our work will include the following areas on 

our High Risk List: (1) the Indian Health Service, 

(2) Medicare, (3) Medicaid, (4) the Food and Drug 

Administration, and (5) Veterans Health Care. We 

will also continue to examine the cost of health 

care and the federal response to the nation’s 

opioid epidemic. 

In 2019 and beyond, GAO looks forward to 

assisting the Congress with addressing the 

nation’s most important challenges.

What’s Next? Future Challenges 

and Priorities

Source: Corbis. | GAO-19-1SP

Absent policy changes, the federal government is 

on an unsustainable long-term fiscal path caused 

by a structural imbalance between revenue and 

spending. As such, decisions in the near term to 

enhance economic growth and address national 

priorities need to be accompanied by a long-term 

fiscal plan to address this imbalance.

We will continue to provide the Congress with 

near-term options for improving the nation’s 

fiscal condition and opportunities to help bring 

revenue more in line with spending over the long 

term. Given congressional interest, we also plan 

to focus our work on several pressing national 

issues. 

Cyber-based Threats to the Nation’s Systems 

and Critical Infrastructure: The cyberattacks 

suffered by the Office of Personnel Management, 

Equifax, and others in recent years highlight 

the criticality of effective cybersecurity. 

Our work will include (1) the security of 

federal information systems and cyber critical 

infrastructure; (2) key agency capabilities for 

preventing and addressing security incidents; 

(3) the cybersecurity of specific sectors, such as 

the electricity grid; and (4) efforts to strengthen 

the nation’s consumer privacy framework to 

reflect the increasing market for personal 

information. 

Impact of Scientific and Technological 

Advances: Rapid advances in science and 

technology hold the potential to improve our 

nation’s well-being through advancements in 
GAO-19-1SP Contents v

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published product may be reproduced and distributed in its entirety without further permission from GAO. 

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holder may be necessary if you wish to reproduce this material separately.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Source: Brand X Pictures. | GAO-19-1SP

A Fiscal Year 2018 Performance and Financial 

Snapshot for the American Taxpayer .............. i

Contents ....................................................v

How to Use This Report ................................vi

Introduction................................................1

From the Comptroller General ........................2

Management Assurance Statements ..................7

About GAO................................................9

Mission ............................................... 10

Core Values.......................................... 10

Strategic Goals ..................................... 10

Organizational Structure .......................... 10

Strategic Planning and Foresight ................ 13

Strategies for Achieving Our Goals .............. 16

How We Measure Our Performance.............. 18

Setting Performance Targets ..................... 19

Part I: Management’s Discussion and Analysis .... 21

Assisting the Congress and Benefiting the Nation 

During Challenging Times ......................... 21

Overall Performance Toward Our Goals......... 22

Other Ways GAO Served the Congress and the 

American People.................................. 41

Strategic Partnerships ............................ 49

Managing Our Resources........................... 50

Management Challenges........................... 56

Part II: Performance Information.................... 61

Performance Information by Strategic Goal ...... 61

Strategic Goal 1: Address Current and 

Emerging Challenges to the Well-being 

and Financial Security of the American 

People.............................................. 62

Financial Benefits ........................... 64

Other Benefits................................ 64

Testimonies................................... 65

Strategic Goal 2: Respond to Changing 

Security Threats and the Challenges of 

Global Interdependence......................... 69

Financial Benefits ........................... 71

Other Benefits................................ 71

Testimonies................................... 71

Strategic Goal 3: Help Transform the 

Federal Government to Address National 

Challenges ......................................... 75

Financial Benefits ........................... 77

Other Benefits................................ 77

Testimonies................................... 78

Strategic Goal 4: Maximize the Value of 

GAO by Enabling Quality, Timely Service 

to the Congress and by Being a Leading 

Practices Federal Agency........................ 81

Part III: Financial Information ........................ 86

From the Chief Financial Officer .................... 86

Audit Advisory Committee’s Report ................ 89

Independent Auditor’s Report....................... 90

Purpose of Each Financial Statement............... 95

Notes to Financial Statements......................100

Required Supplementary Information ............. 111

Part IV: Inspector General’s View of GAO’s 

Management Challenges ........................... 113

Inspector General’s Statement .................... 114

Part V: Appendixes .................................... 115

Appendix I: Abbreviations .......................... 116

Appendix II: Data Quality............................ 119

Verifying and Validating Performance Data ... 119

Image Sources ..........................................130

Providing Comments on This Report............... 130

Obtaining Copies of GAO Documents .............. 130

Connect with GAO .....................................130
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

How to Use This Report

This report describes for the Congress and the American taxpayer the U.S. 

Government Accountability Office’s performance measures, results, and accountability 

processes for fiscal year 2018 (October 1, 2017 through September 30, 2018). In 

assessing our performance, we compared actual results against targets and goals 

that were set in our annual performance plan and performance budget and were 

developed to help carry out our strategic plan. Our complete set of strategic planning 

and performance and accountability reports is available on our website at 

https://www.gao.gov/about/performanceaccountabilityreport/overview.

This report has an introduction, four parts, 

and supplementary appendixes as follows:

Introduction

This section includes the letter from the 

Comptroller General and a statement 

attesting to the completeness and 

reliability of the performance and financial 

data in this report and the effectiveness 

of our internal control over financial 

reporting. This section also includes 

a summary discussion of our mission, 

strategic planning process, organizational 

structure, strategies we use to achieve 

our goals, and process for assessing our 

performance. 

Management’s Discussion and 

Analysis

This section discusses our agency-wide 

performance results and use of resources 

in fiscal year 2018. It also includes 

information on our internal controls and 

the management challenges and external 

factors that affect our performance. 

Performance Information

This section includes details on our 

performance results by strategic goal 

in fiscal year 2018 and the targets we 

are aiming for in fiscal year 2019. It also 

includes a summary of our program 

evaluation for fiscal year 2018. 

Financial Information

This section includes details on our 

finances in fiscal year 2018, including 

a letter from our Chief Financial 

Officer, audited financial statements 

and notes, and the reports from our 

external auditor and Audit Advisory 

Committee. This section also includes 

an explanation of the information each 

of our financial statements conveys. 

Inspector General’s View 

of GAO’s Management 

Challenges

This section includes our Inspector 

General’s perspective of our agency’s 

management challenges. 

Appendixes

This section provides the report’s 

abbreviations and describes how we 

ensure the completeness and reliability 

of the data for each of our performance 

measures.

vi How to Use This Report GAO-19-1SP
Introduction 

Source: Comstock (columns), GAO (The Capitol). | GAO-19-1SP

SERVING CONGRESS AND THE NATION
2 GAO-19-1SP From the Comptroller General

Source: Eyeware. | GAO-19-1SP

November 15, 2018

I am pleased to present GAO’s Performance and Accountability Report for fiscal year 2018. 

GAO’s mission is to support the Congress in meeting its constitutional responsibilities and 

to help improve the performance and ensure the accountability of the federal government 

for the benefit of the American people. Our results for fiscal year 2018 demonstrate the 

strength of our commitment to this mission.

Financial Benefits: In fiscal year 2018, we documented a record $75.1 billion in financial 

benefits for the government—a return of about $124 for every dollar invested in us. 

Examples of our work that contributed to these benefits included (1) revising spending 

limits for Medicaid demonstration projects ($36.8 billion); (2) helping the Centers for 

Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) achieve and measure the benefits of its fraud 

prevention system ($1.3 billion); and (3) identifying unexpended and unobligated balances 

in DOD’s Military Personnel accounts ($849 million). 

Legislative Impacts: In fiscal year 2018, the Congress used GAO’s work to make important 

legislative decisions. Examples linked directly to GAO’s work include:

 The 2018 Omnibus Appropriations Act: Based on GAO’s work, the Congress directed

— the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) to research the overmedication of veterans 

that led to deaths, suicides, and mental health disorders; 

— DOD to align its (1) structure, (2) statutory parameters, and (3) regulatory guidance 

across federal prescription drug buying programs to increase its buying power and 

reduce costs; 

— the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to (1) develop performance metrics 

for all deployed border security, (2) evaluate the individual and collective effect of 

deployed technologies, and (3) assess progress; 

From the Comptroller General
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 3 From the Comptroller General

— DHS to regularly assess advanced protective technologies for cybersecurity; and 

— federal agencies, such as DOD, National Cybersecurity and Communications Center, 

and Bureau of Indian Affairs, to report on how they plan to implement GAO 

recommendations. 

 The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2018 (December 2017): Reflecting 

our past work, the Congress directed DOD to 

— improve its budget guidelines, cost savings, leadership of business operations, military 

readiness goals and implementation strategies, and reduce vulnerabilities in military 

aircraft and risks to military installations from climate change; 

— increase reporting on the Columbia class submarine to keep the program on track;

— change its space leadership structure;

— reinstate annual reports on the time required to conduct investigations, adjudicate 

cases, and grant security clearances; and 

— establish new ways for agencies to modernize their legacy information technology.

 The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2019: Reflecting our past work, 

the Congress directed DOD to 

— provide military servicemembers with training to enhance their employability within 

one year prior to their separation, and improve related performance reporting and 

monitoring; 

— require the Navy to provide detailed budget information for aircraft carrier 

dismantlement and disposal activities; and

— require the Secretary of Defense to designate a component responsible for 

coordinating efforts to acquire a modernized Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver. 

In addition, a House report accompanying the act directed DOD to (1) use policy and 

technological solutions to manage risk and secure classified information and systems to 

counter insider threats, and (2) urge the Secretary of the Air Force and Secretary of the 

Navy, in concert with the F-35 Joint Program Office, to reduce F-35 sustainment costs. 

 The Supreme Court of the United States cited our November 2017 analysis of state sales 

taxes in its June 21, 2018 opinion—allowing states to require sellers to collect sales 

taxes from relevant Internet and other remote sales, regardless of whether the seller 

has a physical presence in the state. 

Other Benefits: Many other benefits resulting from our work cannot be measured in dollars 

but lead to program and operational improvements. In fiscal year 2018, we recorded 1,294 

of these other benefits. For example, our work on public safety and security

 positioned U.S. Customs and Border Protection to better protect U.S. manufacturers 

from economic harm and U.S. consumers from potential risks posed by counterfeit 

products sold online; 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

4 GAO-19-1SP From the Comptroller General

 led the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) to begin updating and improving 

the risk assessment and strategy it uses to (1) secure airport perimeters, and (2) control 

access to restricted areas to better assess security issues at airports nationwide; and

 prompted the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Office of National Drug Control 

Policy to begin developing results-oriented measures, such as reductions in overdose 

deaths, to help them assess progress made in combatting the nation’s opioid epidemic. 

Similarly, our work related to vulnerable populations 

 led the Congress to pass legislation to strengthen the nation’s data on elder abuse by 

requiring annual data collection and reporting to support national prevention policy;

 prompted the Indian Health Service to publish wait-time standards for primary care and 

urgent care visits to help it monitor patient access to care; and 

 led the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to begin measuring the effectiveness 

of industry efforts to prevent wireless network outages—helping to ensure that 

Americans who rely solely on them have access during emergencies. 

Furthermore, our work in the area of agency operations

 led the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to (1) pilot a data-sharing 

process with states to allow it to identify potentially duplicative disaster assistance 

payments, and (2) make plans to create a similar process to manage future disasters; 

 prompted the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) to issue formal 

guidance and implementation guidelines to help federal agencies continually assess 

their employees’ eligibility to hold security clearances and to do so uniformly; and 

 led the Congress to require federal agencies to inform active-duty military 

servicemembers of their eligibility to receive student loans at a 6 percent interest rate 

to better ensure timely access to these loans and prevent overpayments. 

Building Bodies of Knowledge: Through the products we issued in fiscal year 2018, 

we continued to build on bodies of work related to our three broad strategic goals to 

(1) address current and emerging challenges to the well-being and financial security of 

the American people, (2) help the Congress respond to changing security threats and the 

challenges of global interdependence, and (3) help transform the federal government to 

address national challenges. Examples include:

 Protection of children. We reported on the need to (1) improve federal support to help 

states recruit and retain foster care families to meet demand; (2) develop guidance for 

states to help them better apply protections for substance-affected infants; (3) consider 

discipline disparities for Black students, boys, and students with disabilities in K-12 

public schools; and (4) update guidance to better monitor lead in school drinking water.

 Veterans. We reported on the need for (1) DOD to improve its monitoring of and 

reporting on its transitioning veterans program; (2) the Department of Veterans Affairs 

(VA) to further assess its performance and progress toward meeting its opioid safety 

goals for veterans; and (3) VHA to collect better data and evaluate its strategies for 

improving physician staffing, recruitment, and retention. 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 5 From the Comptroller General

 Health care. We reported on the need to (1) better secure the electronic health 

information of Medicare beneficiaries; (2) improve federal oversight of the health and 

welfare of beneficiaries receiving Medicaid assisted-living services; and (3) improve 

assessments of individuals’ needs for home- and community-based services.

 Technology and science. We reported on (1) Artificial Intelligence applications in 

four areas—cybersecurity, automated vehicles, criminal justice, and financial services; 

(2) chemical innovation—technologies that improve the chemistry behind medicines, 

personal care products, and other everyday items to reduce environmental impacts; 

(3) electromagnetic risks to the U.S. electric grid from extreme solar storms and 

high-altitude nuclear blasts; and (4) quantum computing, synthetic biology, and other 

potentially transformational research and considerations for U.S. competitiveness.

 High risk areas. We continued to monitor federal operations previously identified 

as “high risk” and our outreach with executive branch agencies to discuss how to 

make progress in these areas. We also added the government-wide personnel security 

clearance process to our High Risk List and updated our cybersecurity area. This year, 

our high-risk work resulted in 166 reports, 49 testimonies, $46.8 billion in financial 

benefits, and 526 other benefits. 

 Fragmentation, overlap, and duplication. Our annual report identified 68 new actions 

across 23 new program areas that could reduce fragmentation, overlap, and duplication, 

or provide other cost savings and revenue enhancement opportunities across the federal 

government. Actions taken by the Congress and executive branch agencies to address 

the 724 actions government-wide we identified from 2011 to 2017 led to about $178 

billion in financial benefits—$125 billion through 2017, with $53 billion more expected.

Expanding our Focus on Technology and Science

The Committee report accompanying our fiscal year 2019 appropriation called for us to 

reorganize our technology and science function to create a new office within GAO that will 

provide high-quality, independent science and technological expertise. We are on pace to 

stand up a new Technology and Science team in January 2019. 

Serving Our Clients

In fiscal year 2018, we received 786 requests for work from 90 percent of the standing 

committees of the Congress—supporting a broad range of congressional interests. We issued 

633 reports and made 1,650 new recommendations. Our senior executives were asked to 

testify 98 times before 48 separate committees or subcommittees on topics including key 

risks for the 2020 Census, improper payments under Medicaid, national defense, border 

security, and the nation’s cybersecurity challenges. 

I continued my regular meetings with the Chairs and Ranking Members of congressional 

committees to obtain their views on GAO’s work, including their priorities, and to discuss 

opportunities and challenges facing GAO. I also continued to send letters to the heads 

of most federal departments, recognizing their progress in implementing our priority 

recommendations and calling attention to those still requiring action. These letters 

were also sent to congressional committees of jurisdiction to inform their oversight. In 

addition, we continued to highlight the status of key recommendations in our annual 

duplication, fragmentation, and overlap report—citing progress made and the benefits 

of full implementation. In fiscal year 2018, agencies implemented 77 percent of our 

recommendations against a target of 80 percent. 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

6 GAO-19-1SP From the Comptroller General

Supporting Our People

The hard work and dedication of our diverse and professional multidisciplinary staff 

positioned GAO to achieve a 97 percent on-time delivery of our products in fiscal year 

2018. Our performance this year also indicates that staff received the support needed 

to produce high-quality work. We exceeded the targets for our seven people measures—

new hire rate, retention rates with and without retirements, staff development, staff 

utilization, effective leadership by supervisors, and organizational climate. GAO also 

continued its distinction as an employer of choice, ranking second among mid-size federal 

agencies and first for supporting diversity by the Partnership for Public Service. 

Managing Our Internal Operations

In fiscal year 2018, we continued efforts to support our fourth strategic goal—to maximize 

our value by enabling quality, timely service to the Congress and being a leading practices 

federal agency. We made progress addressing our three internal management challenges—

managing a quality workforce, engagement efficiency, and information technology services. 

To enhance our workforce, we hired staff to fill 222 positions and reached 3,015 full-time 

equivalents. To improve engagement efficiency, we issued our first web-based, mobilefriendly report using the New Blue system—designed to modernize product development 

and distribution. To enhance information technology services, we continued to strengthen 

monitoring and detection of malicious activity to counter escalating cybersecurity threats.

This fiscal year, we also made significant contributions to the domestic and international 

auditing community. Our Center for Audit Excellence helped 15 domestic and international 

audit organizations build their audit capacity through training and other services and we 

are working to expand our engagement with these organizations. Our Office of General 

Counsel (OGC) handled about 2,600 bid protests, issued more than 600 decisions on 

the merits, and carried out GAO’s responsibilities under the Impoundment Control Act 

regarding the President’s special message of May 2018.

We again received from independent auditors an unmodified or “clean” opinion on our 

financial statements for fiscal year 2018 and our internal control over financial reporting. 

There was no reportable noncompliance for fiscal year 2018 with provisions of applicable 

laws, regulations, contracts, and grant agreements tested. We have demonstrated that the 

detailed performance and financial information in this report is complete and reliable and 

meets our high standards for accuracy and transparency. 

In fiscal year 2019 and beyond, we look forward to continuing to serve the Congress and 

the public on issues affecting the lives of all Americans.

Gene L. Dodaro

Comptroller General

of the United States
GAO-19-1SP 7 Management Assurance Statements 

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

November 15, 2018

Assurance Statement on Internal Control over Operations, Reporting, and Compliance

GAO management is responsible for managing risks and maintaining effective internal 

control to meet the objectives of the Federal Managers’ Financial Integrity Act (FMFIA). 

These are objectives that we set for ourselves even though, as part of the legislative 

branch of the federal government, GAO is not subject to the FMFIA. GAO conducted its 

assessment of risk and internal control consistent with Office of Management and Budget 

(OMB) Circular No. A-123, Management’s Responsibility for Enterprise Risk Management 

and Internal Control. Based on the results of the assessment, GAO can provide reasonable 

assurance that internal control over operations, reporting, and compliance as of September 

30, 2018, was operating effectively and that no material weaknesses were found in the 

design or operation of internal controls. 

Assurance Statement on Internal Control over Financial Reporting

GAO’s internal control over financial reporting is a process effected by those charged 

with governance, management, and other personnel, the objectives of which are to 

provide reasonable assurance that transactions are (1) properly recorded, processed, 

and summarized to permit the preparation of financial statements in accordance with 

U.S. generally accepted accounting principles, and assets are safeguarded against loss 

from unauthorized acquisition, use, or disposition; and (2) executed in accordance with 

provisions of applicable laws (including laws governing the use of budget authority); 

regulations; contracts; and grant agreements, noncompliance with which could have a 

material effect on the financial statements. 

Management Assurance Statements
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

8 GAO-19-1SP Management Assurance Statements 

GAO management is responsible for designing, implementing, and maintaining effective 

internal control over financial reporting. GAO conducted its assessment of the effectiveness 

of internal control over financial reporting according to the criteria established under 

FMFIA and OMB Circular No. A-123. Based on the results of the assessment, GAO can 

provide reasonable assurance that its internal control over financial reporting as of 

September 30, 2018, was operating effectively and that no material weaknesses were 

found in the design or operation of internal control over financial reporting.

Assurance Statement on Financial Management Systems

GAO conducted reviews of its financial management systems consistent with Appendix D of 

OMB Circular No. A-123, Compliance with the Federal Financial Management Improvement 

Act of 1996 (FFMIA). We conduct these reviews even though, as part of the legislative 

branch of the federal government, GAO is not subject to the FFMIA. Based on the results 

of these reviews, GAO can provide reasonable assurance that it has implemented and 

maintained financial management systems that comply substantially with federal financial 

management systems requirements, applicable federal accounting standards, and the 

U.S. Government Standard General Ledger at the transaction level consistent with the 

requirements of the FFMIA. 

Gene L. Dodaro

Comptroller General

of the United States

Karl J. Maschino 

Chief Administrative Officer/

Chief Financial Officer

Katherine A. Siggerud 

Chief Operating Officer

William L. Anderson 

Controller

Thomas H. Armstrong

General Counsel
GAO-19-1SP 9 About GAO

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

About GAO

GAO is an independent, nonpartisan 

professional services agency in the 

legislative branch of the federal 

government. Commonly known as the 

investigative arm of the Congress or the 

“congressional watchdog,” we examine how 

taxpayer dollars are spent and advise 

lawmakers and agency heads on ways to 

make government work better. As a 

legislative branch agency, we are exempt 

from many laws that apply to executive 

branch agencies; however, we generally 

hold ourselves to the spirit of many such 

laws, including the Federal Managers’ 

Financial Integrity Act of 1982 (FMFIA); the 

GPRA Modernization Act of 2010 (GPRAMA); 

and the Federal Information Security 

Modernization Act of 2014 (FISMA). 

Accordingly, this performance and 

accountability report for fiscal year 2018 

provides what we consider to be 

information comparable to that reported by 

executive branch agencies in their annual 

performance and accountability reports.

GAO’s History

The Budget and Accounting Act of 1921 required the President to issue an annual federal budget and 

established GAO as an independent agency to investigate how federal dollars are spent. In the early years, 

we mainly audited vouchers, but after World War II, we started to perform more comprehensive audits 

that examined the economy and efficiency of government operations. By the 1960s, GAO had also begun to 

perform the type of work we are noted for today—performance audits—which include 

 evaluations of federal policies, programs, and the performance of agencies; 

 oversight of government operations to determine whether public funds are spent efficiently, effectively, 

and in accordance with applicable laws; and 

 policy analyses to assess needed actions and the implications of proposed actions.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

10 GAO-19-1SP About GAO

This report also fulfills our requirement 

to report annually on the work of the 

Comptroller General under 31 U.S.C. 719.1

Mission

Our mission is to support the Congress in 

meeting its constitutional responsibilities 

and to help improve the performance 

and ensure the accountability of the 

federal government for the benefit of the 

American people. 

Core Values

Our three mission core values—

accountability, integrity, and reliability—

form the basis for all of our work, 

regardless of its origin. These core mission 

values work in concert with our three core 

people values—valued, respected, and 

treated fairly—to create a synergy, which is 

essential for us to achieve our mission. (See 

the inside front cover of this report for 

more detail, along with our scope of work.)

Strategic Goals

GAO has three externally focused goals and 

one internally focused goal. These include:

 Goal 1: Address Current and Emerging 

Challenges to the Well-being and 

Financial Security of the American 

People

1

FMFIA requires executive agencies to establish systems of internal 

accounting and administrative controls consistent with standards for 

internal control in the federal government issued by the Comptroller 

General and to evaluate such systems annually. Pub. L. No. 97-255, 

96 Stat. 814 (Sept. 8, 1982), codified at 31 U.S.C. § 3512 (c)-(d). 

GPRAMA Pub. L. No. 111-352, 124 Stat. 3866 (Jan. 4, 2011) 

updated the Government Performance and Results Act of 1993 

(GPRA), Pub. L. No. 103-62, 107 Stat. 285 (Aug. 3, 1993), and, 

among other things, requires executive branch agencies to prepare 

strategic plans, annual performance plans, and annual performance 

reports. FISMA, Pub. L. No. 113-283, 128 Stat.3073 (Dec. 18, 

2014), codified at 44 U.S.C. §§ 3551-3558, largely superseded 

the very similar Federal Information Security Management Act of 

2002, Pub. L. No. 107-347, title III, 116 Stat. 2899, 2946 (Dec. 

17, 2002), setting requirements for federal agencies to implement 

policies and procedures to cost-effectively reduce information 

technology risks. 

 Goal 2: Respond to Changing Security 

Threats and the Challenges of Global 

Interdependence

 Goal 3: Help Transform the Federal 

Government to Address National 

Challenges

 Goal 4: Maximize the Value of GAO 

by Enabling Quality, Timely Service to 

the Congress and by Being a Leading 

Practices Federal Agency 

For additional information see Part II of this 

report and GAO’s Strategic Plan.

Organizational Structure

As the Comptroller General of the United 

States, Gene L. Dodaro is the head of GAO. 

On December 22, 2010, he was confirmed 

as Comptroller General after serving as the 

Acting Comptroller General since March 

2008. Prior to that, Mr. Dodaro served as 

GAO’s Chief Operating Officer for 9 years. 

Three other executives join Comptroller 

General Dodaro to form our Executive 

Committee: Chief Operating Officer 

Katherine Siggerud, Chief Administrative 

Officer/Chief Financial Officer Karl J. 

Maschino, and General Counsel Thomas H. 

Armstrong (see fig. 9).

To achieve our mission, our staff is 

organized primarily into 14 evaluation, 

audit, research, and investigative 

teams that support our three external 

strategic goals—with several of the teams 

supporting more than one strategic goal. 

For example, our Forensic Audits and 

Investigative Service team (FAIS) follows 

up on engagements and referrals from our 

other teams when its special services are 

required for specific fraud allegations or for 

assistance in evaluating security matters. 

FAIS also manages FraudNet, which is our 

online system created for the public to 

report to GAO allegations of fraud, waste, 

abuse, or mismanagement of federal funds. 

FAIS is an integrated unit composed of 

investigators, analysts, and auditors who 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 11 About GAO

Mission Teams

Legend:

The Executive Committee

GAO’s Organization Chart

Comptroller General of the United States

Gene Dodaro

Defense Capabilities

and Management

Cathleen Berrick

Homeland Security

and Justice

Charles Johnson 

Information 

Technology

Valerie Melvin

Physical 

Infrastructure

Daniel Bertoni

Financial Management

and Assurance

Larry Malenich 

Forensic Audits and 

Investigative Service

Johana Ayers

Education, Workforce,

and Income Security

Barbara Bovbjerg

International Affairs 

and Trade

Thomas Melito

Natural Resources

and Environment

Mark Gaffigan

Strategic Issues

Christopher Mihm

Financial Markets and 

Community Investment

Lawrance Evans Jr 

Health Care

A. Nicole Clowers

Inspector General

Adam Trzeciak

Congressional 

Relations

Orice Williams 

Brown 

Public Affairs

Chuck Young

Opportunity and

Inclusiveness

Reginald Jones

Strategic Planning 

and External Liaison

James-Christian

Blockwood

Benjamin Nelson

Anu Mittal

Audit Policy 

Quality Assurance

Chief Quality Officer

Timothy Bowling

November 2018

Managing Associate G.C. 

Goal 2

Stephanie May

Managing Associate G.C. 

Goal 3

Robert Cramer

Managing Associate G.C. 

Procurement Law

Ralph White

Managing Associate G.C. 

Goal 1

Susan Sawtelle

Managing Associate G.C.

Legal Services

Joan Hollenbach

Managing Associate G.C. 

Goal 3

Julie Matta 

Managing Associate G.C. 

Procurement Law

Kenneth Patton

Managing Associate G.C. 

Goal 1

Helen Desaulniers

Deputy General Counsel/

Ethics Counselor

Edda EmmanuelliPerez 

General Counsel

Thomas H. Armstrong 

Human Capital

William White

Infrastructure 

Operations

Terrell Dorn

Field Operations

Linda Calbom

Information Systems

and Technology 

Services

Howard Williams

Professional 

Development Program

Teresa Rivera 

Russell

Financial Management

and Business 

Operations

William Anderson

Deputy Chief

Administrative Officer

Paul Johnson

Chief Administrative Officer/

Chief Financial Officer

Karl Maschino

Chief Operating Officer

Katherine Siggerud 

Staff Offices

Note: Everyone listed on this table, other than the Comptroller General, is a Senior Executive Service (SES) level manager. Also, with the exception of the Comptroller General 

of the United States, the Chief Operating Officer, the Chief Administrative Officer, the Deputy Chief Administrative Officer, the Inspector General, the General Counsel, the 

Deputy General Counsel, and the Chief Quality Officer, the SES managers are titled “Managing Director.” GAO has six technical chiefs under the Managing Director for Applied 

Research and Methods. These include the Chief Accountant, Chief Actuary, Chief Economist, Chief Scientist, Chief Statistician, and Chief Technologist. 

Applied Research

and Methods

Nancy Kingsbury

Contracting and National 

Security Acquisitions

Michele Mackin

Continuous Process

Improvement

Patricia McClure

Learning Center

vacant

Figure 9: Organizational Structure

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

12 GAO-19-1SP About GAO

have experience with forensic auditing and 

data mining; they are assisted by staff in 

our Office of General Counsel.

Senior executives in the teams manage a 

portfolio of engagements to ensure that 

we quickly meet the Congress’s need for 

independent and unbiased information on 

emerging issues, while continuing longerterm work that flows from our strategic 

plan. To serve the Congress effectively with 

a finite set of resources, senior managers 

consult with our congressional clients 

and determine the timing and priority of 

engagements for which they are responsible.

As described in greater detail below, our 

General Counsel’s office provides legal 

counsel to all of our teams. In addition, the 

Applied Research and Methods team assists 

the other teams on matters requiring 

expertise in areas such as economics, 

research design, statistical analysis, and 

science and technology. Staff in many 

offices, such as Strategic Planning and 

External Liaison, Congressional Relations, 

Opportunity and Inclusiveness, Audit 

Policy and Quality Assurance (APQA), 

Public Affairs, and the Chief Administrative 

Office, support the efforts of the teams. 

This matrixed structure increases our 

effectiveness, flexibility, and efficiency in 

using our expertise and resources to meet 

congressional needs on complex issues.

The Office of the General Counsel is 

structured to facilitate the delivery of legal 

services to the teams and staff offices 

that support our four strategic goals. This 

structure allows the Office of the General 

Counsel to (1) provide legal support to 

our staff offices and serve as engagement 

counsel to audit teams concerning all 

matters related to their work, including 

fulfilling our responsibility to ensure the 

legal sufficiency of all GAO products; and 

(2) produce legal decisions and opinions 

on behalf of the Comptroller General. 

Specifically, the legal groups that support 

our three external goals are organized to 

provide each of the audit teams with a 

corresponding team of attorneys dedicated 

to acting as engagement counsel for each 

team. 

In addition, these groups prepare advisory 

opinions for committees and members of 

the Congress on agency adherence to laws 

applicable to their programs and activities. 

The Legal Services group provides inhouse support to our management on a 

wide array of human capital matters and 

initiatives and on information management 

and acquisition matters, and defends 

the agency in administrative and judicial 

forums. The Opportunity and Inclusiveness 

team provides legal advice and assistance 

to GAO’s Office of Opportunity and 

Inclusiveness (OO&I), GAO management, 

and others on issues related to GAO’s 

Equal Employment Opportunity and OO&I 

program. Attorneys in the Procurement Law 

group prepare administrative decisions and 

opinions adjudicating protests to the award 

of government contracts. Attorneys in the 

Budget and Appropriations Law group opine 

on the availability and use of appropriated 

funds and publish products related to 

GAO’s statutory responsibilities under the 

Impoundment Control Act of 1974. Finally, 

GAO also issues opinions related to issues 

arising under the Congressional Review Act. 

For our one internal strategic goal (Goal 4), 

staff in our Chief Administrative Office take 

the lead. Our Office of Continuous Process 

Improvement leads the agency’s efforts to 

improve efficiency and effectiveness of the 

work conducted by our mission and mission 

support operations. Other teams and offices 

across GAO including the Applied Research 

and Methods team, the Office of Strategic 

Planning and External Liaison, Congressional 

Relations, OO&I, APQA, and Public Affairs 

assist in achieving specific key efforts. As 

previously mentioned, attorneys in the 

General Counsel’s office, primarily in the 

Legal Services group and the OO&I team, 

provide legal support for Goal 4.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 13 About GAO

The Government Accountability Office 

Act of 2008 established GAO’s Office of 

Inspector General (OIG) as a statutory 

office within the agency. The Inspector 

General (IG) is appointed by, and reports 

to, the Comptroller General. The IG is 

responsible for conducting audits and 

investigations relating to the administration 

of GAO programs and operations and for 

making recommendations to promote its 

economy, efficiency, and effectiveness. 

The IG also keeps the Comptroller General 

and the Congress fully informed through 

semiannual reports that summarize the IG’s 

findings. In addition, the IG investigates 

allegations concerning activities within GAO 

that may constitute the violation of any 

law, rule, or regulation; mismanagement; a 

gross waste of funds; or other wrongdoing. 

We maintain a workforce with training in 

many disciplines, including accounting, 

law, engineering, public and business 

administration, economics, and the social 

and physical sciences. Seventy-one percent 

of our approximately 3,000 employees are 

based at our headquarters in Washington, 

D.C.; the rest are deployed in 11 field 

offices across the country (see fig. 10); 

and nearly all GAO employees participate 

in some form of telework. Staff in these 

field offices are aligned with our research, 

audit, investigative, and evaluation teams 

and perform work in tandem with our 

headquarters staff in support of our 

external strategic goals.

Figure 10: GAO’s Office Locations

Sources: GAO (data) and MapArt (map).

Los Angeles Chicago Dayton

Oakland Huntsville

Seattle

Dallas Norfolk

Denver Boston

Atlanta

Washington, D.C.

Source: Map Resources (map). | GAO-19-1SP

Strategic Planning and 

Foresight

In February 2018, we issued our strategic 

plan for fiscal years 2018 through 2023, 

which describes our goals and strategies for 

supporting the Congress and the nation.2

2

https://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-18-1SP

This plan reflects the full scope of the 

federal government’s operations, as well as 

emerging and future trends that may affect 

government and society. 

As part of our strategic planning process, 

we emphasize foresight, continuous 

environmental scanning, and trend analysis 

as essential to helping inform our decision 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

14 GAO-19-1SP About GAO

making and long-term planning. Our 

continuous scanning of trends helps to 

ensure GAO remains an agile and responsive 

organization. The plan outlines the areas 

in which we expect to conduct research, 

audits, analyses, and evaluations to meet 

our clients’ needs and allocate resources. 

We developed this plan based on a review 

of external literature, discussions with 

outside advisors and selected experts, input 

from our mission teams based on their 

discussions with congressional clients, our 

staff’s subject matter expertise, and our 

foresight work. 

GAO’s strategic plan consists of three parts: 

(1) Goals and Objectives (GAO-18-1SP); 

(2) Key Efforts (GAO-18-395SP); and 

(3) Trends Affecting Government and 

Society (GAO-18-396SP). 

We engage in a range of ongoing foresight 

activities to explore the implications of 

emerging issues that pose both risks and 

opportunities for the federal government. 

Our strategic plan identified eight broad 

trends shaping the United States and its 

place in the world (see fig. 11). These eight 

trends are discussed in greater detail in our 

strategic plan on our website.3

3

https://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-18-1SP

We will periodically update our trends 

and key efforts, as appropriate, to reflect 

shifts in congressional priorities and 

GAO’s expected areas of work based on 

our foresight work. Any revisions to our 

strategic plan or resource allocations are 

disclosed in our annual performance plans, 

available on our website.

Our work is aligned under our four strategic 

goals (see fig. 11). Specifically, our audit 

and investigative work is conducted 

primarily under the first three strategic 

goals in our plan, which span domestic and 

international issues affecting the lives of 

all Americans. Our fourth strategic goal is 

focused on our internal operations. 

Our strategic plan is based on a four-tiered 

hierarchy—four strategic goals (the highest 

tier) followed by strategic objectives, 

performance goals, and key efforts. 

Each strategic goal comprises strategic 

objectives, for which there are specific 

strategies taking the form of performance 

goals (each of which has a set of key 

efforts). The text box below provides an 

example from one of our strategic goals. 

An Example of Our Four-tiered Strategic Planning Process

Strategic Goal 1: Address Current and Emerging Challenges to the Well-being and Financial Security of the 

American People 

Strategic Objective 1.4: Financial Security and Well-being of an Aging Population 

Performance Goal 1.4.2: Assess the policies and administration of programs that could enable older adults to 

maintain their independence and ties to the community.

Key Efforts:

 Examine federal efforts to develop a comprehensive system of home- and community-based services to 

enable older adults to age in place.

 Examine federal efforts to work with state and area agencies on aging to establish and sustain various 

models of aging-friendly communities.

 Compare the availability, accessibility, and use of home- and community- based services by older adults 

with facility-based long-term care. 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 15 About GAO

Figure 11: GAO’s Strategic Plan Framework

GAO'S STRATEGIC FRAMEWORK

GAO exists to support the Congress in 

meeting its constitutional responsibilities and 

to help improve the performance and ensure 

the accountability of the federal government 

for the benefi t of the American people.

 Accountability

 Integrity

 Reliability

Valued

Respected

Treated Fairly

WELL-BEING AND

FINANCIAL SECURITY

Goal: Provide timely, quality service to the Congress 

and the federal government to address current and 

emerging challenges to the well-being and fi nancial 

security of the American people related to...

STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES

 Health care needs

 Lifelong learning

 Challenges facing an aging 

population

 Effective system of justice

 Housing fi nance and viable 

communities

 Stable fi nancial system and 

consumer protection

 Natural resources and the 

environment

 National infrastructure

 Benefi ts and protections for 

workers, families, and children

$ NATIONAL SECURITY AND 

GLOBAL INTERDEPENDENCE

Goal: Provide timely, quality service to the Congress 

and the federal government to respond to changing 

security threats and challenges of national security 

and global interdependence involving...

STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES

 Homeland security

 Military capabilities and 

readiness

 Foreign policy and 

international economic 

interests

 Intelligence Community’s 

management and integration

NATIONAL CHALLENGES

Goal: Help transform the federal government to address 

national challenges by assessing...

STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES

 Government’s fi scal position 

and approaches to address 

current and projected fi scal 

gaps

 Major management 

challenges and program risks

 Fraud, waste, and abuse 

and needed improvements in 

internal controls

MAXIMIZE GAO VALUE

Goal: Maximize the value of GAO by enabling quality, 

timely service to the Congress and by being a leading 

practices federal agency by focusing on...

 Empowering GAO’s workforce 

to excel

 Delivery of quality results and 

products

 Promotion of knowledge 

sharing, government 

standards and strategic 

solutions 

 Providing modern integrated 

tools and systems 

TRENDS SHAPING THE UNITED STATES AND ITS PLACE IN THE WORLD

GLOBAL 

SECURITY

ECONOMICS, 

TRADE, AND

CONNECTEDNESS

EDUCATION 

AND

EMPLOYMENT

CHANGES 

IN PEOPLE 

AND 

SOCIETY

SCIENCE 

AND 

TECHNOLOGY

ENVIRONMENT 

AND 

SUSTAINABILITY

GOVERNMENT

AND 

GOVERNANCE

DEBT 

AND FISCAL 

OUTLOOK

MISSION GAO CORE VALUES

MISSION VALUES PEOPLE VALUES

GOALS AND OBJECTIVES

STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES

GAO STRATEGIC PLAN 2018–2023 GAO-18-1SP

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

16 GAO-19-1SP About GAO

Strategies for Achieving Our 

Goals

GPRA directs agencies to articulate 

not just goals, but also strategies for 

achieving those goals. GAO’s strategic 

plan provides a detailed roadmap of our 

goals and strategies. As detailed in Part I

of this report, we emphasize two areas of 

focus in achieving our goals: (1) providing 

information from our work to the Congress 

and the public in a variety of forms, and 

(2) continuing to strengthen our human 

capital and internal operations. 

Additionally, we emphasize the importance 

of working with other organizations on 

cross-cutting issues, effectively addressing 

the challenges to achieving our agency’s 

goals, and recognizing the internal and 

external factors that could impair our 

performance. With this approach, which 

has proven successful for us for a number 

of years, we plan to achieve the level of 

performance that is needed to meet our 

performance measures and goals and to 

achieve our four broad strategic goals.

Attaining our three externally focused 

strategic goals (1, 2, and 3) and their 

related objectives rests on providing 

accurate, professional, objective, factbased, nonpartisan, nonideological, fair, 

and balanced information to support the 

Congress in carrying out its constitutional 

responsibilities. To implement these 

performance goals and key efforts related 

to these three goals, we develop and deliver 

information in a number of ways, including 

 evaluations of federal policies, 

programs, and the performance of 

agencies; 

 oversight of government operations 

through financial and other management 

audits to determine whether public 

funds are spent efficiently, effectively, 

and in accordance with applicable laws; 

 investigations to assess whether illegal 

or improper activities are occurring; 

 analyses of the financing for government 

activities; 

 legal opinions that determine whether 

agencies are in compliance with 

applicable laws and regulations; 

 policy analyses to assess needed actions 

and the implications of proposed 

actions; and

 additional assistance to the Congress in 

support of its oversight and decisionmaking responsibilities.

We conduct specific engagements as a 

result of requests from congressional 

committees and mandates written into 

legislation, resolutions, and committee 

reports. In fiscal year 2018, we devoted 

97 percent of our engagement resources 

to work requested or mandated by the 

Congress. We devoted the remaining 3 

percent of engagement resources to work 

initiated under the Comptroller General’s 

authority. Much of this work addressed 

various challenges that are of broadbased interest to the Congress, such as 

the federal response to 2017 hurricanes 

and wildfires, the cybersecurity high-risk 

update, child well-being in the United 

States, CMS fraud risk management, older 

adult housing needs, security clearance 

reform efforts, and the federal, state, and 

local government fiscal outlooks.4

Our reviews of government programs 

and operations have identified those 

programs that are at high risk for fraud, 

waste, abuse, and mismanagement. These 

reviews help support our biennial High Risk 

Report, which we will update next year. By 

making recommendations to improve the 

accountability, operations, and services 

of government agencies, we contribute 

to increasing the effectiveness of federal 

spending and enhancing the taxpayers’ 

trust and confidence in their government. 

4

https://www.gao.gov/americas_fiscal_future. 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 17 About GAO

Our staff are responsible for following high 

standards for gathering, documenting, and 

supporting the information we collect and 

analyze. The U.S. Government Auditing 

Standards, developed by the Comptroller 

General of the United States, together 

with the GAO policies that we apply in 

conducting our audits are consistent with 

the Fundamental Auditing Principles of the 

International Standards of Supreme Audit 

Institutions. This is especially important 

given the increased focus in recent years 

on the development and adoption of 

international accounting and auditing 

standards. 

Information developed during our reviews 

is usually presented in products that are 

made available to the public. Over the past 

5 years, we have issued, on average, about 

730 products annually, primarily in an 

electronic format. In addition, we publish 

about 500 legal decisions and opinions 

annually. In some cases, we develop 

products that contain classified or sensitive 

information that cannot be made available 

publicly. Our products include: 

 reports and written correspondence; 

 testimonies and statements for the 

record, where the former are delivered 

orally by one or more of our senior 

executives at a congressional hearing 

and the latter are provided for inclusion 

in the congressional record; 

 briefings, which are usually given 

directly to congressional staff members; 

and 

 legal decisions and opinions resolving 

bid protests and addressing issues of 

appropriations law, as well as opinions 

on the scope and exercise of the 

authority of federal officers.

We also produce special publications on 

specific issues of general interest to many 

Americans, such as our reports on the fiscal 

future of the United States and our decisions 

on federal bid protests.5 Our publication, 

Principles of Federal Appropriations Law, 

is viewed both within and outside of the 

government as the primary resource on 

federal case law related to the availability, 

use, and control of federal funds.6 In 

addition, we maintain the government’s 

repository of reports on Antideficiency Act 

violations and make available on our website 

information extracted from those reports. 

Such special publications are valuable 

because they help us highlight areas of focus 

on important policy and management issues 

facing the nation. Collectively, our products 

contain information and often conclusions 

and recommendations that allow us to 

achieve our external strategic goals. 

Another means of ensuring that we are 

achieving our goals is by examining the 

impact of our past work and using that 

information to shape our future work. 

Consequently, we evaluate actions taken 

by federal agencies and the Congress in 

response to our past recommendations. 

The results are reported in terms of 

financial benefits and other benefits. We 

actively monitor the status of our open 

recommendations—those that remain valid 

but have not yet been implemented—and 

post our findings to a recommendations 

database, which is updated regularly and 

publicly available (https://www.gao.gov/

recommendations/).

To attain our fourth strategic goal—

an internal goal—and its three related 

objectives, we implement projects 

to address the key efforts in our 

strategic plan. We conduct surveys of 

5

GAO, Bid Protest Annual Report to Congress for Fiscal Year 2017, 

GAO-18-237SP (Washington, D.C.: Nov. 13, 2017). 

6

Principles of Appropriations Law, also known as the Red Book, is 

a multi-volume treatise concerning federal fiscal law available at 

https://www.gao.gov/legal/red-book/overview. GAO-17-797SP

(Washington, D.C.: Sept. 14, 2017), GAO-16-463SP (Washington, 

D.C.: Mar. 10, 2016), GAO-16-464SP (Washington, D.C.: 

Mar.10, 2016). ), GAO-15-303SP (Washington, D.C.: Mar. 

12, 2015), GAO-08-978SP (Washington, D.C.: Sept. 1, 2008), 

GAO-06-382SP (Washington, D.C.: Feb. 1, 2006), GAO-04-261SP

(Washington, D.C.: Jan. 1, 2004).
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

18 GAO-19-1SP About GAO

our congressional clients and internal 

customers to obtain feedback on our 

products, processes, and services and 

identify ways to improve them. We also 

perform internal management studies and 

evaluations.

Achieving our strategic goals and 

objectives also requires coordination 

with other organizations with similar or 

complementary missions. To this end, 

we use advisory panels and other bodies 

to inform our strategic and annual work 

planning, coordinate as appropriate with 

other legislative branch agencies, and 

maintain collaborative working relationships 

with national and international 

government accountability and professional 

organizations, including the federal 

inspectors general, state and local audit 

organizations, and the national audit offices 

of other countries.

These networks allow us to extend our 

institutional knowledge and experience, 

leverage our resources, and improve our 

service to the Congress and the American 

people. Our Strategic Planning and External 

Liaison office takes the lead and provides 

strategic focus overall for the work with 

external partner organizations. Our 

research, audit, and evaluation teams lead 

the work with most of the issue-specific 

external organizations as they conduct 

their work.

How We Measure Our 

Performance

To help us determine how well we are 

meeting the needs of the Congress 

and maximizing our value as a leading 

practices federal agency, we assess our 

performance annually using a balanced 

set of quantitative performance measures 

that focus on four key areas—results, 

client, people, and internal operations. 

These categories of measures are briefly 

described next.

 Results. Focusing on results and the 

effectiveness of the processes needed 

to achieve them is fundamental to 

accomplishing our mission. To assess our 

results, we measure financial benefits, 

other benefits, recommendations 

implemented, and percentage of new 

products with recommendations. 

Financial benefits and other benefits 

provide quantitative and qualitative 

information, respectively, on the 

outcomes or results that have been 

achieved from our work. They often 

represent outcomes that occurred or 

are expected to occur over a period of 

several years. 

For financial benefits and other benefits, 

we first set targets for the agency as 

a whole, and then we set targets for 

each of the external goals (1, 2, and 3) 

to reach the agency-wide targets. For 

past recommendations implemented 

and percentage of products with 

recommendations, we set targets and 

report performance for the agency as 

a whole because we want to encourage 

consistent performance across goals. 

Internally, we track our performance by 

strategic goal in order to understand why 

we met or did not meet the agency-wide 

target. We also use this information to 

provide feedback to our teams on the 

extent to which they are contributing 

to the overall target and to help them 

identify areas for improvement.

 Client. To measure how well we are 

serving our client, we capture our 

timeliness in delivering products to 

the Congress and the number of times 

that our senior executives were asked 

to present expert testimony. We use 

an electronic client feedback form to 

collect quantitative and qualitative data 

and information on the services we are 

providing to our congressional clients. 

We also set a target at the agency-wide 

level for the number of testimonies 

and then assign a portion of these 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 19 About GAO

testimonies as a target for each of the 

external goals (1, 2, and 3) based on 

that goal’s expected contribution to the 

agency-wide total. We base this target 

on our assessment of the congressional 

calendar and hearing trend data. As for 

measuring the results of our work, we 

track our progress on this measure at 

the goal level in order to understand 

where we met or did not meet the 

agency-wide target. We set an agencywide target for timeliness because we 

want our performance on this measure 

to be consistent across goals.

 People. As our most important asset, 

our people define our character and 

capacity to perform our work. A variety 

of data sources, including an internal 

survey, provide information to help us 

measure how well we are attracting 

and retaining high-quality staff and how 

well we are developing, supporting, 

using, and leading staff. We set targets 

for these measures at the agency-wide 

level.

 Internal operations. GAO’s ability to 

carry out its mission and retain a skilled 

and talented workforce is supported by 

our administrative services, including 

information technology, infrastructure 

operations, human capital, and financial 

management. Through an internal 

customer satisfaction survey, we gather 

information on three areas of interest: 

(1) how well our internal operations 

help employees get their jobs done, 

(2) how our internal operations improve 

employees’ quality of work life, and 

(3) how satisfied employees are with 

our IT tools. Examples of surveyed 

services include information security, 

pay and leave, building security and 

maintenance, and telework/mobility 

tools. We set targets for these measures 

at the agency-wide level.

Setting Performance Targets

To establish targets for all of our measures, 

we consider our past performance, 

including recent patterns and 4-year rolling 

averages, as well as known upcoming 

events and external factors that influence 

our work (see p. 119). Some external 

factors are not in our control, such as 

the pace at which agencies implement 

our recommendations and the number of 

hearings at which we are asked to testify 

(see p. 59). Based on this information, 

the teams and offices that are directly 

engaged in the work discuss with our top 

executives their views of what we have 

planned to accomplish in the strategic plan

and what they believe they can accomplish 

in the upcoming fiscal year. Our Executive 

Committee then establishes targets for the 

performance measures.

Once approved by the Comptroller 

General, the targets become final and are 

presented in our annual performance plan 

and budget.7 We may adjust these targets 

after they are initially published when our 

expected future work or level of funding 

warrants doing so. If we make changes, 

we include the changed targets in later 

documents, such as this performance and 

accountability report, and indicate that we 

have changed them and why this was done. 

In Part V, we include detailed information 

on data sources that we use to assess each 

of these measures, as well as the steps we 

take to verify and validate the data.

On the pages that follow, we assess our 

performance for fiscal year 2018 against our 

previously established performance targets. 

We also present our financial statements, 

our Audit Advisory Committee’s report, 

the independent auditor’s report, and a 

statement from GAO’s Inspector General. 

7

Our most current performance plan is available at https://www.

gao.gov/products/GAO-18-308SP and our most current budget is 

available at https://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-18-426T.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

20 GAO-19-1SP About GAO

Figure 12: GAO’s Performance and Accountability Report Awards

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Awards

2017 CEAR Award, 

CEAR Best-in-Class Award, and

2018 American Inhouse Design Award

Last year, the Association of Government Accountants awarded GAO (for the 17th consecutive 

year) its Certificate of Excellence in Accountability Reporting (CEAR) for our Performance and 

Accountability Report for fiscal year 2017. We also received a CEAR Best-In-Class-Award for 

this report as having the best process to ensure the quality of the agency’s performance data. 

In fiscal year 2018, we also received the American Inhouse Design Award for our Performance 

and Accountability Report for fiscal year 2017 from Graphic Design USA.

Performance and

Accountability Report

Fiscal Year 2017 

SERVING CONGRESS AND THE NATION

U.S. GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE
GAO-19-1SP 21 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

Our mission is to support the Congress in 

meeting its constitutional responsibilities 

and to help improve the performance and 

ensure the accountability of the federal 

government for the benefit of the American 

people. The ways we accomplished this 

mission are described in the following 

pages. In short, we provide objective and 

reliable information and analysis to the 

Congress, to federal agencies, and to the 

public, and recommend improvements on a 

wide variety of issues.

In fiscal year 2018, demand for our work 

was high with 786 congressional requests 

and new mandates. Our work in key 

areas helped inform the Congress and 

the administration on issues relevant 

to all Americans. This section contains 

information on 

Overall Performance Toward Our Goals

 Results

 Client

 People

 Internal Operations

Other Ways GAO Served the Congress 

and the American People

 GAO’s High Risk Program

 Opportunities to Reduce 

Fragmentation, Overlap, and 

Duplication, and Achieve Other 

Financial Benefits

 Financial Regulatory Reform in the 

Aftermath of the Global Financial 

Crisis

 General Counsel Decisions and Other 

Legal Work

Strategic Partnerships

Managing Our Resources

Management Challenges

Assisting the Congress and Benefiting the 

Nation During Challenging Times 

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Part I

Management’s Discussion and Analysis
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

22 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

The results of our efforts are reflected in 

our solid performance in fiscal year 2018 

(see table 2). 

Results 

We exceeded our target of $50.0 billion in 

financial benefits by $25 billion—reaching 

$75.1 billion. This represents a $124 return 

on every dollar the Congress invested in us. 

We also exceeded our target of 1,200 other 

benefits by 94 benefits, accomplishing 1,294 

other benefits. (See pp. 25-30)

We fell short of our target of 80 percent for 

past recommendations implemented by 3 

percentage points, at 77 percent; however, 

this percentage has increased from 73 percent 

in fiscal year 2016. We will continue to take 

actions in 2019 to facilitate implementation of 

our recommendations. (See pp. 31-32)

We exceeded our target of 60 percent for 

new products with recommendations by 4 

percentage points, with 64 percent of new 

products containing recommendations. 

(See p. 32)

Client 

Based on our congressional client survey, 

we exceeded our target of 90 percent for 

delivering our products and testimonies in 

a timely manner by 7 percentage points—

reaching 97 percent on-time delivery for 

fiscal year 2018. Our senior executives 

were asked to testify 98 times, falling 22 

testimonies short of our fiscal year 2018 

target of 120. This was due, in part, to fewerthan-anticipated hearings being held, which 

is a factor not in our control. We were asked 

to testify before 48 separate committees 

or subcommittees on topics spanning most 

federal agencies. (See pp. 34-37)

People 

We exceeded the targets for all of our 

people measures—new hire rate, retention 

rate with and without retirements, staff 

development, staff utilization, effective 

leadership by supervisors, and organizational 

climate. (See pp. 38-39)

We exceeded our new hire rate target of 

80 percent by 5 percentage points at 85 

percent—filling 222 critical positions, against 

a target of 260. For retention rate with 

retirements, we exceeded the 92 percent 

target by 2 percentage points, at 94 percent. 

For retention rate without retirements, 

we exceeded the 96 percent target by 1 

percentage point, at 97 percent. We also 

exceeded our target of 80 percent for staff 

development by 3 percentage points, at 83 

percent. For staff utilization, we exceeded 

our target of 76 percent by 2 percentage 

points, at 78 percent. For effective 

leadership by supervisors, we exceeded our 

target of 82 percent by 3 percentage points, 

at 85 percent. For organizational climate, 

we reached 81 percent—exceeding our 

target of 76 percent by 5 percentage points. 

(See pp. 38-39)

Internal Operations 

We assessed staff satisfaction with our 

three internal operations measures for fiscal 

year 2018 through our internal customer 

satisfaction (CSAT) survey. In this survey, 

we measured how well our administrative 

services (e.g., travel support, counseling, 

building security, etc.) (1) help employees 

get their job done—we exceeded our target 

of 80 percent by 5 percentage points, at 85 

percent, and (2) improve quality of work 

life—we exceeded our target of 80 percent 

by 2 percentage points, at 82 percent. The 

survey also assesses how satisfied employees 

are with Information Technology (IT) Tools. 

We fell short of our goal of 80 percent by 7 

percentage points, at 73 percent. We have 

multiple efforts underway to improve staff 

satisfaction with this measure, which include 

updating our virtual desktop infrastructure. 

(See p. 40)

Overall Performance Toward Our Goals
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 23 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

Table 2: Agency-wide Summary of Annual Measures and Targets

Performance

measure

2013

actual

2014

actual

2015

actual

2016

actual

2017

actual

2018

target actual

Met/

not met

2019

target

Results

Financial benefits

(dollars in billions) $51.5 $54.4 $74.7 $63.4 $73.9 $50.0 $75.1 Met $50.0

Other benefits 1,314 1,288 1,286 1,234 1,280 1,200 1,294 Met 1,200

Past 

recommendations 

implemented

79% 78% 79%b 73% 76% 80% 77% Not met 80%

New products with

recommendations 63% 64% 66%b 68% 63% 60% 64% Met 60%

Client

Testimonies 114 129 109 119c 99 120 98 Not met 120

Timeliness 94% 95% 98% 94% 96% 90% 97% Met 90%

People

New hire rate 66% 88% 83% 81% 83% 80% 85% Met 80%

Retention rate

With 

retirements 93% 94% 94% 93% 94% 92% 94% Met 92%

Without

retirements 96% 97% 96% 96% 97% 96% 97% Met 96%

Staff development 80% 83% 84% 83% 84% 80% 83% Met 80%

Staff utilization 75% 77% 79% 79% 80% 76% 78% Met 76%

Effective 

leadership by 

supervisors

83% 83% 83% 85% 84% 82% 85% Met 82%

Organizational

climate 77% 79% 80% 81% 83% 76% 81% Met 76%

Internal operations

Help get job done 82% 82% 80% N/Ad,e 84% 80% 85% Met 80%

Quality of work 

life 78% 78% 78% N/Ad,e 82% 80% 82% Met 80%

IT tools 68%a 65% 67% N/Ad,e 74% 80% 73% Not met 80%

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Note: Information explaining all of the measures included in this table appears in the Appendix on Data Quality. 

a In 2013, we added the IT performance measure to better gauge and track satisfaction with GAO’s IT services. In prior survey 

years, IT services were under another performance measure (years prior are denoted by N/A).

b

In 2015, we modified our methodology for past recommendations implemented and new products with recommendations to 

exclude Matters for Congressional Consideration (see Appendix on Data Quality). 

c

In 2016, we modified our methodology for counting testimonies to include hearings where two separate statements are 

delivered on different aspects of GAO’s work (see Appendix on Data Quality). 

d

We conducted the survey for these measures on a calendar year basis in 2016, and, therefore, do not have fiscal year-end results 

to report—denoted by N/A. For fiscal years 2017 and 2018, the survey was conducted on a fiscal year basis. 

e

The targets for all three categories in 2016 were 80 percent. 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

24 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

Overall Performance Toward Our Goals

Our fiscal year 2018 targets for all 16 of our 

performance measures are the same as the 

targets we reported in our fiscal year 2018 

performance plan (issued in July 2017). 

We use 4-year rolling averages for key 

performance measures to help us examine 

trends over time, including financial 

benefits, other benefits, new products with 

recommendations, and testimonies. We use 

4-year rolling averages for these measures 

because this calculation minimizes the 

effect of an atypical result in any given year. 

We consider this calculation, along with 

other factors, when we set our performance 

targets. Table 3 shows that our averages for 

financial benefits increased from 2013 to 

2014, increased sharply in 2015, increased 

slightly in 2016, and increased sharply in 

2017 and 2018. The average number of 

other benefits we recorded decreased 

steadily from 2013 through 2015, decreased 

sharply in 2016, decreased slightly in 2017 

and held steady in 2018. New products 

with recommendations have been very 

stable from 2013 through 2018. The average 

number of times our senior executives were 

asked to testify declined steadily from 2013 

through 2016 and declined slightly in 2017 

and 2018.

We use several factors to set our annual 

testimonies target—the number of times 

we expect our senior executives to be 

asked to testify. These factors include 

the cyclical nature of the congressional 

calendar, our 4-year rolling averages, and 

our past performance. We set our target at 

120 testimonies for 2018, but fell short of 

this target by 22 testimonies. The general 

decline in the number of requests for GAO’s 

senior executives to testify in recent years 

mirrors the general decline in the number of 

oversight hearings held by the Congress. For 

2019, we have maintained our target of 120 

testimonies, which we consider a stretch 

goal, given the level of testimony requests 

in recent years. 

Table 3: Four-Year Rolling Averages for Selected GAO Measures

Performance measure 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018

Results

Financial benefits (billions) $50.7 $51.9 $59.1 $61.0 $66.6 $71.8

Other benefits 1,358 1,340 1,332 1,281 1,272 1,274

New products with recommendations 65% 66% 65% 65% 65% 65%

Client

Testimonies 160 144 128 118 114 106

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP
GAO-19-1SP 25 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

Our findings and recommendations produce 

measurable financial benefits for the 

federal government after the Congress 

or agencies act on them and government 

expenditures are reduced or funds are 

reallocated to other areas. For example, 

a financial benefit can be the result 

of changes in business operations and 

activities; the restructuring of federal 

programs; or modifications to entitlements, 

taxes, or user fees.

In fiscal year 2018, our work generated 

about $75.1 billion in financial benefits 

(see fig. 13). We exceeded our target by 

about $25 billion, primarily because of 

one unexpectedly large accomplishment of 

$36.8 billion for revising spending limits for 

Medicaid demonstration projects. In light of 

our (1) performance in fiscal year 2018; (2) 

expected future financial benefits based on 

our past, ongoing, and expected work; and 

(3) uncertainty about the exact amount of 

financial benefits our recommendations will 

yield in 2019; we have set our 2019 target 

for financial benefits at $50 billion. 

Figure 13: Financial Benefits GAO Recorded

Dollars in billions

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Actual Target Actual

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2018

$51.5 $50.0

$63.4

$74.7 $73.9 $75.1

$54.4

The financial benefits that we report in our 

performance measures are net benefits—

that is, estimates of financial benefits that 

have been reduced by the estimated costs 

of taking the action that we recommended. 

We convert all estimates involving past and 

future years to their net present value and 

use actual dollars to represent estimates 

involving only the current year. Financial 

benefit amounts vary depending on the 

nature of the benefit, and we can claim 

financial benefits over multiple years based 

on a single agency or congressional action. 

Source: Comstock. | GAO-19-1SP

Financial Benefits
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

26 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

We limit the period over which benefits 

from an accomplishment can accrue to no 

more than 5 years. For example, fiscal year 

2018 was our fourth year of savings from 

expanding the risk-based element of the 

Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation’s 

premium rate structure. The revenue this 

generated will offset direct federal spending 

by about $1.09 billion for fiscal year 2018. 

See figure 14 for examples of new financial 

savings for fiscal year 2018.

To calculate our financial benefits, we rely 

on estimates from non-GAO sources. These 

sources are typically the agency that acted 

on our work, a congressional committee, or 

the Congressional Budget Office. 

Figure 14: Examples of GAO’s Major New Financial Benefits Reported in Fiscal Year 2018

Description of New Financial Benefits

Amount

(Dollars in 

billions)

Ensuring that Medicaid Demonstrations are Budget Neutral. Many states conduct 

Medicaid demonstrations to test new ways to deliver services, and the Secretary of the 

Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) may allow costs for these projects that 

Medicaid would not usually cover. However, HHS policy requires that these projects be budget 

neutral. We have reported since 2002 that HHS used questionable methods to set spending 

limits for such projects, improperly increasing the federal government’s fiscal liability for 

Medicaid. In 2016, HHS revised its policy for setting spending limits, and estimated in 2018 

that this reduced the federal government’s fiscal liability by $36.8 billion in FYs 2016-2017. 

(GAO-08-87, GAO-13-384, GAO-14-689R, GAO-15-239, GAO-17-312) $36.8

Achieving and Measuring Fraud Prevention at CMS. Medicare has been on our list of 

high risk programs since 1990, partly because its complexity makes it vulnerable to fraud. 

CMS must conduct program integrity activities intended to reduce fraud. In October 2012, we 

found that, while CMS had implemented its Fraud Prevention System to evaluate potentially 

fraudulent claims, it had not determined whether the system was effective. By implementing 

our recommendations, CMS achieved, measured, and reported benefits in August 2017 of 

about $1.3 billion from preventing fraud and improper payments from the first 4 years of using 

this system. (GAO-13-104) $1.3

Reducing Military Personnel Budget Due to Excess Balances. Our review of DOD’s FY18 

Military Personnel (MILPERS) budget request identified millions in potential reductions. These 

potential reductions were based on the reported balances of expired unobligated amounts 

from FYs 2012-2015. We provided our analysis to the House and Senate Appropriations 

Committees, and the Congress reduced DOD’s FY18 MILPERS budget by approximately 

$849 million in the Consolidated Appropriations Act for 2018. $0.85

Reducing Fragmentation and Overlap in Teacher Quality Programs. We have found that 

a number of federal education programs all have similar goals, beneficiaries, and activities. 

For example, we identified 82 federal programs in 2011 that all support teacher quality. Having 

this many programs with similar goals can frustrate agency efforts to manage these portfolios. 

It also increases costs for the government, and makes it difficult to identify the most costeffective programs. We recommended that the Congress consider consolidating or eliminating 

some of these programs. In response, the Congress did not authorize funding for 4 of these 

programs—yielding $678 million in financial benefits for FY17. (GAO-11-510T) $0.68

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Note: Additional examples of fiscal year 2018 financial benefits can be found in Part II of this report.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 27 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP
28 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

Source: Photodisc. | GAO-19-1SP

Many of the benefits that result from our 

work cannot be measured in dollar terms, 

so we refer to them as “other benefits.” 

During fiscal year 2018, we recorded a total 

of 1,294 other benefits (see fig. 15). We 

exceeded our target by about 8 percentage 

points largely because of a number of 

accomplishments we documented for 

public safety and security and business 

process and management. We have set 

our 2019 target for these other benefits at 

1,200 again given our past, ongoing, and 

expected work. 

Figure 15: Other Benefits

0

300

600

900

1200

1500

2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2018

Number

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Actual Target Actual

1,200

1,314 1,288 1,234 1,286 1,280 1,294

We categorize our other benefits into 

six areas—similar to those on our High 

Risk List (see fig. 16). This year, most of 

our other benefits were in public safety 

and security (39 percent) and business 

process and management (29 percent). 

See figure 17 and Part II of this report for 

specific examples.

Figure 16: Types of Fiscal Year 2018 Other 

Benefits

0

10

20

30

40

50

Percentage of total

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

 Program Efficiency 

 and Effectiveness

Business Process 

 and Management 

8%

39%

2%

11% 11%

29%

 

Acquisition and 

Contract Management

 Public Safety and 

 Security

 Public Insurance

 and Benefits

 

Tax Law 

Administration

Other Benefits
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 29 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

Examples of programs included in the six categories in figure 16 are:

 Public insurance and benefits. Medicare, Medicaid, VA, and DOD health care, disability 

programs, food assistance, education programs, national flood insurance, federal 

deposit insurance, and other insurance programs.

 Public safety and security. Homeland security and justice programs; critical 

infrastructure, including information security; critical technologies; food safety; 

transportation safety; telecommunications safety; international food assistance; public 

health; consumer protection; environmental issues; national defense; foreign policy; and 

international trade.

 Acquisition and contract management. DOD weapon systems acquisitions, National 

Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) acquisition management, and all federal 

agency and interagency contract management.

 Tax law administration. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) business systems modernization, 

tax policy, and enforcement of tax laws.

 Program efficiency and effectiveness. Fraud, waste, and abuse; U.S. financial 

regulatory system; federal oil and gas resources; U.S. Postal Service (USPS); 

transportation funding; and telecommunications funding.

 Business process and management. Federal financial reporting; federal information 

systems; federal real property; human capital management; and DOD business 

transformation, business systems modernization, financial management, support 

infrastructure management, and supply chain management.

Figure 17: Examples of GAO’s Other Benefits Reported in Fiscal Year 2018

Category Description

Public 

Insurance and 

Benefits

Minimizing Duplicate Enrollment in Medicaid and Federally-subsidized Health 

Coverage. Many low-income individuals may transition between Medicaid and 

federally-subsidized health coverage purchased from exchanges. In 2015, we found 

that such individuals may become simultaneously enrolled in both types of coverage, 

which is generally not allowed. We also found that CMS did not have adequate controls 

to prevent and detect this duplicate coverage. In response, CMS began implementing 

procedures to better detect duplicate coverage from 2015 through 2017—minimizing 

the risk of the federal government paying twice for an individual’s health coverage. 

(GAO-16-73)

Public Safety 

and Security

Improving the Reliability of Data on Asylum Fraud Investigations. People who 

have been persecuted or fear persecution in their own countries can seek refuge in the 

United States by applying for asylum. We reported in December 2015 that DHS had a 

limited ability to detect fraud in asylum applications. For example, U.S. Citizenship and 

Immigration Services (USCIS) did not have complete data on fraud investigations. We 

recommended that USCIS collect reliable data about such efforts. In response, USCIS 

improved its tracking database and updated its training materials, which should help 

USCIS better detect and prevent fraud. (GAO-16-50)
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

30 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

Acquisition 

and Contract 

Management

Addressing F-35 Aircraft Deficiencies and Modernization Plans. In 2018, we found 

that DOD planned to begin full-scale production of the F-35 aircraft without fixing nearly 

200 critical deficiencies—which could add to the program’s estimated costs of over 

$406 billion if aircraft need to be retrofitted later. We recommended and DOD agreed to 

resolve these deficiencies before it moved to full-scale production. Although DOD has 

plans to modernize the F-35—an initial estimated cost of $3.9 billion—we asked the 

Congress to consider delaying funding for this until DOD provides a sound business 

case. As a result, the Congress limited modernization funding pending a cost and 

schedule estimate from DOD. (GAO-18-321)

Program 

Efficiency and 

Effectiveness

Improving Regulators’ Supervision of Banks’ Ability to Withstand Financial 

Stress. Large banks must test their ability to withstand financial hardships. In 2016, we 

found that federal regulators that oversee this requirement implemented it differently, 

which could cause uneven oversight. The Federal Reserve also assesses the 

processes that banks use to ensure they hold enough capital to absorb unexpected 

losses—but it did not disclose enough information to banks and the public about how it 

conducts these assessments and what it found. Our recommendations led regulators 

to improve coordination and the Federal Reserve to provide more information to banks 

and the public, which should improve regulatory oversight. (GAO-17-48)

Business 

Process and 

Management

Improving Improper Payment Risk Assessment and Estimation Processes. The 

federal government remains unable to tell how many improper payments it is making, 

or to ensure that actions are being taken to reduce them. In FY 2018, we found that the 

improper payment risk assessment process at certain agencies was not complete. We 

also found that some agencies were not producing reliable estimates of their improper 

payments. We made several recommendations to help them better identify programs at 

high risk for improper payments and better estimate the amount of improper payments. 

The agencies either agreed or partially agreed, but we continue to believe the 

recommendations all warrant action. (GAO-18-316R, GAO-18-36, GAO-18-377) 

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Note: Additional examples of other benefits for the fiscal year can be found in Part II of this report.

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Beryl Davis, Director, Financial Management and Assurance Team, discussed GAO’s work on improper payments on 

Government Matters.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 31 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

Past Recommendations Implemented

One way we measure our effect on 

improving the government’s accountability, 

operations, and services is tracking 

the percentage of recommendations 

that we made 4 years ago that have 

since been implemented. Putting these 

recommendations into practice generates 

tangible benefits for the nation. We use 

a 4-year reporting window because it 

generally takes that much time to fully 

implement some of our recommendations. 

The 77 percent implementation rate 

for fiscal year 2018 increased by 1 

percentage point from 2017, but fell 

below our target of 80 percent for the 

year (see fig. 18). However, we have 

made steady progress toward this goal 

since fiscal year 2016, when we achieved 

a 73 percent implementation rate. To 

help continue this upward trend, we 

(1) sent letters to the heads of most 

federal departments to acknowledge 

progress made toward implementing our 

priority recommendations and to draw 

their attention to those still warranting 

action; (2) highlighted the status of 

key recommendations in our annual 

duplication, fragmentation, and overlap 

work—including progress made and the 

benefits of full implementation; and 

(3) received support from the Congress, 

which included provisions in the 2018 

Ominbus Appropriations Act requiring 

federal agencies, such as DOD, DHS, 

and VHA, to report on how they plan to 

implement our recommendations. 

Our 4-year average implementation rate 

for past recommendations has been 76 

percent. We are retaining our target of 

80 percent for fiscal year 2019 and will 

continue to take appropriate actions to 

reach this target. (See Setting Performance 

Targets)

Other Measures of Our Results

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

32 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

Figure 18: Percentage of Past 

Recommendations Implemented

Four-year implementation rate

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Actual Target Actual

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2018

79% 80%

73% 78% 79% 76% 77%

As figure 19 shows, agencies need time 

to act on our recommendations. Our 

experience indicates that recommendations 

remaining open after a four-year period are 

generally not implemented in subsequent 

years. 

Figure 19: Cumulative Implementation Rate for 

Recommendations Made in Fiscal Year 2014

Percentage

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

After

4 years

After

3 years

After

2 years

After

1 year

77%

52%

37%

17%

New Products Containing 

Recommendations

In fiscal year 2018, about 64 percent of the 

512 written products we issued contained 

recommendations (see fig. 20). We track 

the percentage of new products with 

recommendations because we want to 

focus on developing recommendations that, 

when implemented, produce financial and 

other benefits for the nation. We exceeded 

our target of 60 percent by 4 percentage 

points. We are maintaining the 60 percent 

target for 2019 because we recognize that 

including recommendations in our products 

is not always warranted, and the Congress 

and agencies often find informational 

reports as useful as those that contain 

recommendations. Our informational 

reports have the same analytical rigor and 

meet the same quality standards as those 

with recommendations and, similarly, 

can help to bring about substantial 

financial and other key benefits. Hence, 

this measure allows us some flexibility 

in responding to requests that result in 

reports without recommendations.

Figure 20: Percentage of New Products with 

Recommendations

Percentage

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Actual Target Actual

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2018

63% 63% 64% 60%

66% 68% 64%

Note: See Part V for detailed information on data sources 

that we use to assess each performance measures, as well 

as the steps we take to verify and validate the data.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 33 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Report to the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, 

House of Representatives 

United States Government Accountability Office

March 2018

GAO-18-142SP

Convened by the Comptroller General

of the United States

HIGHLIGHTS OF A FORUM

TECHNOLOGY ASSESSMENT

Emerging Opportunities, Challenges, 

and Implications

Artificial Intelligence
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

34 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

To fulfill the informational needs of the 

Congress, we plan to deliver the results of 

our work orally, as well as in writing, at 

a time agreed upon with our client. Our 

performance this year indicates that we 

assisted the Congress well. In fiscal year 

2018, we received requests for work from 

90 percent of the standing committees 

of the Congress and 43 percent of the 

subcommittees. Our 4-year average for 

these requests is 94 percent and 49 

percent, respectively. We strive to respond 

to all congressional requests for testimony 

and deliver almost all of our products when 

promised, based on our clients’ needs. We 

issued 679 total products and completed 

work for 114 committees or subcommittees 

in fiscal year 2018. 

Testimonies

Our clients often invite us to testify on our 

current and past work as it relates to issues 

that committees are examining through 

the congressional hearing process. During 

fiscal year 2018, our senior executives 

were asked to testify 98 times and we fell 

22 testimonies short of our target (see 

fig. 21). Although we did not meet our 

target, we were asked to testify before 48 

separate committees or subcommittees—

on topics spanning most federal agencies 

(see fig. 22). This measure is client-driven 

based on invitations to testify; therefore, 

we cannot always anticipate clients’ 

specific subject area interests. The 98 

testimonies that our senior executives 

delivered in fiscal year 2018 covered the 

scope of our mission areas. Fifty percent of 

the testimonies that our senior executives 

delivered were related to our high risk 

areas and programs, which are listed on 

page 42 of this report. 

Figure 21: Testimonies

0

50

100

150

2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2018

Number

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Actual Target Actual

120 114 119

109

99 98

129

Our senior executives also participated in 

7 roundtables sponsored by congressional 

committees, subcommittees, or working 

groups. The topics covered by these 

roundtables included reforming the 

veterans appeals process, Indian school 

infrastructure needs, VA procurement, antiterrorism standards program for chemical 

facilities, and reauthorizing DHS (see text 

box below). We were also asked to submit 

three Statements for the Record in lieu of 

testifying. 

For 2019, we have maintained our target of 

120 testimonies, which we consider a 

stretch goal, given the level of testimony 

requests in recent years. (See p. 24 and 

Setting Performance targets.)

Informing the Debate on DHS Reauthorization: In February 2018, GAO served as an expert witness at 

a roundtable on draft legislation to reauthorize DHS. As of September 30, 2018, the DHS Authorization 

Act passed the House and was being considered in the Senate. If enacted, the act would reinforce GAO 

recommendations to strengthen DHS’s management. For example, it would codify steps DHS has taken 

to strengthen acquisitions (GAO-17-171, GAO-12-833), codify aspects of its Office of International Affairs 

(GAO-13-681), require a review of DHS’s research and development policies (GAO-12-837), and require states to 

better report on emergency preparedness grants (GAO-12-303, GAO-12-342SP).

Focusing on Our Client
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 35 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

 Observations on DOJ’s Grantees’ Capacity to 

Process DNA Evidence

 Observations on the Supplemental Nutrition 

Assistance Program

 Improving DOD’s Oversight of its Program for 

Transitioning Veterans 

 Observations on the Strategic Petroleum 

Reserve’s Emergency Stockpile

 Improving Retrospective Reviews Under the 

Regulatory Flexibility Act

 Addressing DOE Management Challenges

 Implementing Positive Train Control

 Addressing Native American Youth in the 

Justice System

 Reducing Risk of Harm to Medicare 

Beneficiaries from Prescription Opioids

 Improving the Transfer and Monitoring of 

Unaccompanied Children

 Improving Federal Management of Indian 

Programs

 Improving Oversight of VA Health Care 

Providers

Goal 1: Address Current and Emerging Challenges to the Well-being and Financial 

Security of the American People

 Addressing Longstanding Management 

Challenges for Immigration Courts

 Improving Management of the Coast Guard’s 

Acquisition Portfolio

 Securing the Southwest Border—Progress and 

Challenges

 Improving Navy and Marine Corps Plans to Train 

for Amphibious Operations

 Enhancing Information Sharing with Private 

Sector on Counterfeits Market 

 Improving Oversight of the Antiterrorism 

Assistance Program

 Using TSA Data to Monitor Airport 

Operations Including Passenger Wait Times 

 Preliminary Observations on Reported 

Injuries to U.S. Personnel in Cuba

 Monitoring Inter-American Assistance 

Agreements and U.S. Contributions

 Improving Management of DHS’ Chemical 

Facility Security Program

 Improving VA’s Medical and Surgical Supply 

Contracts to Reduce Costs

Goal 2: Respond to Changing Security Threats and the Challenges of Global 

Interdependence

 Addressing Physical Security Challenges at NIST 

and Commerce

 Implementing High-Risk Recommendations for IT 

Acquisitions, Operations, and Cybersecurity

 Mitigating Key Risks for 2020 Census

 Improving Federal Regulatory Guidance Practices 

 Addressing DHS’ Urgent Cybersecurity Workforce 

Needs

 Observations on Challenges and Opportunities 

for Grants Management 

 Addressing Cost Growth and Schedule Delays in 

NASA’s Major Projects

 Addressing Management Challenges 

Presented by Budget Uncertainty

 Preparing for VA’s Transition to a New 

Electronic Health Record System

 Improving Government Efficiency and 

Effectiveness to Reduce Federal Costs

 Observations on USPTO’s Covered Business 

Method Patent Review Program

 Improving Management of Medicare’s Fraud 

Risks

 Addressing Delays in NASA’s Commercial 

Crew Program

Goal 3: Help Transform the Federal Government to Address National Challenges

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Note: Additional information on selected testimonies can be found in Part II of this report.

Figure 22: Selected Testimony Topics • Fiscal Year 2018
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

36 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

Comptroller General Testifying Before the Congress

Source: GAO (two photos above, screenshots of GAO website, and covers of GAO reports). | GAO-19-1SP

August 21, 2018

Comptroller General testified to the U.S. Senate on Medicaid: 

CMS Has Taken Steps to Address Program Risks but Further 

Actions Needed to Strengthen Program Integrity

MEDICAID

CMS Has Taken Steps to 

Address Program Risks 

but Further Actions 

Needed to Strengthen 

Program Integrity

Statement of Gene L. Dodaro 

Comptroller General of the United States

Testimony 

Before the Committee on Homeland 

Security and Governmental Affairs, U.S. 

Senate

For Release on Delivery 

Expected at 10:00 am ET Tuesday, August 21, 2018

GAO-18-687T

United States Government Accountability Office

April 26, 2018 

Comptroller General testified to the U.S. House of 

Representatives on GAO’s 2018 Duplication Report
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 37 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

Timeliness

To be useful to the Congress, our products 

must be available when our clients need 

them. In fiscal year 2018, we exceeded 

our timeliness target of 90 percent by 7 

percentage points (see fig. 23). We reach 

out directly to our clients through several 

means, including an electronic feedback 

form. We use the results of our client 

feedback form as a primary source and 

barometer for whether we are getting 

our products to our congressional clients 

when they need the information. To 

calculate this result, we tally responses 

from the client survey form we send to 

key congressional staff working for the 

requesters of our testimony statements 

and more significant written products (e.g., 

engagements assigned an interest level 

of “high” by our senior management and 

those expected to reach 500 staff days or 

more), which represented about 64 percent 

of the congressionally requested written 

products we issued in fiscal year 2018. 

Because our products usually have multiple 

requesters, we often send forms to more 

than one congressional staff person per 

testimony or product. One of the questions 

on each form asks the client whether the 

product was provided or delivered on time. 

In fiscal year 2018, of the congressional 

staff that responded to the question on 

timeliness, 97 percent said our products 

were on time. Overall, the response rate 

to our entire form was about 23 percent. 

We received feedback on 52 percent of the 

products for which we sent forms. 

We have consistently set a high target for 

timeliness because it is important for us to 

meet congressional needs when they occur. 

We have again set our fiscal year 2019 

target at 90 percent because we believe 

that this is realistic given current staffing 

levels and workload demands. 

Figure 23: Timeliness

Percentage of products on time

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Actual Target Actual

90% 94% 95% 98% 94% 96% 97%

0

20

40

60

80

100

2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2018

Note: See Part V for detailed information on data sources 

that we use to assess each performance measures, as well 

as the steps we take to verify and validate the data.

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

38 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

Focusing on Our People

Our highly diverse and professional 

multidisciplinary staff were critical to our 

fiscal year 2018 performance. Our ability 

to hire, develop, retain, and lead staff is 

key to fulfilling our mission of serving the 

Congress and the American people. Over 

the last 11 fiscal years, we have refined 

our processes for measuring how well we 

manage our human capital. In fiscal year 

2018, we exceeded the targets for all seven 

of our people measures. These measures 

are directly linked to our Goal 4 strategic 

objective of being a leading practices 

federal agency. For more information about 

our people measures, see pages 123-128 of 

this report.

New Hire Rate

Our new hire rate is the ratio of the 

number of people hired to the number we 

planned to hire. GAO’s annual workforce 

planning process helps to identify the 

human capital resource requirements 

needed to accomplish its mission. It is the 

key tool to put strategic goals into human 

capital actions that are needed to respond 

to changing work environments. The 

workforce plan takes into account strategic 

goals, projected workload requirements, 

and other changes, such as retirements, 

attrition, promotions, and skill gaps. It 

specifies the number of planned hires for 

the upcoming year. Adjustments to the plan 

are made throughout the year, if necessary, 

to respond immediately to the most 

pressing issues for congressional oversight 

and decision making. Table 4 shows that in 

fiscal year 2018, our new hire rate was 85 

percent. We planned to hire 260 new staff, 

and filled 222 positions (85 percent of our 

target) by the end of the year. 

Table 4: Actual Performance and Targets Related to Our New Hire Rate Measure

Performance

measure

2013

actual

2014

actual

2015

actual

2016

actual

2017

actual

2018

target

2018

actual

People

New hire rate 66% 88% 83% 81% 83% 80% 85%

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Retention Rate

We continuously strive to make GAO a 

place where people want to work. Once 

we have made an investment in hiring and 

training people, we would like them to stay 

with us. This measure is one indicator of 

whether we are attaining this objective. 

We calculate this measure by taking 100 

percent minus the attrition rate, where 

attrition rate is defined as the number of 

separations divided by the average onboard 

strength. We calculate this measure with 

and without retirements. Table 5 shows 

that in fiscal year 2018, we exceeded our 

target rate of 92 percent for retention with 

retirements by 2 percentage points at 94 

percent. We also exceeded our retention 

rate target without retirements by one 

percentage point at 97 percent. 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 39 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

Staff Development and Utilization, 

Effective Leadership by Supervisors, 

and Organizational Climate

One way that we measure how well we 

are supporting our staff and providing an 

environment for professional growth is 

through our annual employee feedback 

survey. This anonymous, web-based survey 

is administered to all of our employees 

once a year. Through the survey, we 

encourage our staff to indicate what 

they think about our overall operations, 

work environment, and organizational 

culture and how they rate their immediate 

supervisors on key aspects of their 

leadership styles. (See Part V of this report 

on pp. 119-129 for additional information 

about these measures.) This fiscal year, 

67 percent of our employees completed 

the survey, and we exceeded all four 

targets (see table 6). Our performance on 

staff development exceeded our target 

of 80 percent by 3 percentage points. 

Staff utilization exceeded our target of 76 

percent by 2 percentage points, leadership 

exceeded our target of 82 percent by 3 

percentage points, and organizational 

climate exceeded our target of 76 

percent by 5 percentage points. Given our 

performance on these measures in recent 

years, we have decided to keep these 

targets for fiscal year 2019.

Table 5: Actual Performance and Targets Related to Our Retention Rate Measures, Including and 

Excluding Retirements

Performance

measures

2013

actual

2014

actual

2015

actual

2016

actual

2017

actual

2018

target

2018

actual

People

Retention rate

With retirements 93% 94% 94% 93% 94% 92% 94%

Without retirements 96% 97% 96% 96% 97% 96% 97%

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Table 6: Actual Performance and Targets Related to Our Measures of Employee Satisfaction with 

Staff Development, Staff Utilization, Effective Leadership by Supervisors, and Organizational Climate

Performance

measuresa 2013

actual

2014

actual

2015

actual

2016

actual

2017

actual

2018

target

2018

actual

2019

target

People

Staff development 80% 83% 84% 83% 84% 80% 83% 80%

Staff utilization 75% 77% 79% 79% 80% 76% 78% 76%

Effective leadership 

by supervisors 83% 83% 83% 85% 84% 82% 85% 82%

Organizational 

climate 77% 79% 80% 81% 83% 76% 81% 76%

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

a

Certain portions of our web-based survey are used to develop these four measures (see Appendix on Data Quality) .
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

40 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

Our mission and people are supported 

by our administrative services, including 

information management, infrastructure 

operations, human capital, and financial 

management. To assess our performance 

and set targets related to how well our 

administrative services help employees 

get their jobs done and improve quality 

of work life, and employee satisfaction 

with IT tools, we use information from 

our annual customer satisfaction survey 

(see table 7). We ask staff to rate internal 

services available to them, indicating 

their satisfaction with each service from 

“very dissatisfied” to “very satisfied,” 

or to indicate that they did not use the 

service. Our internal operations measures 

are directly related to our efforts under 

Goal 4 of our strategic plan to enable 

quality, timely service to the Congress and 

be a leading practices federal agency. We 

measured staff satisfaction with our three 

internal operations for fiscal year 2018 

through our internal customer satisfaction 

survey, conducted in two parts—half of the 

GAO staff in February 2018 and the second 

half in August 2018, to allow us to identify 

and respond to issues more quickly. 

The first measure includes services that 

help employees get their jobs done, such as 

hiring, IT support, internal communications, 

and report production. The second measure 

includes services that affect quality of work 

life, such as assistance related to pay and 

leave, building security and maintenance, 

and reasonable accommodations. The third 

measure includes IT tools, such as our 

internal engagement management system, 

telework tools, and the intranet. Using 

survey responses, we calculate a composite 

score for each service category. 

Table 7 shows that in fiscal year 2018, we 

exceeded our target rate of 80 percent 

for “help get job done” by 5 percentage 

points at 85 percent. We also exceeded 

our target of 80 percent for quality of 

work life by 2 percentage points at 82 

percent. We fell short of our target of 80 

percent for IT tools by 7 percentage points 

at 73 percent. In fiscal year 2019, we will 

continue our efforts to improve employee 

satisfaction with IT tools, including updates 

to our virtual desktop infrastructure and 

online collaboration tools. Given our recent 

performance, we have decided to keep 

these targets for fiscal year 2019 (see 

Setting Performance Targets). 

Focusing on Our Internal Operations

Table 7: Actual Performance and Targets Related to Our Internal Operations Measures

Performance

measures

2013

actual

2014

actual

2015

actual

2016

actual

2017

actual

2018

target

2018

actual

2019

target

Internal operations

Help get job done 82% 82% 80% N/Aa 84% 80% 85% 80%

Quality of work life 78% 78% 78% N/Aa 82% 80% 82% 80%

IT tools 68%b 65% 67% N/Aa 74% 80% 73% 80%

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Notes: Information explaining the measures included in this table appears in the Appendix on Data Quality.

a

We did not have data to report for fiscal year 2016 because the survey was conducted on a calendar year basis (denoted by N/A). 

b

In 2013, we added the IT performance measure to better gauge and track satisfaction with GAO’s IT services. In prior survey 

years, IT services were covered under another performance measure (denoted by N/A). 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 41 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

GAO’s High Risk Program

At the start of each new Congress, we issue 

a biennial update of our High Risk Report. 

This report focuses attention on government 

operations that are at high risk of fraud, 

waste, abuse, and mismanagement, or need 

transformative change. Our 2017 edition 

offered solutions to 34 high risk programs 

with the potential to save billions of dollars, 

improve service to the public, and 

strengthen the performance and 

accountability of the U.S. government. Our 

next update will be issued in early 2019.

The major cross-cutting high risk 

program areas include transforming DOD 

business operations, and ensuring the 

nation’s cybersecurity, managing federal 

contracting more effectively, assessing 

the efficiency and effectiveness of tax 

law administration, and modernizing 

and safeguarding insurance and benefit 

programs. Our 2018 high-risk work 

produced 166 reports, 49 testimonies, 

$46.8 billion in financial benefits, and 526 

program and operational benefits. The high 

risk areas with the largest financial benefits 

were Medicaid, Medicare, DOD Weapon 

Systems Acquisition, Federal Disability 

Programs, and Pension Benefit Guaranty 

Corporation Insurance Programs. 

While our next High Risk Report will not 

be issued until 2019, we did add one new 

area to our High Risk List in fiscal year 

2018—bringing the total number of areas to 

35. Specifically, we added the governmentwide personnel security process to this 

list in January 2018. The Comptroller 

General determined that it was important 

to call policymakers’ attention to this area 

then, based on (1) the importance of a 

high quality and timely personnel security 

clearance process to national security, and 

(2) the results of two reports (GAO-18-117

and GAO-18-29), which found that 

executive branch agencies were unable to 

investigate and process personnel security 

clearances in a timely manner. This had 

contributed to a backlog of background 

investigations, totaling over 700,000 cases 

as of September 2017. We also updated the 

cybersecurity area on our High Risk List.

The Program Management Improvement 

Accountability Act of 2017, which seeks to 

improve program and project management 

in federal agencies, included provisions for 

(1) the Deputy Director of OMB to address 

programs on GAO’s High Risk List, and (2)

GAO to review the effectiveness of key 

efforts under the act. 

Our experience for more than 26 years 

has shown that the key elements needed 

to make progress in high risk areas are 

(1) congressional action, (2) high-level 

Administration initiatives, and/or (3) agency 

efforts targeted to address the risk. 

In 2018, we continued to meet with agency 

leaders in a series of regular meetings 

to discuss progress and actions needed 

for removal from our High Risk List. A 

complete list of these areas is shown in 

table 8 and details can be found at 

https://www.gao.gov/highrisk/overview. 

Opportunities to Reduce 

Fragmentation, Overlap, and 

Duplication; and Achieve 

Other Financial Benefits

In April 2018, we issued our eighth 

annual report to the Congress on federal 

programs, agencies, offices, and initiatives 

Our 2018 high-risk work produced:

 166 reports 

 49 testimonies 

 $46.8 billion in financial benefits

 526 other benefits 

Other Ways GAO Served the Congress and the American People
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

42 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

Table 8: GAO’s High Risk List as of September 30, 2018 

High risk area Year 

designated

Strengthening the Foundation for Efficiency and Effectiveness

 Improving Federal Programs that Serve Tribes and Their Membersa 2017

 2020 Decennial Census 2017

 U.S. Government’s Environmental Liabilitiesa 2017

 Improving the Management of IT Acquisitions and Operations 2015

 Limiting the Federal Government’s Fiscal Exposure by Better Managing Climate Change Risks 2013

 Management of Federal Oil and Gas Resources 2011

 Modernizing the U.S. Financial Regulatory System and the Federal Role in Housing Financea 2009

 Restructuring the U.S. Postal Service to Achieve Sustainable Financial Viabilitya 2009

 Funding the Nation’s Surface Transportation Systema 2007

 Managing Federal Real Property 2003

 Strategic Human Capital Managementa 2001

Transforming DOD Program Management

 DOD Approach to Business Transformation 2005

 DOD Support Infrastructure Managementa 1997

 DOD Business Systems Modernization 1995

 DOD Financial Management 1995

 DOD Supply Chain Management 1990

 DOD Weapon Systems Acquisition 1990

Ensuring Public Safety and Security

 Government-wide Personnel Security Clearance Process (new) 2018

 Mitigating Gaps in Weather Satellite Data 2013

 Protecting Public Health through Enhanced Oversight of Medical Products 2009

 Transforming EPA’s Processes for Assessing and Controlling Toxic Chemicals 2009

 Ensuring the Effective Protection of Technologies Critical to U.S. National Security Interestsa 2007

 Improving Federal Oversight of Food Safetya 2007

 Strengthening Department of Homeland Security Management Functions 2003

 Ensuring the Cybersecurity of the Nationa 1997

Managing Federal Contracting More Effectively 

 DOD Contract Managementa 1992

 DOE’s Contract Management for the National Nuclear Security Administration and Office of 

Environmental Management 1990

 NASA Acquisition Management 1990

Assessing the Efficiency and Effectiveness of Tax Law Administration 

 Enforcement of Tax Lawsa 1990

Modernizing and Safeguarding Insurance and Benefit Programs 

 Managing Risks and Improving VA Health Carea 2015

 National Flood Insurance Programa 2006

 Improving and Modernizing Federal Disability Programs 2003

 Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation Insurance Programsa 2003

 Medicaid Programa 2003

 Medicare Programa 1990

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

a

Legislation is likely to be necessary in order to effectively address this area.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 43 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

that have duplicative goals or activities, 

as well as opportunities to achieve greater 

efficiency and effectiveness that result in 

cost savings or enhanced revenue collection 

(GAO-18-371SP). 

Our 2018 report identified 68 new actions 

that executive branch agencies or the 

Congress could take to improve the 

efficiency and effectiveness of government 

across 23 new program areas. We found 

evidence of fragmentation, overlap, or 

duplication in 13 of these areas. For 

example, DOD could potentially save 

approximately $527 million over 5 years 

by minimizing unnecessary overlap and 

duplication in its U.S. distribution centers 

for troop support goods.

We also highlighted 10 new areas to 

reduce the cost of government operations 

or enhance revenues. For example, 

the Congress and the IRS could realize 

hundreds of millions of dollars in savings 

and increased revenues by enhancing 

online services and improving efforts to 

prevent identity theft refund fraud.

In addition to identifying new areas, we 

continued to monitor the progress the 

Congress and executive branch agencies 

have made in addressing the 724 actions 

that we identified government-wide from 

2011 to 2017. Congressional and executive 

branch efforts to address these actions 

over the past 7 years have resulted in 

roughly $178 billion in financial benefits— 

$125 billion had accrued through 2017 

and at least an additional $53 billion in 

estimated benefits is projected to accrue in 

future years.

Policymakers and the public can track 

the status of congressional and executive 

branch efforts to address the issues we 

have previously identified on GAO’s Action 

Tracker, located on our website under the 

“Duplication and Cost Savings” collection 

https://www.gao.gov/duplication/action_

tracker/all_areas.

Financial Regulatory Reform 

in the Aftermath of the Global 

Financial Crisis 

Since the global financial crisis, which 

resulted in the collapse of financial 

firms around the world, the Congress 

and regulators have worked to improve 

oversight of the financial markets. A 

significant impetus for many reforms was 

the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and 

Consumer Protection Act (2010)—intended 

to address regulatory gaps and oversight 

failures in the U.S. mortgage, securities, 

and financial markets. We have completed 

almost 30 one-time studies, mandated by 

this act, and continue to work on several 

recurring studies. We have also identified 

several ways that financial regulators could 

better oversee markets and reduce risks 

to financial stability, market participants, 

investors, and consumers. 

To improve financial regulation and assist 

the Congress with financial reforms, 

we issued reports in fiscal year 2018 on 

how financial regulators could better 

assess the implementation of regulations 

and potentially reduce the burden of 

compliance (GAO-18-213, GAO-18-256). We 

also reported on bank regulators’ efforts 

to oversee risks in banks’ commercial real 

estate lending activities. For example, we 

found that, while loan delinquencies are 

now lower than during the crisis, the level 

of risk in bank loan portfolios has been 

increasing (GAO-18-245).

Since much of the financial crisis was due 

to problems with housing markets, we 

continued to examine improvements in 

the oversight of these markets, including 

identifying additional actions the Congress 

and housing regulators could take to 

strengthen capital requirements and stress 

testing practices. These actions could help 

ensure that the fund backing federallyinsured mortgages is able to withstand 

future economic downturns (GAO-18-92). 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

44 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 45 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

General Counsel Decisions

In addition to benefiting from our audit 

and evaluation work, which reflects 

considerable legal input, the Congress and 

the public also benefited from the legal 

products and activities undertaken by our 

Office of the General Counsel in fiscal year 

2018. The following exemplify some of our 

key contributions.

The Office of the General Counsel handled 

about 2,600 bid protests during the course 

of fiscal year 2018.8 The bid protest 

process was authorized by the Congress, 

as part of the Competition in Contracting 

Act of 1984, to provide companies with 

an administrative forum to challenge the 

award, or solicitation for the award, of 

a federal contract. The statute requires 

that GAO resolve protest disputes in no 

more than 100 calendar days, and, in most 

cases, requires agencies to stop work on a 

contract until the protest is resolved. The 

Congress adopted this stop work approach 

to preserve the possibility for meaningful 

relief upon completion of the protest. 

In fiscal year 2018, we issued more than 

600 decisions on the merits, which are 

accessible on GAO’s Bid Protest Decisions 

web page at https://www.gao.gov/legal/

bid-protests/search. These decisions 

addressed a wide range of issues involving 

compliance with, and the interpretation 

of, procurement statutes and regulations. 

Certain of these protests involved highly 

visible government programs and received 

extensive media coverage. Many of our 

fiscal year 2018 protests were resolved 

without a written decision on the merits 

because the federal agency involved 

voluntarily took corrective action to 

address the protest, in some cases after 

GAO used Alternative Dispute Resolution 

techniques. The remaining protests were 

decided on the merits, dismissed for 

8

The number of protests in the last 3 years are as follows: 2,596 filings 

in fiscal year 2017; 2,789 filings in fiscal year 2016; and 2,639 filings 

in fiscal year 2015.

procedural deficiencies, or withdrawn 

by the protester. As required by the 

Competition in Contracting Act of 1984, 

the Comptroller General reports annually 

to the Congress on federal agencies that 

do not fully implement a recommendation 

made by GAO in connection with a bid 

protest decided in the prior fiscal year.

The Consolidated Appropriations Act, 

2014,9 included a provision for GAO to 

develop an electronic filing and document 

dissemination system for bid protests. The 

statute also authorized GAO to collect 

and use fees to offset the costs of that 

system. On May 1, 2018, GAO successfully 

launched its new electronic bid protest 

filing system know as the Electronic Protest 

Docking System (EPDS) and the system 

has been working as fully expected. With 

the launch of the system, GAO began 

charging protesters a $350 filing fee for 

new protests. Prior to going live with the 

system, GAO thoroughly tested the system 

with active protests during a 3-month pilot 

program from February through April of 

2018. 

Within the Office of the General Counsel, 

seven attorneys appointed by the General 

Counsel also serve on our Contract Appeals 

Board, established by the Congress in 

2007 to hear and decide the appeals of 

contracting officer decisions with respect 

to contract disputes involving all legislative 

branch agencies. In addition to using 

Alternative Dispute Resolution procedures, 

the GAO Contract Appeals Board also issues 

formal decisions as necessary to adjudicate 

contract appeals. These appear on our 

website at https://www.gao.gov/legal/

contract/decisions.html. 

During fiscal year 2018, the GAO Contract 

Appeals Board opened eight new appeals 

and closed seven appeals. One appeal 

was dismissed for failure to prosecute 

the appeal, in accordance with our Board 

9

Pub. L. No. 113-76, div. I, title I, § 1501, 128 Stat. 5, 433-34 (Jan. 

17, 2014).
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

46 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

Rules; one appeal was withdrawn by the 

appellant; and five appeals were closed 

based on settlements by the parties 

based on varying degrees of GAO Contract 

Appeals Board input. There were also 

a number of instances involving the 

submission of appeals over which the 

GAO Contract Appeals Board did not have 

jurisdiction, and for which no appeal file 

was opened. At the end of fiscal year 

2018, the GAO Contract Appeals Board had 

seven pending appeals on its docket, as 

compared with six appeals pending at the 

end of fiscal year 2017. 

In fiscal year 2018, we published 15 

appropriations law products. These are 

available on our Appropriations Law 

Decisions web page at https://www.gao.

gov/legal/appropriations-law-decisions/

search. Five of these products were 

issued pursuant to our duties under the 

Impoundment Control Act of 1974. On 

May 8, 2018, the President transmitted 

to the Congress a special message 

proposing rescissions for 38 appropriation 

accounts. GAO mission teams identified 

prior work concerning the subject matter 

of the proposals and contacted officials 

at affected agencies for additional 

information. Our Office of the General 

Counsel reviewed the message and 

concluded that two of the proposed 

rescissions were not consistent with one 

of the requirements of the Impoundment 

Control Act of 1974 and, consequently, that 

the affected amounts could not be withheld 

from obligation.10 Subsequently, the Office 

of Management and Budget instructed the 

affected agency to release the amounts 

for obligation.11 We also reviewed the 

President’s supplementary special message 

of June 5, 2018, to confirm technical 

corrections and the proper withholding 

or release of amounts.12 Finally, after the 

Congress did not enact the proposals within 

10B-330045, May 22, 2018.

11B-330045.1, May 24, 2018.

12B-330045.2, June 18, 2018.

the period specified by law, we verified 

with the affected agencies that, as required 

by law, that they released the affected 

amounts for obligation.13 In addition, in 

December 2017, we issued an opinion noting 

an improper impoundment at the Advanced 

Research Projects Agency-Energy resulting 

from legislative proposals in the President’s 

budget request for fiscal year 2018.14 As 

a result of our work, the Department of 

Energy (DOE) immediately released $91 

million for obligation.

Other appropriations law decisions and 

opinions issued this fiscal year spanned 

a variety of topics. For example, we 

concluded that the Environmental 

Protection Agency violated the 

Antideficiency Act when it obligated 

more than $5,000 for the installation 

of a soundproof privacy booth without 

making a statutorily-required notification 

to the committees on appropriations.15 In 

another opinion, we concluded that the 

Department of Transportation violated both 

the Antideficiency Act and an anti-lobbying 

statutory provision when it “retweeted” 

and “liked” a tweet urging followers to tell 

the Congress to pass pending legislation.16

In an opinion that has important 

ramifications for agency obligational and 

funds-control practices, we discussed legal 

liabilities arising from the Commodity 

Futures Trading Commission’s leases for 

real property.17

GAO is also sometimes asked to provide 

opinions on Congressional Review Act 

(CRA)–related issues, primarily with 

regard to whether an agency action other 

than promulgation of a rule (e.g., issuing 

guidance or a memorandum) constitutes a 

“rule” as defined by the CRA. We issued 

seven opinions in fiscal year 2018.

13B-330045.3, July 3, 2018.

14B-329092, Dec. 12, 2017.

15B-329603, Apr. 16, 2018.

16B-329368, Dec. 13, 2017.

17B-328450, Mar. 6, 2018.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 47 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

Other Legal Work

Attorneys from the Office of the 

General Counsel also provided ongoing 

appropriations law assistance to various 

congressional committees and federal 

agencies on a number of topics, including 

the application of the Antideficiency Act 

and the Impoundment Control Act of 1974. 

We also informally assisted the Congress 

on a number of other matters, including 

agency reorganizations, continuing 

resolutions, legislative drafting, and 

transfer authority. 

GAO’s Principles of Federal Appropriations 

Law, commonly known as the Red Book, 

continued to be the primary resource for 

appropriations law guidance in the federal 

community. In fiscal year 2018, the Red 

Book averaged thousands of downloads 

as attorneys, budget analysts, financial 

managers, project managers, contracting 

officers, and accountable officers from all 

three branches of government accessed 

it to research questions about budget and 

appropriations law.18

Attorneys from the Office of the General 

Counsel continued to teach a 21⁄2-day 

course on appropriations law. They 

presented a framework for understanding 

and properly applying provisions of 

appropriations law— helping to ensure that 

agencies use public money as the Congress 

directs. We held 15 classes across 10 

agencies, including classes for the Senate 

and the House of Representatives. 

We also provided briefings for the staff 

of the appropriations committees and 

for both the Senate and the House of 

Representatives. In addition, attorneys 

spoke on our appropriations law work at 

18Principles of Appropriations Law, also known as the Red Book, is a 

multi-volume treatise concerning federal fiscal law available at https://

www.gao.gov/legal/red-book/overview. GAO-17-797SP (Washington, 

D.C.: Sept. 14, 2017), GAO-16-463SP (Washington, D.C.: Mar. 10, 

2016), GAO-16-464SP (Washington, D.C.: Mar.10, 2016), GAO15-303SP (Washington, D.C.: Mar. 12, 2015), GAO-08-978SP

(Washington, D.C.: Sept. 1, 2008), GAO-06-382SP (Washington, 

D.C.: Feb. 1, 2006), GAO-04-261SP (Washington, D.C.: Jan. 1, 2004).

conferences and trainings hosted by 6 

agencies and professional organizations. 

To enhance communication within the 

appropriations law community across all 

agencies and within the three branches 

of government, we hosted our fourteenth 

annual Appropriations Law Forum in March 

2018, in which 240 attorneys from 93 

government agencies and 26 Inspectors 

General offices participated. 

For fiscal year 2018, we received 8 

Antideficiency Act reports and made 

selected information from these reports 

available on our website. Since the 

Congress amended the Antideficiency Act 

in 2004 requiring agencies to send us a 

copy of any report of an Antideficiency Act 

violation, we have received 233 reports 

and maintain an official repository of 

Antideficiency Act reports. 

We continued to report under the CRA on 

major rules proposed by federal agencies 

to the standing committees of jurisdiction 

of both Houses of the Congress. We issued 

51 reports for rules received in fiscal year 

2018.

We also continued to fulfill our 

responsibilities under the Federal Vacancies 

Reform Act (FVRA). FVRA requires 

executive departments and agencies to 

immediately report to the Congress and 

the Comptroller General certain vacancies 

that require presidential appointment 

and Senate confirmation. It requires the 

Comptroller General to report to the 

Congress, the President, and the Office of 

Personnel Management if the Comptroller 

General determines that an acting 

official is serving longer than the 210-day 

period (including applicable extensions) 

established by the act.

In addition, we sometimes issue standalone 

advisory opinions for members of the 

Congress on agency adherence to laws 

applicable to their programs and activities. 

In November 2017, we identified gaps 

in current legislation addressing the 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

48 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

illegal trafficking of antiquities and the 

circumstances under which agencies may 

offer financial rewards for information 

about such trafficking.19

The Office of the General Counsel was 

involved in the analysis of a wide range of 

labor relations and federal employment 

issues, as well as privacy and document 

disclosure matters, during the course 

of the year. The Office of the General 

Counsel attorneys represented GAO and its 

officials in various ongoing civil litigation 

matters pending before federal courts 

and administrative boards. Attorneys also 

continued to provide training for managers 

on employment and other human capital 

responsibilities. The Office of the General 

Counsel was also an active stakeholder in 

ensuring that GAO’s acquisition practices 

and procedures comply with best practices.

19B-329243, Nov. 9, 2017.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 49 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

Through its domestic and international 

partnerships, GAO builds collaborative 

knowledge-sharing and capacity-building 

networks. We prioritize strong partnerships 

with federal inspectors general, state 

and local audit organizations, and other 

countries’ national audit offices—known as 

supreme audit institutions or SAIs. These 

networks enhance our ability to perform 

audits and allow us to shape professional 

audit standards and serve as a leader 

within the accountability community. They 

also allow GAO to participate in efforts to 

help strengthen the professional capacities 

of international and domestic audit 

organizations.

Networks, Collaborations, and 

Partnerships 

GAO is a leader in the accountability 

community. We work closely with SAIs, 

federal inspectors general, and state and 

local U.S. auditors to bolster expertise 

around emerging issues. This helps us 

address the unique challenges of overseeing 

federal spending that flows to international 

partners and sub-federal grant recipients at 

the state and local level. 

In addition, we share information about 

our mission and work with visitors to our 

agency headquarters. In fiscal year 2018, 

this included 220 international visitors 

from 59 countries. GAO values these visits 

as important opportunities to build or 

reinforce our professional networks. 

Federal, State, and Local Collaboration 

In fiscal year 2018, we continued to 

promote dialogue and action on domestic 

accountability issues to more than 740 

individuals through national and regional 

meetings of the intergovernmental audit 

forum network. Comptroller General 

advisory groups and partnerships—such as 

the Domestic Working Group and Council 

of the Inspectors General on Integrity and 

Efficiency (CIGIE)—hosted special events 

to discuss a wide range of topics. GAO 

planned these events to help auditors 

better understand or improve government 

strategies around disaster recovery, 

data transparency, cybersecurity, sexual 

harassment prevention, data analytics, and 

improper payments.

International Coordination 

GAO made substantial contributions 

to the international accountability 

community through its leadership role in 

the International Organization of Supreme 

Audit Institutions (INTOSAI), including 

participation in INTOSAI working groups 

and the INTOSAI Journal of Government 

Auditing (the INTOSAI Journal). 

INTOSAI is an umbrella organization for 

the international government auditing 

community that provides a framework 

to promote development and sharing 

of knowledge and improve government 

auditing around the world. In fiscal year 

2018, we led efforts to create the first 

INTOSAI Performance and Accountability 

Report. 

The INTOSAI Journal is INTOSAI’s official 

publication developed to promote 

collaboration and continuous improvement 

among the international accountability 

community. GAO manages quarterly 

publication of the journal on behalf of 

INTOSAI’s 194 members. In fiscal year 

2018, we launched a new journal website 

with interactive design features and 

improved accessibility to better reach this 

community. We enhanced the journal’s 

social media outreach strategy, increasing 

its Twitter following to over 1,100.

Strategic Partnerships 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

50 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

Capacity Building

Capacity-building efforts help the U.S. 

government promote good governance and 

ensure that federal funds for programs 

abroad are worthwhile investments. When 

developing countries bolster the professional 

capacities and independence of their audit 

agencies, they are better able to ensure 

government funds are spent efficiently and 

effectively. 

GAO continues to advance SAI capacitybuilding efforts, including the INTOSAIDonor Cooperation (IDC) initiative. Through 

this initiative, INTOSAI coordinates with 

members of the donor community to 

strategically invest in capacity-building 

efforts that strengthen SAIs in developing 

countries. GAO serves as INTOSAI’s Vice 

Chair of IDC. 

GAO also supports capacity building efforts 

through the International Auditor Fellowship 

Program, a four-month training for mid- to 

senior-level staff from SAIs. This program 

strengthens GAO’s partnerships in the 

international accountability community 

while also investing in future networks 

and relationships. In fiscal year 2018, GAO 

hosted 20 fellows from 15 countries and 

reached the milestone of over 600 graduates 

in the 40-year history of the program. 

Center for Audit Excellence 

The Congress authorized GAO to establish 

a Center for Audit Excellence (the Center) 

in 2014 in order to provide training and 

technical assistance to domestic and 

international accountability organizations. 

Although GAO contributes to a number 

of efforts that promote good governance 

and enhance accountability community 

capacity, the Center is unique in its ability 

to tackle complex training and capacitybuilding projects because it can offer 

a wide range of services at locations 

throughout the world. The Center is 

authorized to charge fees for its services to 

recover its costs.

In fiscal year 2018, the Center provided 

training and technical assistance to 12 

domestic audit organizations—including 

federal inspectors general and state and 

local audit offices—that enhanced their 

understanding of federal internal control 

standards, Government Auditing Standards, 

and performance audit methodologies. The 

Center also provided technical assistance to 

three SAIs in Europe and Central America 

to enhance their capacity to conduct and 

achieve results from performance audits.

The Center signed a Memorandum of 

Understanding (MOU) with the U.S. Agency 

for International Development in 2016. In 

fiscal year 2018, under the MOU, the Center 

assessed the capacity-building needs of 

an African country’s audit institutions and 

helped identify areas for improvement.

Managing Our Resources

Resources Used to Achieve Our Fiscal 

Year 2018 Performance Goals 

Our financial statements for the fiscal 

year ending September 30, 2018, were 

audited by an independent auditor, 

CliftonLarsonAllen, LLP, and received an 

unmodified opinion. The auditor found our 

internal controls over financial reporting to 

be effective—which means that no material 

weaknesses or significant deficiencies 

were identified—and reported that we 

substantially complied with the applicable 

requirements for financial systems in 

FFMIA. In addition, the auditor found no 

instances of noncompliance with the laws 

or regulations in the areas tested. In the 

opinion of the independent auditor, our 

financial statements are presented fairly in 

all material respects and are in accordance 

with accounting principles generally 

accepted in the United States. The 

auditor’s report, along with the statements

and accompanying notes, begins on page 90

in this report. 

Table 9 summarizes key data.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 51 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

Table 9: GAO’s Financial Summary (Dollars in Millions)

Fiscal year 2018 Fiscal year 2017

Total Assets $160.9 $106.1

Total Liabilities $81.7 $78.7

Total Net Position $79.2 $27.4

Net Cost of Operations by Goal

Goal 1: Well-being / Financial Security of 

American People $222.8 $215.5

Goal 2: Changing Security Threats / Challenges 

of Global Interdependence 151.8 148.4

Goal 3: Help Transform the Federal Government 

to Address National Challenges 144.1 144.2

Goal 4: Maximize the Value of GAO 14.9 15.7

Other Costs in Support of the Congress 49.4 45.7

Reimbursable services not attributable to above 

cost categories (14.0) (10.3)

Total Net Cost of Operations $569.0 $559.2

Actual full-time equivalents (FTE) 3,015 2,994

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Compared with the statements of large 

and complex departments in the executive 

branch, our statements present a relatively 

simple picture of a small yet very important 

agency in the legislative branch. We 

focus most of our financial activity on the 

execution of our congressionally approved 

budget with most of our resources devoted 

to the people needed for our mission. 

In fiscal year 2018, our budgetary resources 

included new direct appropriations of $578.9 

million plus $14 million of supplemental 

appropriations for disaster relief, and 

$32.2 million in spending authority from 

offsetting collections, primarily from the 

lease of space in our headquarters building 

and certain audits of agency financial 

statements. Our total budgetary resources 

in fiscal year 2018 were $668.5 million. 

Total assets were $160.9 million, consisting 

mostly of Fund balance with Treasury 

and property and equipment (including 

the headquarters building, land and 

improvements, and computer equipment and 

software). The increase in the Fund balance 

with Treasury line item at September 30, 

2018, resulted from increased appropriations 

over fiscal year 2017 to include additional 

appropriations for audits related to disaster 

relief for Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria 

and the 2017 wildfires. Total liabilities were 

$81.7 million and primarily consist of amounts 

earned and unpaid for employees’ salaries 

and benefits and accrued annual leave 

(earned but not used) as well as amounts 

owed to other government agencies and 

nongovernmental entities for products and 

services rendered to GAO. Total liabilities 

at the end of fiscal year 2018 remain 

substantially the same as total liabilities at 

the end of fiscal year 2017. 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

52 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

Deferred maintenance and repairs 

increased by $5.6 million ending with a 

balance of $29.1 million as of September 

30, 2018. The majority of the increase 

stems from a need to replace interior 

finishes on the second, fourth and fifth 

floors of the GAO headquarters building as 

well as replacement of other capitalized 

assets. Deferred maintenance and repairs 

is disclosed as Required Supplementary 

Information.

Our net cost of operations in fiscal year 

2018 is $569.0 million compared to $559.2 

million in fiscal year 2017. Our overall gross 

costs (before reimbursable services offset) 

increased almost 3% with no significant 

changes year to year amongst our major 

programs in Goals 1-4. As mainly a service 

organization, our largest cost category is 

salary and benefits. One of the greatest 

single increases in costs in fiscal year 2018 

related to federal employee retirement 

benefit costs paid by OPM and imputed to 

GAO. This increased by almost $10 million 

or 50% over fiscal year 2017 due to across 

the board increases in the cost factors OPM 

used to calculate the amounts imputed 

for pension as well as health and life 

insurance.

Figure 24 shows how our fiscal year 2018 

costs break down by category. 

Figure 24: Use of Fiscal Year 2018 Funds by 

Category: 

Percentage of total costs

Facilities

Salaries 

and benefits

5.2%

84.5%

IT services and 

equipment 6.0%

Contract services 

(non-IT)

Other 2.8%

1.5%

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Summary of Financial Systems 

Strategies and Framework 

In keeping with our effort to continuously 

improve our operations, we undertook 

a significant endeavor this fiscal year to 

migrate to a new financial management 

system. The migration to the Legislative 

Branch Financial Management System 

(LBFMS) aligns with guidance from the House 

Subcommittee on the Legislative Branch, 

to consolidate Legislative Branch financial 

operations. The Library of Congress is the 

system owner and the system is hosted 

on a cloud operated by CGI Federal, Inc. 

The LBFMS operates Oracle based federal 

accounting software, Momentum, as the 

integrated Financial Management System 

and hosts the transaction processing system 

in a FedRAMP compliant and secure facility. 

LBFMS utilizes Treasury’s eInvoicing system 

which allows non-federal customers to 

submit electronic invoices which, when 

approved by GAO, are loaded into the 

accounting system and paid. This improves 

internal controls over invoicing processing, 

reduces data entry errors, and increases 

efficiency and timeliness of payments. GAO 

engaged CGI Federal to conduct certain 

transaction processing services in LBFMS. 

Internal Controls 

We recognize the importance of internal 

controls to ensure our accountability, 

integrity, and reliability. To achieve a high 

level of quality, management maintains a 

quality control program and seeks advice 

and evaluation from both internal and 

external sources. 

We meet the internal control objectives of 

FMFIA and follow the spirit of OMB Circular 

No. A-123, Management’s Responsibility for 

Enterprise Risk Management and Internal 

Control, and all applicable appendices. 

Although we are not subject to the act or 

circular, we comply voluntarily with the 

requirements. Our internal controls are 

designed to provide reasonable assurance 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 53 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

that transactions are properly recorded, 

processed, and summarized to permit 

the preparation of financial statements 

and that assets are safeguarded against 

loss from unauthorized acquisition, use, 

or disposition. Further, our controls are 

designed to ensure that transactions are 

executed in accordance with the laws 

governing the use of budget authority, 

other laws, and regulations that could 

have a direct and material effect on the 

financial statements. 

Accordingly, we performed a risk-based 

assessment of internal control over 

reporting, operations, and compliance 

by identifying, analyzing, and testing 

controls for key business processes. Based 

on the results of the assessment, we have 

reasonable assurance that control over 

operations, reporting, and compliance 

as of September 30, 2018, was operating 

effectively and that no material control 

weaknesses were found in the design or 

operation of the internal control. Further, 

our independent auditor found that we 

maintained effective internal control over 

financial reporting and compliance with 

laws and regulations. The external auditor 

also found no material internal control 

weaknesses or significant deficiencies.

In addition, we met the objectives 

of FFMIA. We believe that we have 

implemented and maintained financial 

systems that comply substantially with 

federal financial management systems 

requirements, applicable federal 

accounting standards, and the U.S. 

Government Standard General Ledger at 

the transaction level as of September 30, 

2018. We made this assessment based 

on criteria established under FFMIA and 

guidance issued by OMB. 

While not subject to the Improper 

Payments Elimination and Recovery Act 

of 2012, we complied with the spirit of it 

which requires that agencies periodically 

review activities susceptible to significant 

improper payments, estimate the amount 

of improper payments (which are de 

minimus), and implement a plan to reduce 

and report estimated improper payments. 

We have implemented and maintained 

internal control procedures to monitor the 

disbursement of federal funds for valid 

obligations.

Our Office of Inspector General (OIG) 

independently conducts audits and 

investigations of GAO programs and 

operations. During fiscal year 2018, the 

OIG issued five audit reports. In audit 

report (OIG-18-1) the OIG assessed GAO 

compliance with federal guidance and 

requirements when making its fiscal 

year 2017, second quarter financial and 

award data submission for publication on 

USASpending.gov, as required by the Digital 

Accountability and Transparency Act (DATA 

Act). As reported in OIG-18-2, the OIG 

assessed the extent to which agency need 

required Forensic Audits and Investigative 

Service’s criminal investigators to work 

hours beyond their regularly scheduled 

40-hour workweek; and whether criminal 

investigators met the Law Enforcement 

Availability Pay (LEAP) Act eligibility 

requirements for receiving LEAP premium 

pay. The OIG also assessed the extent to 

which GAO had established controls for 

ensuring uniform standards are applied 

in debt and interest waiver decisions 

consistent with federal requirements as 

reported in OIG-18-3. In OIG-18-4, the 

OIG reported on its assessment of GAO’s 

information security controls, specifically 

GAO’s performance against select Federal 

Information Security Modernization Act of 

2014 metrics developed by the Department 

of Homeland Security. Finally, in OIG-18-5, 

the OIG reported on the extent to which 

GAO maintained effective contract closeout 

controls for reducing financial, operational, 

and compliance risks through fiscal year 

2017. These and other OIG publications are 

available at https://www.oversight.gov. 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

54 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

In addition, the OIG maintained a hotline 

for use by employees, contractors, and 

the public. The hotline is the primary 

source of complaints or information for 

identifying suspected fraud and other 

problems, abuses, and deficiencies relating 

to the administration of GAO’s programs 

and operations. Complaints are converted 

to OIG investigations when the complaint 

contains credible allegations involving 

GAO operations or its employees, and the 

possible violation of law or regulation. 

Investigations can substantiate an allegation; 

find the allegation to be unsubstantiated; or 

conclude that insufficient evidence exists 

for criminal and/or administrative action. 

In fiscal year 2018, the OIG initiated 22 

investigations and closed 12 investigations. 

The results of the IG’s work, and 

actions taken by us to address IG 

recommendations, are highlighted in the 

IG’s semiannual reports to the Congress and 

are available at https://www.oversight.gov. 

Furthermore, our Audit Advisory Committee 

assists the Comptroller General in 

overseeing the effectiveness of our financial 

reporting and audit processes, internal 

control over financial reporting, and 

processes that ensure compliance with laws 

and regulations relevant to our financial 

operations. The committee is composed of 

individuals who are independent of GAO 

and have outstanding reputations in public 

service or business with financial or legal 

expertise. For fiscal year 2018, the members 

of the committee were: 

 Michael A. Nemeroff (Chair), a partner 

in Sidley Austin LLP, and head of its 

Government Contracting Practice, and 

a former member of the GAO Legal 

Advisory Committee. 

 Robert H. Attmore, CPA, CGFM-Retired, 

previously served as the Chairman 

of the Governmental Accounting 

Standards Board, New York Deputy State 

Comptroller, President of the National 

State Auditors Association, and a 

Trustee of the Academy for Government 

Accountability. 

 Michael S. Helfer, former Vice Chairman 

of Citigroup Inc. Prior positions 

include partner and Chairman of the 

Management Committee of the law firm 

Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering. He serves 

on the Boards of Banco Nacional de 

Mexico and Shakespeare & Company.

 Robert Mednick, former worldwide 

Managing Partner of Professional and 

Regulatory Matters of Arthur Andersen, 

past Chairman of the American Institute 

of CPAs, and serves on a number of civic 

and charitable organization Boards.

The committee’s report appears in Part III

of this report on page 89.

Limitation on Financial Statements 

Responsibility for the integrity and 

objectivity of the financial information 

presented in the financial statements in 

this report rests with our managers. The 

statements were prepared to report our 

financial position and results of operations, 

consistent with the requirements of the 

Chief Financial Officers Act, as amended 

(31 U.S.C. 3515(b)). The statements were 

prepared from our financial records in 

accordance with Federal GAAP and the 

formats prescribed in OMB Circular No. 

A-136, Financial Reporting Requirements. 

These financial statements differ from 

the financial reports used to monitor and 

control our budgetary resources. However, 

both were prepared from the same 

financial records.

Our financial statements should be read 

with the understanding that as an agency 

of a sovereign entity, the U.S. government, 

we cannot liquidate certain liabilities (e.g., 

accrued annual leave) without legislation 

that provides resources to do so. Although 

future appropriations to fund these liabilities 

are likely and anticipated, they are not 

certain. 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 55 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

Planned Resources to Achieve Our 

Fiscal Year 2019 Performance Goals 

For fiscal year 2019, the Legislative 

Branch Appropriation provides GAO an 

appropriation of $589.7 million for the 

fiscal year which is a $10.8 million increase 

over the fiscal year 2018 enacted level. The 

increased funding allows GAO to add staff, 

better positioning us to achieve 3,150 FTEs 

in fiscal year 2019 and moving closer to our 

optimal staffing level of 3,250 FTEs.20

The additional staff will focus on 

(1) increasing critical cybersecurity issues 

and the threats to the nation’s critical 

infrastructure; (2) rapidly evolving science 

and technology issues; (3) the greater 

investment and requests in Department of 

Defense programs; and (4) the challenges 

associated with growing federal health care 

costs. 

Additionally, GAO is able to continue 

strategic investments on long delayed 

infrastructure activities by using the $10 

million in two-year infrastructure funding 

provided to us in FY 2018. The Information 

technology (IT) and building investments 

afforded by the two-year infrastructure 

funding will lower GAO’s operational costs 

in the long term and allow us to increase 

rental revenue by bringing in a new tenant. 

20Highlights of GAO-18-448T, a testimony before the Subcommittee 

on the Legislative Branch, Committee on Appropriations, U. S. House 

of Representatives) 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

56 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

Internal Management Challenges

The Comptroller General, along with 

his Executive Committee, and other 

senior executives, identify management 

challenges through the agency’s risk 

management, strategic planning, internal 

controls execution, and budgetary 

processes. We monitor our progress in 

addressing these challenges through our 

annual performance and accountability 

process, and ask our Inspector General 

each year to comment on management’s 

assessment of these challenges. For fiscal 

year 2019, we will focus management 

attention on the following three challenges, 

which are summarized below:

 Managing a quality workforce;

 Improving the efficiency of our 

engagements; and

 Ensuring the confidentiality, integrity, 

and availability of GAO’s information 

technology services. 

These three challenges are interconnected, 

and are essential to GAO’s ability to fulfill 

its mission in serving and supporting the 

Congress. To meet our mission, we must 

have highly skilled employees working 

as efficiently as possible with the most 

effective tools in a secure electronic 

environment. Additional information on 

progress made and actions planned for the 

future can be found in Part II.

CHALLENGE: Managing a Quality 

Workforce

More than 80 percent of GAO’s budget goes 

toward its people; as a result, it is critical 

that we hire the right people, provide them 

with the right training, and retain them.

GAO must maintain a skilled, engaged, and 

committed workforce in order to fulfill its 

mission.

 Acquire talent: The nation’s capital 

and the cities where many of our 

field offices are located are highly 

competitive job markets. We must 

follow a strategic approach to acquiring 

talent—for both our analyst cohort 

and our operations staff—with critical 

skills that align with the needs of the 

agency and the competencies for the 

position in order to optimally deliver 

GAO’s mission. To help target our 

recruiting efforts and ensure that our 

hiring activities align with our workforce 

planning goals, we hired a Recruiting 

Program Manager in fiscal year 2018 

whose duties include developing, 

implementing, and evaluating 

agency-wide recruitment and talent 

management strategies—including 

assessing options to promote and sustain 

a diverse talent pipeline for GAO. 

 Retain an expert, seasoned 

workforce: Hiring people with the right 

skills is just the first step. We must 

also nurture and sustain our people 

throughout their careers and be mindful 

of the challenges employees face in 

connecting and collaborating in an 

increasingly mobile work environment. 

In addition to our continued focus 

on providing professional education 

and developmental opportunities to 

employees at all stages of their careers, 

we are continuing to create and offer 

online, virtual learning that both 

furthers the professional development 

of employees and reinforces techniques 

for managing and working virtually. 

 Manage and engage a remote 

workforce: Nearly all GAO employees 

participate in some form of telework. 

Leading and sustaining GAO’s 

workforce requires being aware of 

the implications of having a virtual 

environment and being intentional about 

communication and engagement. We 

Management Challenges
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 57 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

identified this as a challenge in fiscal 

year 2014 and continue to monitor 

the status of recommendations from 

our internal telework evaluation. 

One recommendation that remains 

outstanding is to re-examine and make 

enhancements to our collaboration 

tools. GAO continues to pursue a Unified 

Communications Tool (UCT) to include 

audio, web, and video conferencing, 

instant messaging, screen sharing, and 

social collaboration. UCT will provide 

a seamless collaboration platform 

that will create the sense of presence 

needed in a virtual environment. 

GAO designated a senior-level Special 

Assistant for Telework to serve as the 

agency’s telework program oversight 

and evaluation expert, cultural change 

agent, and communications liaison in 

the implementation of telework at GAO. 

The Special Assistant for Telework is 

also partnering with a senior executive 

team of analysts to develop indicators 

and methodologies to identify telework’s 

impact on product quality, collaboration 

with a focus on new staff, and potential 

fraud risks. The expected outcome 

will be a robust telework evaluation 

instrument and implementation plan 

that should provide early indication of 

telework risks. 

 Continually sustain an inclusive work 

environment: We are committed to 

creating and maintaining an organization 

where every employee feels valued, 

respected, treated fairly, and is given 

opportunities to enrich the work of 

GAO through their unique skills, talents, 

and life experiences. While GAO is a 

recognized leader for its support of 

diversity by the Partnership for Public 

Service, fostering an inclusive work 

environment is an ongoing challenge to 

which we remain dedicated, regardless 

of historic and recent successes. 

To this end, in fiscal year 2018, we 

formally launched our people values, 

combining them with our core values 

of accountability, integrity, and 

reliability into one logo. Our Diversity 

and Inclusion team worked with the 

Peoples Value initiative to align its 

efforts and goals throughout the year, 

and particularly during our annual 

celebration in June during which we 

highlighted GAO’s “journey to inclusion” 

with a number of special events and 

videos.

CHALLENGE: Improving the Efficiency 

of Our Engagements

Improving the efficiency of conducting and 

delivering the results of our analyses—the 

core of GAO’s work—continues to be a 

challenge that we are working on through 

a variety of projects and initiatives, 

in particular focusing on the use of 

technology and change management. 

In the area of technology, we updated 

several related systems that support GAO 

product distribution, recommendation 

status tracking, and accomplishment 

reporting. These updates streamlined 

user interfaces and integrated with 

our engagement management system, 

eliminating duplicate data entry, reducing 

errors, and allowing us to modernize 

outdated legacy systems. We also piloted 

a new system that will facilitate our 

ability to easily generate our products in a 

format that our clients and the public can 

access on any device, including hand-held 

mobile devices. This new system will also 

bring tremendous efficiencies in managing 

the content review, fact checking, and 

publishing processes. The system’s pilot 

yielded critical insight into the remaining 

work needed to complete full development 

of the system in fiscal year 2019. While 

challenges remain in continuing to replace 

outdated systems with modern, integrated 

solutions, an increase in dedicated funding 

in fiscal years 2018-19 to support core 

infrastructure needs should position GAO 

to take better advantage of modern, 

integrated solutions and simplify our overall 

systems profile supporting mission work. 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

58 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

In the area of change management, we 

continued to work extensively with analysts 

and managers on two significant initiatives—

the new product creation system and 

project management. In each case, we 

have significant involvement of the target 

user communities in both development and 

testing of the proposed solutions to ensure 

that our projects fit the needs of the 

agency and its people. Challenges remain 

in determining the extent to which culture 

and other organizational factors affect our 

projects, as these important drivers of 

staff behavior are often not immediately 

clear even to the individuals who are 

directly involved. 

CHALLENGE: Ensuring the 

Confidentiality, Integrity, and 

Availability of GAO’s Information 

Technology Services 

GAO has taken a number of steps to 

better manage enterprise risk activities to 

ensure it can appropriately mitigate risks 

and achieve its strategic and operational 

goals and objectives. GAO has created 

a Risk Management Committee, cochaired by the Chief Operating Officer 

and Chief Administrative Officer/Chief 

Financial Officer, who also serve as 

Chief Risk Officers (CROs), to oversee 

GAO’s enterprise risk management (ERM) 

program. Annually, GAO assesses its 

operating environment and identifies risks 

which have the potential to significantly 

impair its ability to achieve its strategic 

and operational goals and objectives if not 

managed effectively. Ensuring GAO’s ability 

to maintain a high-performing, resultsoriented workforce, continually improve 

the efficiency of its engagements, and 

provide a stable IT infrastructure are key 

components of GAO’s risk profile, which 

GAO uses to manage current and proposed 

projects and actions to mitigate the impact 

of identified risks.

Providing the full breadth of secure 

technology solutions to users across all of 

GAO continues to be a challenge, as it is 

for every federal agency. GAO continually 

works to provide highly available systems 

on a modern technology platform in an 

ever-changing environment while also 

working to ensure the agency’s systems 

are secure from threats. In addition, GAO 

has recently rolled out new technological 

solutions for key business processes 

and continues to develop systems and 

processes to enable GAO’s work. Providing 

the full range of agency-level functions 

and requirements within a tight budget 

environment is a challenge GAO works 

every day to meet.

Given escalating and emerging threats 

from around the globe, and the steady 

advances in the sophistication and the 

destructiveness of attack technology, 

ensuring the confidentiality, integrity, 

and availability of our IT services will 

continue to be a management challenge 

for GAO and for all government and 

private sector entities for the foreseeable 

future. To monitor, detect, and respond 

to inappropriate access to computer 

resources, GAO has established a layered 

approach to providing reliable information 

technology services, including the use 

of security building blocks for basic 

authentication and access controls. 

As threats continue to evolve, GAO is 

continuing to pursue advanced technologies 

to protect its information and information 

systems. 

GAO continues to place a high value on 

protecting its assets, data, and systems, 

while providing a robust computing 

capability to meet its business needs. 

GAO is currently implementing technology 

initiatives funded by the Congress in its 

2018 appropriation that will improve 

system performance, provide new services 

to users, improve GAO’s redundancy 

capability, while also providing some 

savings in the future as old, less-efficient 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 59 Management’s Discussion and Analysis

systems are replaced. GAO is making 

investments to update its virtual desktop 

infrastructure and other infrastructure 

that will improve performance across the 

enterprise. GAO is also moving quickly to 

replace its aging telephone system and 

roll out new technologies and equipment 

that will greatly improve employee 

communication, collaboration, and 

efficiency. 

To help ensure that GAO can maintain 

reliable, secure systems, GAO created 

the Strategic Business and Technology 

Transformation (SBTT) Board. The SBTT 

drives organizational transformation and 

IT modernization and optimizes strategic 

IT outcomes by supporting GAO’s decisions 

to more effectively, efficiently, and 

strategically invest available funds.

OIG Recommendations

The OIG’s Semiannual Report to the 

Congress for the period ending September 

30, 2018, included five unimplemented 

recommendations. Three of these 

recommendations were intended to 

help GAO more fully implement federal 

information security requirements. 

Specifically, to enhance GAO’s ERM 

management program’s plan and processes 

to ensure the agency’s IT investments 

support the GAO’s Strategic Plan and IT 

Strategy with an emphasis on monitoring 

and risk management. The remaining two 

recommendations were intended to bring 

GAO’s use of Law Enforcement Availability 

Pay (LEAP) in line with its need for criminal 

investigators to work beyond a 40-hour 

workweek in support of the agency’s 

investigative needs, and to ensure that 

the calculation upon which eligibility for 

LEAP is based is reliable and properly 

supported. GAO concurred with all five 

recommendations and is taking steps to 

address them. For further information, 

see OIG-19-1SP. For the IG’s comments 

regarding our management challenges 

assessment, see Part IV of this report. 

Mitigating External Factors 

While GAO’s fiscal year 2018 appropriation 

allowed the agency to invest in IT and 

building facility projects, and begin to 

increase staffing, several external factors 

exist that could affect our performance 

and progress toward our goals. These 

include: 

 Shifts in congressional interest.

 Modifications or repeals of outdated 

statutory requirements. 

 Challenges in hiring desired expertise.

 Access to agency information.

Demand for our work is very high as 

demonstrated by the 786 congressional 

requests and new mandates in fiscal 

year 2018. The Comptroller General and 

other senior officials maintain frequent 

communication with our congressional 

clients to ensure that our work supports 

the highest legislative and oversight 

priorities while recognizing that changing 

international and domestic events may 

affect priorities. 

We continue to collaborate with the 

Congress to revise or repeal mandated 

reporting requirements which have, over 

time, lost relevance or usefulness. For 

example, S. 2400, The GAO Audit Mandates 

Revision Act of 2018, would shift many lowrisk financial audits to public accounting 

firms so that GAO can audit Treasury’s 

General Fund. The fund, which has never 

been audited before, covers every federal 

entity that receives appropriated funds. 

As the Congress turns to GAO for insightful 

analysis and advice to address rapidly 

evolving cybersecurity threats, recruiting 

top-tier cyber talent to augment our 

current audit workforce is critical. GAO 

plans to recruit talent from leading 

cybersecurity-related undergraduate and 

graduate institutions, including those 

participating in the CyberCorps Scholarship 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

60 Management’s Discussion and Analysis GAO-19-1SP

for Service program. This would augment 

our existing cadre of experts who can 

assess the nature and extent of cyber 

risks, both present and future, as well 

as evaluate the government’s complex 

and multi-faceted attempts to address 

them. However, as GAO plans to increase 

the level of staff hired in these specialty 

areas, it faces challenges recruiting and 

hiring staff with the desired education, 

experience, and expertise.

Access to information also plays an 

essential role in our ability to report on 

issues of importance to the Congress and 

the American people. We are generally 

able to obtain the information needed 

for our engagements. For the most part, 

departments and agencies continue to 

be cooperative in providing us access to 

requested information or working with us 

toward an accommodation that will allow 

the work to move forward.

We reported for the past several years 

on our experiences in obtaining access 

from elements of the Intelligence 

Community (IC) pursuant to Intelligence 

Community Directive (ICD) 114, which 

was issued in 2011 by the Director of 

National Intelligence, in consultation 

with the Comptroller General. While ICD 

114 generally provides for constructive 

interaction between GAO and the IC, 

we continue to have concerns with how 

several key terms in the directive could 

be interpreted because they are framed 

as categories of information that would 

generally not be made available to us for 

certain audits or reviews.

During fiscal year 2018, as GAO’s work 

reviewing activities of the IC grew, we 

continued to require a significant amount 

of time and effort to work through access 

issues, which delayed our work. For 

the most part, we successfully worked 

through these issues with the IC elements 

and obtained the necessary information. 

However, ODNI did not provide us access to 

key budget-related documents necessary 

to fully address a review of IC business 

enterprise functions requested by the 

intelligence oversight committees. We 

attempted to reach an accommodation 

consistent with ICD 114, but ODNI did 

not substantively engage with us in that 

effort. We will continue to monitor the 

level of cooperation provided by ODNI and 

the other IC elements as they implement 

ICD 114, and we remain committed to 

a constructive engagement with the IC 

moving forward.

We previously reported that we had 

encountered significant difficulties in 

obtaining timely and efficient access to 

information from the Office of Personnel 

Management (OPM), particularly with 

regard to Enterprise Human Resources 

Integration (EHRI) statistical data. We 

have made significant progress in obtaining 

timely access to EHRI data and other 

information from OPM. We will continue 

to monitor this area to ensure continued 

progress in obtaining needed information in 

a timely manner.

Over the past year, we have encountered 

difficulties in obtaining meetings and 

information from National Security Council 

and White House Counsel staff on the fairly 

limited basis needed for our engagements. 

We have communicated with the White 

House Counsel about this matter and 

efforts to resolve the issue are ongoing.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 61 Performance Information

Source: Comstock | GAO-19-1SP

Performance Information by Strategic Goal 

In the following sections, we discuss how 

each of our four strategic goals contributed 

to our fiscal year 2018 performance results. 

For goals 1, 2, and 3—our external goals—

we present performance results for the 

three annual measures that we assess at 

the goal level, as well as accomplishments 

under the strategic objectives for 

these goals. Most teams and units also 

contributed toward meeting the targets 

for the agency-wide measures that were 

discussed in Part I of this report. For goal 

4—our internal goal—we present selected 

work and accomplishments for that goal’s 

strategic objectives. There were no 

changes in our strategic goals or measures 

during fiscal year 2018. 

Part II

Performance Information 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

62 Performance Information GAO-19-1SP

Our first strategic goal upholds our mission 

to support the Congress in carrying out its 

constitutional responsibilities by focusing 

on work that helps address the current and 

emerging challenges affecting the wellbeing and financial security of the American 

people. Our multiyear (fiscal years 2018-

2023) strategic objectives under this goal 

are to provide information that will help 

address

 health care needs;

 lifelong learning;

 challenges facing an aging population;

 effective system of justice; 

 housing finance and viabile communities;

 stable financial system and consumer 

protection; 

 natural resources and the environment; 

 national infrastructure; and

 benefits and protections for workers, 

families, and children.

Strategic Goal 1

Address Current and Emerging Challenges to the 

Well-being and Financial Security of the American 

People

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 63 Performance Information

These objectives, along with the performance goals and key efforts that support them, are 

discussed fully in our strategic plan, which is available on our website at https://www.gao.

gov/about/stratplanning.html. The work supporting these objectives is performed primarily 

by headquarters and field staff in the following teams: Education, Workforce, and Income 

Security; Financial Markets and Community Investment; Health Care; Homeland Security 

and Justice; Natural Resources and Environment; and Physical Infrastructure.

To accomplish our work under these strategic objectives in fiscal year 2018, we conducted 

engagements, audits, analyses, and evaluations of programs at major federal agencies. 

As shown in table 10, we exceeded the performance targets set for financial and other 

benefits for Goal 1, but did not meet the target for testimonies.

Table 10: Strategic Goal 1’s Annual Performance Results and Targets

Performance 

measure

2013

actual

2014

actual

2015

actual

2016

actual

2017

actual

2018

target

2018

actual

Met/

not met

2019

target

Financial benefits

(dollars in billions) $22 $15.5 $51.4b $19.6 $22.4b $11.0 $52.5 met $18.5

Other benefits 271 240 255 284 263 246a 262 met 244

Testimonies 60 57 57 38 48 48a 42 not met 46

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Note: Financial benefits for Goals 1 through 3 do not sum to the total agency-wide target for 2019 as we have left a portion of 

the financial benefits target unassigned. Experience leads us to believe that we can meet the agency-wide target but we cannot 

always accurately predict under which goals. 

a

Our fiscal year 2018 targets for two of our three performance measures differ from those we reported in our fiscal year 2018 

performance plan in July 2017. Specifically, we increased our other benefits target from 241 to 246 and decreased the testimony 

target from 54 to 48, based on revised estimates from mission teams (see Setting Performance Targets and p.34).

b

In fiscal years 2015 and 2017, we achieved some unexpectedly large financial benefits; however, we did not expect this level of 

results in fiscal year 2018. 

To help us examine trends for these measures over time, we look at their 4-year averages, 

which minimize the effect of an unusual level of performance in any single year. These 

averages are shown below in table 11. This table indicates that the 4-year average for Goal 

1 financial benefits held steady from 2013 to 2014, increased sharply in 2015, decreased 

slightly in 2016, held steady in 2017, and increased sharply in 2018. Goal 1’s average other 

benefits were fairly steady from 2013 through 2018. The average number of times our 

senior executives were asked to testify has declined steadily since fiscal year 2013. 

Example of Work under Goal 1 

Improving Management of the WMATA Workforce: Recent safety incidents on the Washington Metropolitan Area 

Transit Authority’s (WMATA) rail system have focused public attention on how WMATA manages its workforce. 

In 2018, we reported that WMATA’s employee and retiree benefit costs had increased substantially since 

2006, but that WMATA had not assessed the fiscal risks of its pension plans. WMATA also lacks a strategic 

workforce plan to acquire, develop, and retain the workforce it needs to achieve its strategic goals. We 

made several recommendations to address these weaknesses. WMATA generally agreed with our findings and 

recommendations. (GAO-18-643) 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

64 Performance Information GAO-19-1SP

Table 11: Four-Year Rolling Averages for Strategic Goal 1

Performance measure 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018

Financial benefits (dollars in 

billions) $19.5 $19.0 $28.7 $27.1 $27.2 $36.5

Other benefits 256 257 260 263 261 266

Testimonies 73 66 59 53 50 46

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

The following sections describe our performance under Goal 1 for each of these three 

quantitative performance measures, and describe the targets for fiscal year 2019.

Financial Benefits

The financial benefits reported for this goal in fiscal year 2018 totaled $52.5 billion, 

exceeding the target we set by $41.5 billion, due primarily to one large financial 

accomplishment for revising spending limits for Medicaid demonstration projects ($36.8 

billion). Other financial benefits contributing to this total included savings from our work that 

resulted in the elimination of direct payments to farmers, and increased premiums at the 

Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation. We set the target for fiscal year 2019 at $18.5 billion 

based on our recent performance and discussions with the Goal 1 teams about the level of 

benefits they believe they can achieve. 

Other Benefits

Other benefits reported for Goal 1 in fiscal year 2018 totaled 262, exceeding our target of 

246 by 16 benefits or about 7 percent. Many of Goal 1’s other benefits were in the areas of 

public safety and security and program efficiency and effectiveness. For fiscal year 2019, 

we set our target at 244 for these other benefits based on what our Goal 1 teams expect 

to achieve based on past, ongoing, and expected work.

Example of Goal 1’s Financial Benefits

Saving Millions by Reexamining the Strategic Petroleum Reserve’s Size: In 2014, we recommended that DOE 

reexamine the size of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), which was established by the Congress to help 

buffer the U.S. economy against oil supply interruptions. In response (and as required by the Congress), DOE 

completed a strategic review of the SPR in 2016, and the Congress passed legislation that authorized the sale 

of crude oil from the SPR from 2017 through 2025 to fund other national priorities. In fiscal year 2017, DOE 

sold 10 million barrels of crude oil (worth $450 million) from the SPR. (GAO-14-807) 

Example of Goal 1’s Other Benefits

Strengthening Financial Assessments of FHA’s Mortgage Insurance Fund: The Federal Housing 

Administration (FHA) insures private lenders against losses from defaults on single-family mortgages. Its 

mortgage insurance fund holds capital to help it absorb losses, and FHA annually assesses the fund’s ability to 

withstand adverse scenarios (stress tests). The fund has two portfolios—one for traditional mortgages and one 

for reverse mortgages (loans against home equity). In 2017, we found that FHA conducted stress tests on each 

portfolio, but not on the fund as a whole. In response, FHA began to conduct stress tests on the fund as a 

whole to help ensure that it has enough capital to withstand economic downturns. (GAO-18-92) 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 65 Performance Information

Testimonies

Our senior executives testified 42 times on our Goal 1 work, which fell short of the fiscal 

year 2018 target of 48 by 6 testimonies or about 13 percent. Among the topics on which we 

testified were federal efforts to assist railroads with implementing positive train control, 

address Native American Youth in the justice system, better ensure successful appeals 

reform for VA disability benefits, improve oversight of reusable medical equipment, analyze 

regulatory burdens, and improve the transfer and monitoring of care for unaccompanied 

children who enter the United States with no lawful immigration status. (See fig. 22 for 

selected testimony topics by goal.) We set our fiscal year 2019 target at 46 testimonies on 

Goal 1 issues based on our experience over the past few years. 

Table 12 contains examples of Goal 1 accomplishments and contributions, which includes 

both financial and other benefits.

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP 

Susan Fleming, Director, Physical Infrastructure Team, testified on Positive Train Control.

Example of Goal 1’s Testimonies

Implementing Positive Train Control to Improve Rail Safety: Forty railroads must implement Positive Train 

Control (PTC)—a system designed to slow or stop a train not being operated safely. We testified that 32 of the 

40 railroads reported they will seek a maximum 2-year extension of the December 31, 2018, implementation 

deadline, leaving substantial work for railroads and the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) to complete. 

We also testified that it remains unclear how FRA will enforce the deadline, and manage its workload. We 

recommended that FRA communicate extension information and prioritize its workload based on risk. FRA has 

taken some steps to address these recommendations. (GAO-18-692T, GAO-18-367T) 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

66 Performance Information GAO-19-1SP

Table 12: Goal 1 Examples of Accomplishments and Contributions

Health Care Needs and Financing

Setting Medicare 

Payments for 

Provider-Based 

Outpatient Services

Medicare has historically paid a higher rate for services provided in a 

hospital outpatient department (HOPD) than in a physician’s office. In 

2015, we found that increases in hospital and physician consolidation 

and Medicare expenditures for HOPD services highlighted the need for 

payment reform. We advised the Congress to consider directing HHS to 

equalize HOPD and physician office payment rates. In 2015, the Congress 

passed the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015, which lowered the Medicare 

reimbursement rate for new provider-based HOPDs—saving an estimated 

$1.6 billion in FYs 2017 and 2018. (GAO-16-189)

A Responsive, Fair, and Effective System of Justice

Improving Federal 

Agency Assessment 

of Strategies for 

Combating Opioids

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimated that 

over 70,000 Americans died from drug overdoses in 2017. In 2018, 

we reported that DOJ and the Office of National Drug Control Policy 

documented strategies to combat illicit opioids. However, only one of the 

five strategies we reviewed included results-oriented measures, such as 

reductions in overdose deaths, largely due to agency perceptions that 

designing such measures posed challenges. We recommended that these 

agencies develop results-oriented metrics to help them assess their 

progress in combating the opioid epidemic. (GAO-18-205)

Addressing Native 

American Youth 

Delinquency in the 

Justice System 

In FY18, we testified on our findings about Native American youth in the 

justice system, as well as grant programs used to help address juvenile 

delinquency. We found that Native American juvenile delinquency rates 

declined between 2010 and 2016. However, their share of the juvenile 

population in the federal system was higher than their share in the 

nationwide youth population—likely due to federal jurisdiction on tribal 

lands. We also found that 122 federal grant programs addressed related 

issues (like alcohol and substance abuse), but selected applicants cited 

factors like short deadlines as challenges in applying. (GAO-18-697T, GAO-18-591)

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Gretta Goodwin, Director, Homeland Security and Justice Team, testified on Native American youth in the justice system. 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 67 Performance Information

Housing Finance and Viable Communities

Improving Program 

Evaluation at the 

Small Business 

Administration

SBA programs have provided small businesses with billions of dollars 

in direct and guaranteed loans and access to federal contracts over 

the years. However, in 2012 and 2015, we reported that SBA had not 

evaluated the effectiveness of 10 of the 19 programs we reviewed. Per 

our recommendations, SBA finalized an evaluation framework in 2017, 

tripled program evaluation funding in FY 2018, and incorporated program 

evaluation results in its FYs 2018-2022 strategic planning process, which 

will give it better information to guide future activities and improve 

program performance. (GAO-15-347, GAO-12-819)

Stewardship of Natural Resources and the Environment

Developing Guidelines 

for Arctic Council 

Recommendations

The Arctic Council is an important intergovernmental forum for the U.S. 

Department of State (State) to pursue U.S. interests in the Arctic region. 

In 2014, we found that Arctic Council members had issues implementing 

the Council’s recommendations because they were broadly written, 

numerous, and not prioritized. We recommended that State work 

with other Council members to develop guidelines for producing clear, 

measurable, and prioritized recommendations. In 2016, State developed 

and proposed such guidelines to the Council. Council members agreed to 

consider them as they develop recommendations, which will help ensure 

that action is taken on the highest priorities. (GAO-14-435)

Improving Access to 

Data and Research on 

Ocean Acidification

Ocean acidification may pose risks to marine ecosystems and the coastal 

communities that rely on them for food and commerce. In 2014, we 

found that the Executive Office of the President had not established 

an electronic exchange to share information on ocean acidification as 

required by the Federal Ocean Acidification Research and Monitoring Act 

of 2009, and recommended it do so. In response, an interagency working 

group established an ocean acidification information exchange website 

in 2018. This exchange positions government officials, researchers, and 

the public to better share information and respond to ocean acidification 

issues. (GAO-14-736) 

Addressing Leaking 

Waste Tanks at 

the Hanford Site in 

Washington State

DOE is responsible for the treatment and disposal of millions of gallons of 

radioactive and hazardous waste at its Hanford site in Washington State. 

In October 2012, DOE announced that nuclear waste had leaked from 

one of the underground storage tanks at this site. In November 2014, we 

found that DOE lacked specific information about the condition of the 

other tanks at the Hanford site. We recommended that DOE analyze 

the risks of continuing to store waste in aging tanks. In response, DOE 

undertook an analysis in October 2017 and is now better equipped to 

make decisions about this waste. (GAO-15-40)

Viable National Infrastructure

Improving Physical 

Security at Federal 

Facilities

Federal facilities, their employees, and visitors may be targets of violent 

attacks. In FY18, we found that four selected agencies—the Customs and 

Border Protection, the Federal Aviation Administration, the Agricultural 

Research Service, and the Forest Service did not use facility security 

assessments that fully aligned with federal standards. These agencies also 

faced challenges in conducting assessments and monitoring their security 

programs—leaving them vulnerable to sizeable risks. We recommended 

that the agencies improve their security programs’ alignment with federal 

standards for the safety of their facilities and the people using them. All 

four agencies concurred. (GAO-18-72) 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

68 Performance Information GAO-19-1SP

Strengthening 

Wireless Network 

Resiliency

Many Americans rely solely on wireless networks—especially during 

emergencies to call 911 or receive alerts. However, wireless outages 

can make such communications nearly impossible for these people. In 

2017, we reported that wireless outages had increased since 2009. And, 

although the industry has taken actions to improve the resiliency of 

wireless networks, FCC had limited plans to oversee these efforts. We 

recommended that FCC determine if industry efforts are effective or 

if other FCC action is needed to strengthen wireless network resiliency 

to help ensure access during emergencies. FCC concurred with our 

recommendation. (GAO-18-198)

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 69 Performance Information

Source: U.S. Air Force. | GAO-19-1SP

The federal government is working to 

promote foreign policy goals, sound trade 

policies, and other strategies to advance 

the interests of the United States and its 

allies. The complex and rapidly evolving 

security environment facing the United 

States includes cyber attacks, terrorist 

activities, and instability in key regions of 

the world. Given the importance of these 

issues, our second strategic goal focuses 

on helping the Congress and the federal 

government in their responses to changing 

security threats and the challenges of 

global interdependence. Our multiyear 

(fiscal years 2018-2023) strategic objectives 

under this goal support congressional and 

agency efforts related to

 homeland security;

 military capabilities and readiness; 

 foreign policy and international economic 

interests; and 

 the Intelligence Community’s 

management and integration. 

These objectives, along with the 

performance goals and key efforts that 

support them, are discussed fully in our 

strategic plan, which is available on our 

website at https://www.gao.gov/about/

stratplanning.html. 

Example of Work under Goal 2

Enhancing Oversight of the Columbia Class Submarine Program: At a cost of over $267 billion, the Columbiaclass ballistic missile submarine program is a top Navy priority. In 2017, we found that several technologies 

critical to achieving the submarine’s performance were still immature. Specifically, they needed more 

development and testing before the Navy designs and builds the first submarine to avoid the risk of cost 

growth and schedule delays. We suggested that the Congress require the Navy to report on the status of these 

technologies before it approves billions of dollars to fund construction of the first submarine. The Congress 

passed legislation in FY18 that did so. (GAO-18-158) 

Strategic Goal 2

Respond to Changing Security Threats and the 

Challenges of Global Interdependence
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

70 Performance Information GAO-19-1SP

The work supporting these objectives is performed primarily by headquarters and field 

staff in the following teams: Contracting and National Security Acquisitions, Defense 

Capabilities and Management, Homeland Security and Justice, and International Affairs 

and Trade. In addition, the work supporting some performance goals and key efforts is 

performed by headquarters and field staff from the Financial Markets and Community 

Investment, Information Technology, Financial Management and Assurance, Natural 

Resources and Environment, and Applied Research and Methods teams. 

To accomplish our work in fiscal year 2018 under these strategic objectives, we conducted 

engagements that involved fieldwork related to international and domestic programs that 

took us across multiple continents. As shown in table 13, we fell below the performance 

target for financial benefits, exceeded the other benefits target, and fell short of the 

testimonies target for Goal 2. 

Table 13: Strategic Goal 2’s Annual Performance Results and Targets

Performance

measure

2013

actual

2014

actual

2015

actual

2016

actual

2017

actual

2018

target

2018

actual

Met/

not met

2019

target

Financial benefits

(dollars in billions)

$21.4 $25.7 $13.1 $13.0 $46.5a $12.7 $10.5 not met $12.7

Other benefits 488 535 505 502 500 345b 517 met 349

Testimonies 30 40 23 43 21 31b 26 not met 29

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Note: Financial benefits for Goals 1 through 3 do not sum to the total agency-wide target for 2019 as we have left a portion of 

the financial benefits target unassigned. Experience leads us to believe that we can meet the agency-wide target but we cannot 

always accurately predict under which goals. 

a

In fiscal year 2017, we achieved one unexpectedly large financial benefit; however, we did not expect this level of results in 

2018.

b

Our fiscal year 2018 targets for two of our three performance measures differ from those we reported in our fiscal year 

2018 performance plan in July 2017. Specifically, we increased the other benefits target from 334 to 345 and decreased the 

testimonies target from 32 to 31, based on revised estimates from mission teams (see Setting Performance Targets and p. 34). 

To help us examine trends for these measures over time, we look at their 4-year averages, 

which minimize the effect of an unusual level of performance in any single year and are 

shown below in table 14. This table indicates that the 4-year average for Goal 2 financial 

benefits increased from fiscal year 2013 to 2014, declined in 2015, held steady in 2016, 

increased sharply in 2017, and declined in 2018. Goal 2’s average other benefits increased 

from fiscal year 2013 to 2015, held steady in 2016 through 2017, and decreased slightly in 

2018. The average number of testimonies for Goal 2 has declined steadily since 2013. 

Table 14: Four-Year Rolling Averages for Strategic Goal 2

Performance measure 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018

Financial benefits (dollars in 

billions) $20.3 $21.6 $18.4 $18.3 $24.6 $20.8

Other benefits 473 496 510 508 511 506

Testimonies 48 43 37 34 32 28

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 71 Performance Information

The following sections describe our performance under Goal 2 for each of our quantitative 

performance measures and describe the targets for fiscal year 2019. 

Financial Benefits

The financial benefits reported for Goal 2 in fiscal year 2018 totaled $10.5 billion, which 

was $2.2 billion or 17 percent below our $12.7 billion target. We set our fiscal year 2019 

target at $12.7 billion based on what our Goal 2 teams believe they can achieve based on 

past, ongoing, and expected work.

Other Benefits

The other benefits reported for Goal 2 in fiscal year 2018 totaled 517 and exceeded our 

target of 345 by 172 benefits, or about 50 percent. Many of Goal 2’s other benefits were in 

the areas of public safety and security, acquisition and contract management, and business 

process and management. We set our fiscal year 2019 target at 349, which is well below 

our fiscal year 2018 actual performance, but what our Goal 2 teams expect to achieve 

based on past, ongoing, and expected work. 

Testimonies

Our senior executives were asked to testify 26 times on our Goal 2 work in fiscal year 

2018—falling short of our target of 31 testimonies by 5, or about 16 percent. Goal 2 

testimony topics included federal efforts to reform the government-wide personnel 

security clearance process, manage DHS’ chemical facility security program, and manage 

the Coast Guard’s acquisition portfolio. (See fig. 22 for selected testimony topics by goal.) 

We have set our fiscal year 2019 testimony target at 29 based on our recent experience.

Example of Goal 2’s Financial Benefits

Improving DOD’s Method for Setting Its Standard Fuel Price: DOD sets the fuel price it will use in the 

upcoming fiscal year—almost a year before it buys the fuel. In 2014, we found that DOD’s price-setting method 

did not reflect market conditions and recommended it make changes. DOD used a new method for its FY16 

fuel price, but we found that the data it used were not valid or reliable. Per our recommendation, DOD 

updated its method again—reducing its 2018 fuel budget request by about $3.1 billion. We also found that 

DOD’s funding request for fuel was still overestimated. Based on this, the Congress further reduced DOD’s 

funding by about $110 million.

Example of Goal 2’s Other Benefits 

Helping CBP Better Address the Risks Posed by Counterfeit Products Sold Online: Counterfeit goods sold 

online can be hard to spot. In 2018, we reported that 20 of 47 items we purchased from third-party sellers 

on popular websites were identified by manufacturers as counterfeit. We also found that U.S. Customs and 

Border Protection (CBP) had taken few steps to evaluate its efforts to block the import of counterfeit goods. 

We recommended, and CBP agreed, that it should improve evaluations of its efforts and enhance information 

sharing with the private sector. Taking these steps will position CBP to better protect U.S. manufacturers from 

economic harm and U.S. consumers from potential risks posed by counterfeit products. (GAO-18-216)
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

72 Performance Information GAO-19-1SP

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Brenda Farrell, Director, Defense Capabilities and Management Team, testified on improvements needed to the personnel 

security clearance process.

Table 15 provides examples of Goal 2 accomplishments and contributions, which includes 

both financial and other benefits.

Table 15: Goal 2 Examples of Accomplishments and Contributions

Protect and Secure the Homeland

Improving CDC’s Webbased Information 

on Disease-Spreading 

Mosquitos

Emerging infectious diseases, such as the Zika virus, pose an ongoing 

threat to public health. In 2017, we found that the Centers for Disease 

Control and Prevention (CDC) was not clearly communicating the location 

of disease-spreading mosquitos. For example, CDC had not posted 

detailed information on its web page about the sources of data it used to 

generate mosquito distribution maps. We recommended that CDC provide 

more detailed information on these maps. CDC updated its web page in 

September 2017 to show greater detail, including its data sources and 

limitations, to provide better information. (GAO-17-445, GAO-17-612T) 

Example of Goal 2’s Testimonies

Reforming the Government-wide Personnel Security Clearance Process: In FY18, we designated the 

government-wide personnel security clearance process a high risk area. In March 2018, we testified that 

federal agencies had made some progress but longstanding reforms remained incomplete. For example, 

agencies face challenges with background investigation quality and timeliness, and the National Background 

Investigations Bureau (NBIB) has a significant backlog. We made 12 recommendations to the Director of 

National Intelligence (DNI) and the Director of NBIB to address these challenges. NBIB concurred, and the 

DNI concurred with some, but not all, of our recommendations. We continue to believe that they are valid. 

(GAO-18-431T, GAO-18-117 and GAO-18-29)
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 73 Performance Information

Improving TSA Risk 

Management for 

Airport Perimeter 

and Access Control 

Security

TSA works with commercial airports, among others, to ensure that the 

nation’s aviation system is secure. In 2016, we found that TSA had not 

updated its 2013 risk assessment and strategy for airport perimeter 

and access control security (which prevents unauthorized access and 

smuggling into restricted areas). TSA also was not analyzing security 

data for related breaches. In response, TSA developed timeframes and 

processes for updating its risk assessment and strategy, and created a 

program to better assess security data. These steps will help TSA better 

assess security issues at airports nationwide. (GAO-16-632, GAO-16-318SU)

Addressing 

Weaknesses in 

the Cybersecurity 

Workforce

A qualified, well-trained cybersecurity workforce is critical to mitigating 

the nation’s cyber risks. In 2018, we determined that most of the 

24 agencies covered by the Chief Financial Officers Act conducted 

baseline assessments of their cybersecurity workforces and established 

procedures to identify and assign the correct employment codes 

to their cybersecurity positions. However, we made a total of 30 

recommendations to 13 of these agencies to improve their baseline 

assessments and/or coding procedures. In 2018, 8 agencies implemented 

20 of our recommendations—positioning them to more fully identify their 

cybersecurity workforce needs. (GAO-18-466)

Military Capabilities and Readiness

Guiding the 

Continuous Evaluation 

Program for Personnel 

Security Clearances

Longstanding personnel security clearance reform efforts call for 

continuously evaluating employees’ eligibility to hold security clearances. 

In 2017, we found that ODNI had not yet issued formal guidance or 

determined key aspects of a continuous evaluation program. We 

recommended that it issue guidance and develop an implementation 

plan. In 2018, ODNI issued formal guidance and implementation guidelines 

for continuous evaluation. As a result, agencies will have a better 

understanding of continuous evaluation and be able to more uniformly 

implement it. (GAO-18-117) 

Helping the Congress 

Reduce Defense 

Health Program 

Funding by $681 

Million

The Defense Health Program provides medical and dental services for 9.4 

million beneficiaries worldwide, including active-duty servicemembers. 

Our analysis of DOD’s 2017 budget request for this program found that 

DOD had consistently spent fewer dollars for certain activities than the 

budgeted amounts. As a result of our work, the Congress reduced the 

Defense Health Program’s funding for FY17 by $681 million, which better 

reflects DOD’s actual costs. 

U.S. Foreign Policy Interests

Improving DOD’s 

Management of 

Billions Collected to 

Administer the FMS 

Program

Foreign partners buy billions of dollars of U.S. defense equipment and 

services each year through Foreign Military Sales (FMS). DOD collects 

fees from buyers to cover FMS’ costs. In 2018, we reported that DOD’s 

inadequate management controls and oversight processes led to two 

FMS fee accounts growing to over $5 billion—about 5 times the accounts’ 

annual expenses. Also, DOD did not know how the funds were being 

spent. We made 17 recommendations—DOD agreed with 16 of them and 

partly agreed with the other. Implementing our recommendations will 

strengthen DOD’s management and oversight of these funds and reduce 

the risk of fraud, waste, and abuse. (GAO-18-553, GAO-18-401) 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

74 Performance Information GAO-19-1SP

Helping the Congress 

Reduce a Key Foreign 

Assistance Account by 

Almost $500 Million

The U.S Department of State and U.S. Agency for International 

Development use the Economic Support Fund (ESF) to advance U.S. 

interests by helping countries meet political, economic, and security 

needs. For example, ESF-funded programs support accountable 

governance, a stronger private sector, and counter-terrorism efforts. In 

reviewing the FY17 federal budget request, we estimated ESF would have 

an unobligated balance of $4.9 billion that year. For the 5 prior years, 

we found ESF had unobligated balances of $4.2–$5.3 billion. Our analysis 

contributed to a decision by the Congress to reduce appropriated funds 

for ESF by $496.7 million.

Providing Data and 

Analysis on a New 

Foreign Aid Account 

Led to a $150 Million 

Cut

The President’s FY17 budget requested $150 million to establish a new 

foreign aid account—the Mechanism for Peace Operations Response—to 

be managed by the U.S. Department of State. This account was intended 

to support unexpected peacekeeping needs, including efforts led by 

the United Nations. In our 2016 budget justification review and 2017 

update, we informed the Congress of plans for using this account and 

suggested that it consider whether this request was justified. Our analysis 

contributed to the Congress deciding not to fund the account in FY17 

appropriations.

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP
GAO-19-1SP 75 Performance Information

Our third strategic goal focuses on the 

collaborative and integrated elements 

needed for the federal government to 

achieve results. The work under this 

goal highlights the intergovernmental 

relationships that are necessary to address 

national challenges. Our multiyear (fiscal 

years 2018-2023) strategic objectives under 

this goal are

 the government’s fiscal position and 

approaches to address current and 

projected fiscal gaps;

 major management challenges and 

program risks; and

 fraud, waste, and abuse and needed 

improvements in internal controls.

These objectives, along with the 

performance goals and key efforts that 

support them, are discussed fully in our 

strategic plan, which is available on our 

website at https://www.gao.gov/about/

stratplanning.html. The work supporting

these objectives is performed primarily 

by headquarters and field staff from 

the Applied Research and Methods, 

Financial Management and Assurance, 

Forensic Audits and Investigative Service, 

Information Technology, and Strategic 

Issues teams. In addition, the work 

supporting some performance goals and 

key efforts is performed by headquarters 

and field staff from the Contracting and 

National Security Acquisitions, Physical 

Infrastructure, and Natural Resources and 

Environment teams. This goal also includes 

our bid protest and appropriations law 

work, which is performed by staff in the 

Office of the General Counsel.

To accomplish work under these objectives, 

we also perform foresight work (for 

example, examining the nation’s long-term 

fiscal and management challenges) and 

insight work focusing on federal programs 

at high risk for fraud, waste, abuse, and 

mismanagement.

Strategic Goal 3

Help Transform the Federal Government to Address 

National Challenges

Source: Brand X Pictures. | GAO-19-1SP
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

76 Performance Information GAO-19-1SP

As shown in table 16, we met the Goal 3 performance targets set for financial benefits, 

other benefits, and testimonies for fiscal year 2018. 

Table 16: Strategic Goal 3’s Annual Performance Results and Targets

Performance

measure

2013

actual

2014

actual

2015

actual

2016

actual

2017

actual

2018

target

2018

actual

Met/

not met

2019

target

Financial benefits

(dollars in billions)

$8.1 $13.3 $10.1 $30.8 $5.0 $3.9a $12.1 met $3.9

Other benefits 555 513 526 448 517 410a 515 met 411

Testimonies 22 30 26 37 29 23 28 met 25

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Note: Financial benefits for Goals 1 through 3 do not sum to the total agency-wide target for 2019 as we have left a portion of 

the financial benefits target unassigned. Experience leads us to believe that we can meet the agency-wide target but we cannot 

always accurately predict under which goals. 

a

Our fiscal year 2018 targets for two of our three performance measures differ from those we reported in our fiscal year 2018 

performance plan in July 2017. Specifically, we decreased the financial benefits target from $5.7 billion to $3.9 billion and 

increased the other benefits target from 370 to 410, based on revised estimates from mission teams (see Setting Performance 

Targets).

To help us examine trends for these measures over time, we look at their 4-year averages— 

shown in table 17—which minimize the effect of an unusual level of performance in 

any single year. Table 17 indicates that the 4-year average for Goal 3 financial benefits 

increased steadily from 2013 to 2016, declined in 2017, and held steady in 2018. Average 

other benefits for Goal 3 decreased steadily from 2013 to 2017 and held steady in 2018. The 

trend in the average number of testimonies on Goal 3 issues declined from 2013 to 2015 

and held steady from 2016 through 2018. 

Table 17: Four-Year Rolling Averages for Strategic Goal 3

Performance measure 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018

Financial benefits (dollars in billions) $10.9 $11.3 $12.1 $15.6 $14.8 $14.5

Other benefits 630 587 562 511 501 502

Testimonies 37 33 30 29 31 30

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

The following sections describe our performance under Goal 3 for each of our quantitative 

performance measures and describe the targets for fiscal year 2019. 

Example of Work under Goal 3 

Artificial Intelligence: Artificial intelligence (AI) could improve human life and economic competitiveness—

but it also poses new risks. The Comptroller General convened a Forum on AI to consider the policy and 

research implications of AI’s use in 4 areas with the potential to significantly affect daily life: (1) cybersecurity, 

(2) automated vehicles, (3) criminal justice, and (4) financial services. In our March 2018 technology 

assessment, we reported that AI will have far-reaching effects on society—even if AI capabilities stop 

advancing today. We also discussed the prospects for AI in the near future and areas where changes in policy 

and research may be needed. (GAO-18-644T, GAO-18-142SP)
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 77 Performance Information

Financial Benefits

In fiscal year 2018, the financial benefits reported for Goal 3 totaled $12.1 billion, 

exceeding our target of $3.9 billion by $8.2 billion, or about 210 percent. This was due 

primarily to unexpected financial benefits of $1.3 billion from helping CMS achieve and 

measure the benefits of its fraud prevention system and $1.9 billion from our work involving 

improper payments at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. We have set our 

2019 target at $3.9 billion based on what our Goal 3 teams believe they can achieve given 

past, ongoing, and expected work.

Other Benefits

Other benefits reported for Goal 3 in fiscal year 2018 totaled 515, exceeding our target of 

410 benefits by 105, which is about 26 percent. Many of Goal 3’s benefits were in the areas 

of public safety and security, program efficiency and effectiveness, business process and 

management, and tax law administration. We have set our fiscal year 2019 target at 411 

other benefits based on past, ongoing, and expected work.

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Carol Harris, Director, Information Technology Team, testified on improving CIO authorities at the Social Security Administration. 

Example of Goal 3’s Financial Benefits

Modifying IRS’ New Hire Calculations Reduced FY17 Funding Request: Our review of the Internal Revenue 

Service’s (IRS) FY14 budget request found that its estimated costs for hiring staff for new initiatives assumed 

that they would all be hired on October 1st (the 1st day of the fiscal year). However, actual IRS hiring patterns 

showed hiring throughout the fiscal year. We suggested that the Congress request substantiation from IRS to 

address this issue. In response, IRS modified its calculation and began to use a January 1st hire date for most 

new staff. As a result, IRS’s funding request for FY17 for these new hires was $258.6 million less than it would 

have using the prior methodology.

Example of Goal 3’s Other Benefits 

Improving Chief Information Officer Authorities: Agencies planned to spend almost $96 billion on IT in FY18 

but still face longstanding IT challenges. The Congress established the chief information officer (CIO) position 

at 24 federal agencies to address these challenges. However, we reported in 2018 that none of the agencies 

have fully addressed the role of their CIOs in all areas required by federal law, including IT leadership and 

accountability, IT budgeting, and information security. We recommended that these agencies do so to improve 

the effectiveness of federal CIOs—14 of the agencies concurred and 5 had no comments. (GAO-18-93)
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

78 Performance Information GAO-19-1SP

Testimonies

Our senior executives were asked to testify 28 times on topics related to this strategic goal 

in fiscal year 2018, exceeding our target of 23 testimonies by 5, or about 22 percent. 

Among the Goal 3 testimony topics covered were fragmentation, overlap, and duplication 

of federal programs and activities; key challenges for the 2020 Census; and improving CIO 

authorities at the Social Security Administration (SSA). (See fig. 22 for selected testimony 

topics by goal.) For fiscal year 2019, we have set the testimony target at 25, based on our 

experience in recent years. 

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP

Robert Goldenkoff, Director, Strategic Issues Team (top) and David Powner, Director, Information Technology Team (bottom) 

testified jointly on key challenges for the 2020 Census.

Example of Goal 3’s Testimonies 

Key Challenges for the 2020 Census: Our body of work on the 2020 Census has raised serious concerns about 

the Census Bureau’s ability to conduct a cost-effective count of the nation’s population. For these reasons, 

we added the 2020 Census to our High Risk List in FY17. In FY18, we testified that the Bureau needs to control 

cost growth and develop better cost estimates. Also, our preliminary findings on the 2018 End to End Test 

showed that continued attention is needed to mitigate key risks related to implementing and securing IT 

systems. Over the past decade, we have made 93 recommendations specific to the 2020 Census—31 still have 

merit and have not been fully implemented. (GAO-18-543T)
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 79 Performance Information

Table 18 provides examples of Goal 3 accomplishments and contributions, which include 

both financial and other benefits.

Table 18: Goal 3 Examples of Accomplishments and Contributions

Analyze Government’s Fiscal Position

Improving Federal 

Financial Reporting 

and Controls

Our financial statement audits continue to yield improvements in federal 

financial reporting and controls. In response to our recommendations, in 

2017, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau improved its accounting 

of its property and equipment and the Federal Deposit Insurance 

Corporation improved controls over its information systems. Additionally, 

the Treasury disclosed criminal debt information in the U.S. government’s 

consolidated financial statements. It also improved its monitoring of 

the federal government’s progress in resolving differences (e.g., dollar 

amounts) recorded for the same transaction between federal entities. 

(GAO-18-540, GAO-18-316R, GAO-18-293R, GAO-18-185R)

Reducing Inaccurate 

Claims for Higher 

Education Tax Benefits 

Tax benefits for higher education are complex, which may lead taxpayers 

to claim more benefits than they are allowed. In 2009, we found that 

the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) was not comparing individuals’ tax 

returns with the information educational institutions reported (Form 

1098-T Tuition Statement) to verify taxpayers’ claims. We recommended 

that IRS determine the feasibility of doing so to strengthen its compliance 

programs. In 2015, the Congress passed legislation that should enable 

IRS to verify taxpayers’ claims using information from educational 

institutions—which should yield about $504 million in financial benefits in 

FYs 2018-2021. (GAO-10-225) 

Prevent Fraud, Waste, and Abuse

Improving DOD’s 

Financial Management

DOD’s long-standing financial management problems continue to prevent 

its financial statements from being auditable, and contribute to its place 

on GAO’s High Risk List. In FY 2018, we reported on the Army’s efforts to 

resolve more than 121,000 unsupported accounting entries which totaled 

$455 billion over a 6-month period. We also reported that the Navy was 

unable to account for all of the buildings it owned, and had nonexistent 

buildings in its inventory system. We made six recommendations to 

help DOD improve its financial management with which it concurred. 

(GAO-18-289, GAO-18-27) 

Preventing 

Overpayments 

of Disability 

and Workers’ 

Compensation 

Benefits

In 2015, we conducted a review of potential overpayments in SSA’s 

Disability Insurance (DI) program to individuals who were also receiving 

payments from the Federal Employees’ Compensation Act (FECA). 

We provided SSA with information on more than 1,000 individuals we 

identified as receiving potential DI overpayments due to their concurrent 

receipt of FECA benefits. In response, SSA determined that these 

individuals received over $59 million in overpayments. This information 

will help SSA recover this money and ensure that future payments are 

made in compliance with federal law. (GAO-15-531)

Helping Remove 

Ineligible Providers 

from Medicare

In June 2015, we identified weaknesses in the screening procedures 

CMS uses to prevent ineligible or potentially fraudulent providers and 

suppliers from enrolling in Medicare. In April 2015, we provided CMS a list 

of Medicare providers and suppliers we identified as having potentially 

ineligible practice locations, adverse actions against their license, 

debarments, or that were deceased. In response, CMS reviewed the list 

we provided and revoked 8 providers from its database. These actions 

will likely help enhance program integrity and reduce fraud in Medicare. 

(GAO-15-448)
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

80 Performance Information GAO-19-1SP

Major Management Challenges and Program Risks

Defining Scope 

of DOD’s Joint 

Information 

Environment

DOD spent about $42 billion in FY17 on IT to support its thousands of 

networks and millions of computers. In August 2010, the Secretary of 

Defense announced the Joint Information Environment (JIE) initiative to 

consolidate IT infrastructure to reduce costs and improve IT security. 

In 2016, we found that DOD had not effectively defined the scope of 

the JIE initiative. In response, the JIE Executive Committee approved a 

scope statement in 2017—helping to ensure that DOD officials (1) have 

the information they need to oversee progress, (2) are accountable 

for performance, and (3) can make more informed resource decisions. 

(GAO-16-593)

Improving 

Government-wide 

Grant Closeout 

Reporting

In 2008, 2012, and 2016, GAO reported that expired grants with 

undisbursed balances remained in grant accounts well past their period 

of performance end date and were eligible for closeout—and made 

recommendations to address this issue. In January 2016, the Congress 

passed the Grants Oversight and New Efficiency (GONE) Act, citing 

GAO’s work in this area. The GONE Act required agencies to report on 

grants that had been expired for more than 2 years, anticipating that 

doing so would improve financial accountability and save money on 

costs associated with maintaining grants in open status. (GAO-16-362, 

GAO-12-360, GAO-08-432)

Improving Agencies 

Reporting of Major 

Management 

Challenges

Under the GPRA Modernization Act of 2010, agencies are to report major 

management challenges to the Congress to alert it to programs that 

are more vulnerable to waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement. This 

reporting needs to include performance goals and measures, planned 

actions to resolve challenges, milestones, and identify an agency official 

responsible for resolving the challenges. In 2016, we found shortcomings 

in how agencies approached these requirements. In response, several 

agencies took actions to include missing performance information in their 

reporting that will help ensure that this information is useful, transparent, 

and complete. (GAO-16-510)

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 81 Performance Information

Our fourth strategic goal embraces 

the spirit of continuous and focused 

improvement in order to sustain highquality, timely service to the Congress, 

while also implementing leading practices 

in our internal operations. Activities 

carried out under this goal also address our 

three internal management challenges. The 

multiyear (fiscal years 2018-2023) strategic 

objectives under this goal are to

 empower GAO’s workforce to excel 

through strategic talent management; 

 streamline GAO’s processes to deliver 

quality results and products and 

promote knowledge sharing, government 

standards, and strategic solutions; and

 provide modern integrated tools and 

systems in a secure, collaborative, and 

mobile environment. 

These objectives, along with the 

performance goals and key efforts that 

support them, are discussed fully in our 

strategic plan, which is available on our 

website at https://www.gao.gov/about/

stratplanning.html. The work supporting 

these objectives is performed under the 

direction of the Chief Administrative 

Officer through the following offices: the 

Controller and Financial Management and 

Business Operations, Human Capital, 

Information Systems and Technology 

Services, Infrastructure Operations, the 

Learning Center, the Professional 

Development Program, and Field 

Operations. Assistance on specific key 

efforts is provided by the Applied Research 

and Methods team and other offices, 

including Strategic Planning and External 

Liaison, Congressional Relations, 

Opportunity and Inclusiveness, Audit Policy 

and Quality Assurance, Public Affairs, and 

Strategic Goal 4

Maximize the Value of GAO by Enabling Quality, 

Timely Service to the Congress and by Being a 

Leading Practices Federal Agency

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

82 Performance Information GAO-19-1SP

General Counsel. To accomplish our work 

under these four objectives, we performed 

internal studies and completed projects 

that further the strategic goal. As shown in 

table 7 on page 40, our internal operations 

for services and functions that help 

employees get their jobs done, improve the 

quality of their work life, and the IT tools 

they use to accomplish their work were 

rated by our staff with scores of 85 

percent, 82 percent, and 73 percent, 

respectively. Table 19 provides examples of 

Goal 4 accomplishments and contributions.

Examples of Work under Goal 4

Recruiting. As we mentioned in our human capital management challenge, we hired a Recruiting Program 

Manager in fiscal year 2018 to ensure GAO remains a leader in developing, implementing, and evaluating agencywide recruitment and talent management strategies, and sustaining a diverse talent pipeline for the agency.

HQ Space Consolidation. Through an extensive space consolidation effort, we created about 45,000 square feet 

of leasable space in our Headquarters building, new meeting rooms, and privacy rooms for nursing mothers.

Table 19: Goal 4 Accomplishments and Contributions

Empower GAO’s Workforce to Excel through Strategic Talent Management

Hiring, 

developing, 

and retaining 

our workforce

 In fiscal year 2018, GAO set a target of 3,020 full-time equivalents (FTE) and 

reached 3,015 FTE—or 99.8 percent of our target. This hiring success was aided 

by filling 206 paid intern positions beginning in the fall of 2017 through the 

present.

 Under the stewardship of our senior-level Special Assistant for Telework, 

we developed guidance for managers to proactively oversee teleworking 

employees and continued to monitor employee participation in the telework 

program.

Enhancing and 

sustaining a 

fair, diverse, 

and inclusive 

culture

 We integrated GAO’s longstanding core mission values—accountability, 

integrity, and reliability—with our people values that all employees should be 

valued, respected, and treated fairly—to foster a culture that promotes an 

inclusive and bias-free workplace while enhancing our ability to successfully 

conduct our work and achieve our mission. 

 We continued our commitment as a diversity and inclusion (D&I) leader by 

offering numerous learning opportunities for staff, including sessions on 

implicit bias, the impact of growing up as Caribbean Americans, and one 

person’s involvement with a hate group. 

 We also continued to strengthen our partnership with the Public Policy and 

International Affairs (PPIA) Program, an organization which helps prepare 

students from underserved communities for graduate studies in public and 

international affairs graduate programs. GAO employees extended our 

commitment to D&I issues beyond the workplace through presentations at over 

a dozen PPIA partner universities.

Maintaining 

effective 

relationships 

with GAO’s 

internal 

employee 

organizations

 In fiscal year 2018, the agency worked with the GAO Employees Organization, 

International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers (IFPTE) Local 

1921, to negotiate on a variety of initiatives including the following: 

◦ multiyear pay range and geographic zone agreement, 

◦ GAO headquarters consolidation (space) agreement, and 

◦ renovation and relocation of select field offices.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 83 Performance Information

Streamline GAO’s Processes to Deliver Quality Products and Promote Knowledge 

Sharing

Enhancing the 

outreach to 

the Congress 

and access to 

our work

 We held our first-ever open house on the Hill, making available policy experts 

from each of its missions teams to congressional members and their staff at 

the same time and in a single location at the Capitol Visitors Center. 

 We also hosted at our headquarters a bipartisan panel of five senior 

congressional staff, some from our oversight and other committees, who 

shared their views on the products and services GAO offers. 

 Our Fast Facts pilot program (August 2016—May 2017) provided a brief 

summary and related image for our reports, which improved our ability to 

communicate with our online readers. The pilot was a success, with our 

readers staying on GAO.gov about 70 percent longer, viewing about 40 percent 

more pages, and downloading the full report 36 percent more often. As such, 

we plan to expand the program to the rest of the agency by the end of 2018.

 To better reach our audience, we shifted our social media strategy to make 

greater use of video—and our viewership increased as a result. For example, 

we started a new Facebook Live segment in September 2017 called “Cuppa 

GAO: Coffee with Our Experts,” which has aired four episodes to date and 

reached nearly 10,000 views.

Enhancing 

GAO’s 

foresight 

and strategic 

planning 

capacity

 We redesigned and issued our 2018-2023 Strategic Plan to enhance readability 

and enable periodic updates of key efforts. In this Strategic Plan, we identified 

eight trends shaping the United States and its place in the world, and included 

trend papers on environmental sustainability and the nexus among jobs, 

technology, and education. 

 We also held our first meeting with the Center for Strategic Foresight Fellows. 

Center Fellows are recognized experts in areas related to strategic foresight, 

futures studies, and strategic planning, and include members of both the 

public and private sectors, as well as academia and the non-profit sector. The 

Center’s purpose is to enhance GAO’s ability to analyze current and projected 

technological and societal trends and their impact on federal agencies and 

programs.

Continually 

improving 

government 

auditing 

standards

 In collaboration with the government audit community and others, we issued 

revised Government Auditing Standards, also known as the “Yellow Book,” in 

July 2018. These professional standards provide a framework for performing 

high-quality government audit work with competence, integrity, objectivity, 

and independence to provide accountability and to help improve government 

operations and services. 

 In 2018, we assisted in further refining and improving the INTOSAI Framework 

of Professional Pronouncements, through work expected to lead to new and 

revised guidance and ensuring quality control over the standards development 

process.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

84 Performance Information GAO-19-1SP

Enhancing 

GAO’s 

products, 

processes, and 

programs

 To help standardize the information mission teams use to manage their 

portfolio of engagement work while alleviating the burden of developing 

their own portfolio-level analyses and tools, we transitioned our management 

dashboard, mdash, from Excel to an online platform that uses a common set of 

measures. Mdash is easier to learn to use and navigate, more robust, and built 

with the capacity and flexibility to change with the needs of the agency. 

 In the area of project management, we developed work breakdown 

structure templates that will provide a consistent starting point for designing 

engagements based on 18 common engagement activities and methodologies. 

We also developed and tested project management solutions related to staff 

day estimation and scheduling that will help engagement leaders and managers 

facilitate more efficient decision-making. 

 We designed and provided a Project Management course for nearly 350 nonanalyst staff to present the basics of project management as referenced in the 

professionally recognized Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK).

Provide Modern Integrated Tools and Systems in a Secure Environment

Empowering 

staff with 

integrated 

tools to 

enhance 

business 

processes 

and increase 

efficiency

 On September 5, 2018, we issued our first web-based, mobile-friendly report, 

GAO-18-312, using the New Blue system. New Blue will establish the ability 

to easily and efficiently create, review, and manage content through parallel 

workflows in a single interface, and enable digital distribution of our content 

to current and future media as technologies advance.

 On January 17, 2014, the Congress enacted a law that directed us to establish 

and operate a bid protest e-filing and document dissemination system, and 

authorized the collection and use of fees to offset its costs. In fiscal year 

2018, we implemented this system and began collecting fees from users of the 

system to cover operating costs.

	











	




 


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Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 85 Performance Information

Enhancing 

tools that 

integrate 

enterprise 

data to 

facilitate 

decision 

making

 Using enterprise data from several systems, we formally identified and 

documented the associated fraud risks for employee travel vouchers and 

identified key controls and mitigating actions to reduce the likelihood and 

impact of these risks. We intend to use these data to monitor travel voucher 

fraud risk annually.

Enabling 

a mobile, 

collaborative 

environment

 We upgraded the Video Teleconferencing (VTC) equipment in most of our 

existing teleconferencing rooms, both at headquarters and in the field offices, 

positioning us to deliver improvements to our communication and collaboration 

toolset.

Ensuring a 

secure, costeffective 

physical and 

technological 

infrastructure

 We hosted a table-top simulation exercise with senior leaders to validate roles, 

responsibilities, and procedures in the event of a HAZMAT or related occupant 

emergency in Headquarters.

 We developed a manual to provide a detailed guide for Field Office Security 

Officers and their designees in carrying out their responsibility to supervise 

and direct security activities for their respective field offices.

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP
86 GAO-19-1SP From the Chief Financial Officer

Source: Comstock. | GAO-19-1SP

November 15, 2018

I am pleased to report that in fiscal year 2018, the U.S. Government Accountability Office 

(GAO) continued to set the standard for excellence in government financial management. 

Once again, GAO’s financial statements, which are an integral part of our Performance and 

Accountability Report (PAR), received an unmodified “clean” opinion. Our independent 

auditors found that GAO maintained, in all material aspects, effective internal control over 

financial reporting, and our financial management systems substantially complied with 

the applicable requirements of the Federal Financial Management Improvement Act of 

1996 (FFMIA). Although not required, GAO considers the independent auditor’s opinion on 

internal controls and on the system’s compliance with FFMIA to be a leading practice. 

In addition to our own self-assessment, obtaining an independent, objective assessment 

of our internal control over financial reporting and on our system’s compliance with 

FFMIA helps demonstrate our sound stewardship of the taxpayers’ dollars that have been 

entrusted to us. Further, I’m proud to report that our fiscal year 2017 PAR received two 

awards from the Association of Government Accountants. We received the Certificate of 

Excellence in Accountability Reporting (CEAR) award, our 17th consecutive award since we 

first applied in fiscal year 2001. GAO was also honored with the Best-in-Class award, which 

recognizes the best process for assuring data quality.

The funding enacted for fiscal year 2018 afforded GAO the opportunity to increase hiring 

and make strategic investments in communications, infrastructure, and security. GAO also 

continued upgrading key systems that support the products and services we provide to the 

Congress. 

From the Chief Financial Officer

Part III

Financial Information
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 87 From the Chief Financial Officer

These enhancements will improve effectiveness and increase our efficiency in the long 

term. The investments in security, building infrastructure, and the ongoing consolidation of 

headquarters building space will enhance headquarters and field office safety, and bring in a 

new tenant. The rental revenue from a new tenant will allow GAO to increase human capital 

funding to better position it to achieve 3,150 full-time equivalents (FTE) in fiscal year 2019. 

Going forward, GAO will continue to focus efforts toward restoring staffing levels to 

the goal of 3,250 FTEs, as well as maintaining current information technology (IT) and 

infrastructure operations, investing in critical building and IT improvements, and continuing 

to explore further cost reduction measures and new revenue streams. 

GAO successfully migrated to a new financial management system starting in fiscal year 

2018. The migration to the Legislative Branch Financial Management System (LBFMS) aligns 

with guidance from the House Appropriations Subcommittee on the Legislative Branch, to 

consolidate legislative branch financial operations with the Library of Congress as system 

owner and hosted on a cloud operated by CGI, Inc. The LBFMS operates Momentum Release 

7.4 as the integrated Financial Management System, and hosts the transaction processing 

system in a FedRAMP compliant, secure facility. This migration leveraged Treasury’s 

eInvoicing system and will result in long-term cost savings for GAO due to reduced 

operations and maintenance costs. Additionally, GAO is benefiting from the integration of 

acquisition and financial management activity, which led to accuracy and concurrency in 

the financial system. GAO engaged a vendor to conduct financial management transaction 

processing services in the LBFMS, and provide Service Level Agreements and metrics of 

GAO’s operations. 

In the area of internal control, an entity-wide assessment of risk and key controls for the 

agency’s internal control system was conducted by the Program Analysis and Operations 

office (PAO) consistent with the Federal Manager’s Financial Integrity Act and the Office of 

Management and Budget (OMB) Circular A-123, Management’s Responsibility for Enterprise 

Risk Management and Internal Control. This assessment concluded that the agency was in 

compliance with the five components and 17 principles of the Standards for Internal Control 

in the Federal Government (Green Book). 

To validate compliance, effectiveness, and efficiency, and the integrity of data, PAO 

reviewed and tested key business cycles such as acquisitions, human capital/payroll, 

disbursements, and financial reporting. Additionally, we reviewed the independent 

auditors’ reports of our service providers so we could proactively address any issues with 

the appropriate compensating controls. Based on these assessments, GAO has reasonable 

assurance that internal control over reporting, operations, and compliance for fiscal year 

2018 were operating effectively and that no material weaknesses were found in the design 

or operations of the internal control system. 

Consistent with OMB guidance to implement an enterprise risk management (ERM) 

capability and GAO’s A Framework for Managing Fraud Risks in Federal Programs (Fraud Risk 

Framework), GAO continues to use a maturity model approach to incorporate ERM and fraud 

risk assessment activities into our existing governance structure. Under the direction of the 

Chief Risk Officers (CROs) and the Risk Management Council, we: (1) assessed GAO’s operating 

environment and prepared and updated the agency-wide risk profile for 2018; (2) integrated 

ERM considerations into our assessment of internal control over operations, reporting, and 

compliance; and (3) conducted a fraud risk assessment of a high-profile program.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

88 GAO-19-1SP From the Chief Financial Officer

GAO will continue to upgrade agency systems to maximize communications, infrastructure, 

and security in keeping with our strategic goal of maximizing fiscal stewardship of GAO’s 

resources and enabling quality, timely service to the Congress and being a leading-practices 

federal agency. As such, these upgrades coupled with other operational improvements 

will increase our efficiency, thereby improving our ability to meet our Congressional 

responsibilities.

Karl J. Maschino

Chief Administrative Officer/

Chief Financial Officer
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 89 Audit Advisory Committee’s Report Financial Information

Audit Advisory Committee’s Report

The Audit Advisory Committee (the Committee) assists the Comptroller General in 

overseeing the U.S. Government Accountability Office’s (GAO) financial operations. 

As part of that responsibility, the Committee meets with agency management, 

its Inspector General, and its external auditors to review and discuss GAO’s 

external financial audit coverage, the effectiveness of GAO’s internal control 

over its financial reporting, and its compliance with certain laws and regulations 

that could materially impact GAO’s financial statements. GAO’s external auditors 

are responsible for expressing an opinion on the conformity of GAO’s audited 

financial statements with accounting principles generally accepted in the United 

States of America. The Committee reviews the findings of the Inspector General 

and external auditors, and GAO’s responses to those findings, to assure itself 

that GAO’s plan for corrective action includes appropriate and timely followup measures. In addition, the Committee reviews the draft Performance and 

Accountability Report, including its financial statements, and provides comments 

to management who have responsibility for the Performance and Accountability 

Report. The Committee met three times with respect to its responsibilities as 

described above. During these sessions, the Committee met with the Inspector 

General and external auditors without GAO management being present and 

discussed with the external auditors the matters that are required to be discussed 

by generally accepted auditing standards. Based on procedures performed as 

outlined above, the Committee recommends that GAO’s audited statements and 

footnotes be included in the 2018 Performance and Accountability Report.

Michael A. Nemeroff

Chair

Audit Advisory Committee
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

90 GAO-19-1SP Financial Information

Independent Auditor’s Report

CliftonLarsonAllen LLP

www.cliftonlarsonallen.com

INDEPENDENT AUDITORS’ REPORT

Comptroller General of the United States

In our audits of the fiscal years (FY) 2018 and 2017 financial statements of the United States 

Government Accountability Office (GAO), we found:

• The financial statements as of and for the fiscal years ended September 30, 2018 and 

2017, are presented fairly, in all material respects, in accordance with accounting 

principles generally accepted in the United States of America (U.S.);

• GAO maintained, in all material respects, effective internal control over financial reporting

as of September 30, 2018;

• GAO’s financial management systems substantially complied with the applicable 

requirements of the Federal Financial Management Improvement Act (FFMIA) as of 

September 30, 2018; and

• No reportable noncompliance for FY 2018 with provisions of applicable laws, regulations,

contracts, and grant agreements we tested.

The following sections discuss in more detail (1) our report on the financial statements and on 

internal control over financial reporting, which includes required supplementary information (RSI) 

and other information included with the financial statements; (2) our report on systems’ 

compliance with FFMIA; and (3) our report on compliance with laws, regulations, contracts and 

grant agreements.

Report on the Financial Statements and Internal Control over Financial Reporting

We have audited the accompanying financial statements of GAO, which comprise the balance 

sheets as of September 30, 2018 and 2017, and the related statements of net cost, changes in 

net position, and budgetary resources for the years then ended, and the related notes to the 

financial statements (financial statements). We have also audited GAO’s internal control over 

financial reporting as of September 30, 2018. 

We believe that the audit evidence we have obtained is sufficient and appropriate to provide a 

basis for our audit opinions.

Management’s Responsibility

GAO management is responsible for (1) the preparation and fair presentation of these financial 

statements in accordance with accounting principles generally accepted in the U.S.; (2) preparing, 

measuring, and presenting the RSI in accordance with U. S. generally accepted accounting 

principles; (3) preparing and presenting other information included in documents containing the 

audited financial statements and auditor’s report, and ensuring the consistency of that information
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 91 Financial Information

INDEPENDENT AUDITORS’ REPORT (Continued)

with the audited financial statements and the RSI; (4) maintaining effective internal control over 

financial reporting, including the design, implementation, and maintenance of internal control 

relevant to the preparation and fair presentation of financial statements that are free from material 

misstatement, whether due to fraud or error; (5) evaluating the effectiveness of its internal control 

over financial reporting based on criteria established under 31 U.S.C. §3512 (c), (d), commonly 

known as the Federal Managers’ Financial Integrity Act (FMFIA) and Office of Management and 

Budget (OMB) Circular A-123, Management’s Responsibility for Enterprise Risk Management and 

Internal Control (OMB Circular A-123), and (6) providing its assertion about the effectiveness of 

internal control over financial reporting, based on its evaluation as of September 30, 2018. 

Management’s Statement of Assurance is included in the Introduction section of the Performance 

and Accountability Report (PAR).

Auditors’ Responsibilities

Our responsibility is to express an opinion on these financial statements and an opinion on GAO’s 

internal control over financial reporting based on our audits. We conducted our audit of the 

financial statements in accordance with auditing standards generally accepted in the U.S.; and 

the standards applicable to the financial audits contained in Government Auditing Standards,

issued by the Comptroller General of the United States. Our audit of internal control over financial 

reporting was conducted in accordance with auditing standards generally accepted in the U.S. 

and Government Auditing Standards. Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit 

to obtain reasonable assurance about whether the financial statements are free from material 

misstatement, and whether effective internal control over financial reporting was maintained in all 

material respects. We are also responsible for applying certain limited procedures with respect to 

the RSI and all other information included with the financial statements. We also conducted our 

audits in accordance with OMB Bulletin No. 19-01, Audit Requirements for Federal Financial 

Statements (OMB Bulletin 19-01).

An audit of financial statements involves performing procedures to obtain audit evidence about 

the amounts and disclosures in the financial statements. The procedures selected depend on the 

auditor’s judgment, including the auditor’s assessment of the risks of material misstatement of the 

financial statements, whether due to fraud or error. In making those risk assessments, the auditor 

considers internal control relevant to the entity’s preparation and fair presentation of the financial 

statements in order to design audit procedures that are appropriate in the circumstances. An audit 

of financial statements also involves evaluating the appropriateness of the accounting policies 

used and the reasonableness of significant accounting estimates made by management, as well 

as evaluating the overall presentation of the financial statements. An audit of internal control over 

financial reporting includes obtaining an understanding of internal control over financial reporting, 

assessing the risk that a material weakness exists, evaluating the design and operating 

effectiveness of internal control over financial reporting based on the assessed risk, and testing 

relevant internal control over financial reporting. Our audit of internal control also considered the 

entity’s process for evaluating and reporting on internal control over financial reporting based on 

criteria established under FMFIA. Our audits also included performing such other procedures as 

we considered necessary in the circumstances.

We did not evaluate all internal controls relevant to operating objectives as broadly established 

under FMFIA, such as those controls relevant to preparing performance information and ensuring 

efficient operations. We limited our internal control testing to testing controls over financial 

reporting. Our internal control testing was for the purpose of expressing an opinion on whether 

effective internal control over financial reporting was maintained, in all material respects. 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

92 GAO-19-1SP Financial Information

INDEPENDENT AUDITORS’ REPORT (Continued)

Consequently, our audit may not identify all deficiencies in internal control over financial reporting 

that are less severe than a material weakness1

.

Definitions and Inherent Limitations of Internal Control over Financial Reporting

An entity’s internal control over financial reporting is a process effected by those charged with 

governance, management, and other personnel, the objectives of which are to provide reasonable 

assurance that (1) transactions are properly recorded, processed, and summarized to permit the 

preparation of financial statements in accordance with U.S. generally accepted accounting 

principles, and assets are safeguarded against loss from unauthorized acquisition, use, or 

disposition; and (2) transactions are executed in accordance with provisions of applicable laws, 

including those governing the use of budget authority; regulations; contracts; and grant 

agreements, noncompliance with which could have a material effect on the financial statements.

Because of its inherent limitations, internal control over financial reporting may not prevent, or 

detect and correct, misstatements due to fraud or error. We also caution that projecting any 

evaluation of effectiveness to future periods is subject to the risk that controls may become 

inadequate because of changes in conditions, or that the degree of compliance with the policies 

or procedures may deteriorate.

Opinions 

In our opinion, the financial statements referred to above present fairly, in all material respects, 

the financial position of GAO as of September 30, 2018 and 2017, and its net costs, changes in 

net position, and budgetary resources for the years then ended, in accordance with accounting 

principles generally accepted in the U.S. In our opinion, GAO maintained, in all material respects, 

effective internal control over financial reporting as of September 30, 2018, based on criteria 

established under FMFIA and OMB Circular A-123.

Other Matters

Required Supplementary Information

Accounting principles generally accepted in the U.S. require that GAO’s Management Discussion 

and Analysis (MD&A) and Deferred Maintenance disclosure, also regarded as RSI, included as 

Part I of the PAR, be presented to supplement the financial statements. Such information, 

although not a part of the financial statements, is required by the Federal Accounting Standards 

Advisory Board (FASAB), who considers it to be an essential part of financial reporting for placing 

the financial statements in an appropriate operational, economic, or historical context. We have 

applied certain limited procedures to the MD&A and Deferred Maintenance disclosure in 

accordance with auditing standards generally accepted in the U.S., which consisted of inquiries 

of management about the methods of preparing the information and comparing the information 

for consistency with management's responses to our inquiries, the financial statements, and other 

knowledge we obtained during our audit of the financial statements in order to report omissions 

or material departures from FASAB guidelines, if any, identified by these limited procedures. We 

did not audit and we do not express an opinion or provide any assurance on the information 

1 A material weakness is a deficiency, or combination of deficiencies, in internal control over financial reporting, such 

that there is a reasonable possibility that a material misstatement of the entity’s financial statements will not be 

prevented, or detected and corrected, on a timely basis. A deficiency in internal control exists when the design or 

operation of a control does not allow management or employees, in the normal course of performing their assigned 

functions, to prevent, or detect and correct, misstatements on a timely basis.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 93 Financial Information

INDEPENDENT AUDITORS’ REPORT (Continued)

because the limited procedures do not provide us with sufficient evidence to express an opinion 

or provide any assurance.

Other Information

Other information included in the PAR, other than the basic financial statements, RSI, and the 

auditors’ report, contains a wide range of information, some of which is not directly related to the 

financial statements. This information is presented for purposes of additional analysis and is not 

a required part of the basic financial statements or RSI. We read the other information included 

with the financial statements in order to identify material inconsistencies, if any, with the audited 

financial statements. Our audit was conducted for the purpose of forming an opinion on GAO’s 

financial statements. We did not audit and do not express an opinion or provide any assurance 

on the other information.

Report on Systems’ Compliance with FFMIA Requirements

We have audited GAO’s financial management systems’ compliance with certain requirements 

as prescribed in the FFMIA as of September 30, 2018. The objective of our audit was to express 

an opinion on whether GAO’s financial management systems substantially complied with the 

requirements in section 803a of FFMIA as outlined in the following areas: (1) federal financial 

management system requirements, (2) applicable federal accounting standards, and (3) the 

United States Government Standard General Ledger (USSGL) at the transaction level.

Management’s Responsibility

Management is responsible forimplementing and maintaining financial management systems that 

comply with FFMIA requirements.

Auditors’ Responsibility 

Our responsibility is to express an opinion on GAO’s financial management systems’ compliance 

with the three FFMIA requirements based on our audit. We conducted our audit of GAO’s 

compliance with FFMIA requirements in accordance with attestation standards established by the 

AICPA and the attestation standards contained in Government Auditing Standards. Under those 

standards, we planned and performed the audit to obtain reasonable assurance about whether 

the financial management systems substantially complied with the three requirements of FFMIA. 

A compliance audit includes examining, on a test basis, evidence about the entity’s compliance 

with those requirements and performing such other procedures as we consider necessary in the 

circumstance. Our audit does not provide a legal determination of GAO’s compliance.

We believe that our audit provides a reasonable basis for our opinion.

Opinion on Systems’ Compliance with FFMIA

In our opinion, GAO’s financial management systems substantially complied with the applicable 

requirements of FFMIA as of September 30, 2018. Our opinion is based on criteria established 

under FFMIA for federal financial management systems.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

94 GAO-19-1SP Financial Information

INDEPENDENT AUDITORS’ REPORT (Continued)

Report on Compliance with Laws, Regulations, Contracts, and Grant Agreements Based 

on an Audit of Financial Statements Performed in Accordance with Government Auditing 

Standards

In connection with our audit of GAO’s financial statements, we tested GAO’s compliance with 

certain provisions of laws, regulations, contracts, and grant agreements consistent with our 

professional responsibility discussed below. We caution that noncompliance with laws, 

regulations, contracts and grant agreements may occur and not be detected by these tests. We 

performed our tests of compliance in accordance with Government Auditing Standards.

Management’s Responsibility for Compliance

Management is responsible for complying with applicable laws, regulations, contracts, and grant 

agreements.

Auditors’ Responsibility

We are responsible for testing compliance with selected provisions of laws, regulations, contracts, 

and grant agreements, noncompliance with which could have a material effect on the financial 

statements. We did not test compliance with all laws, regulations, contracts, and grant 

agreements applicable to GAO.

Results of Tests of Compliance with Laws, Regulations, Contracts, and Grant 

Agreements 

Our tests for compliance with selected provisions of applicable laws, regulations, contracts, and 

grant agreements disclosed no instances of noncompliance or other matters for the year ended 

September 30, 2018, that are required to be reported in accordance with Government Auditing 

Standards. However, the objective of our tests was not to provide an opinion on compliance with

laws, regulations, contracts, and grant agreements applicable to GAO, and accordingly, we do 

not express such an opinion.

Purpose of the Report on Compliance with Laws, Regulations, Contracts, and Grant 

Agreements

The purpose of the Report on Compliance with Laws, Regulations, Contracts, and Grant 

Agreements is solely to describe the scope of our testing of compliance with selected provisions 

of applicable laws, regulations, contracts and grant agreements and the results of that testing, 

and not to provide an opinion on GAO’s compliance. This report is an integral part of an audit 

performed in accordance with Government Auditing Standards in considering GAO’s compliance. 

Accordingly, this report is not suitable for any other purpose.

CliftonLarsonAllen LLP

Greenbelt, Maryland

November 14, 2018
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 95 Financial Information

Purpose of Each Financial Statement

The financial statements on the following pages are the:

 Balance sheets which present the amounts we had available to use (assets) versus the 

amounts we owed (liabilities) and the residual amounts after liabilities were subtracted 

from assets (net position).

 Statements of net cost which present the annual cost of our operations. The gross 

costs, less any offsetting revenue earned from our activities, is used to arrive at the net 

cost of work performed under our four strategic goals and other costs in support of the 

Congress.

 Statements of changes in net position which present the accounting items that caused 

the net position section of the balance sheets to change from the beginning to the end 

of the fiscal years displayed.

 Statements of budgetary resources which present how budgetary resources were made 

available to us during the fiscal year and the status of those resources at the end of the 

fiscal year.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

96 GAO-19-1SP Financial Information

Financial Statements

U.S. Government Accountability Office

Balance Sheets

As of September 30, 2018 and 2017

(Dollars in thousands)

2018 2017

Assets

Intragovernmental

Fund balance with Treasury (Note 2) $135,215 $77,658 

Accounts receivable 4,047 2,658 

Total Intragovernmental 139,262 80,316 

Property and equipment, net (Note 3) 21,290 25,477 

Other 410 331 

Total Assets $160,962 $106,124 

Liabilities (Note 4)

Intragovernmental

Accounts payable and other $5,948 $3,340 

Federal employee benefits (Note 5) 3,774 3,665 

Federal Employees’ Compensation 

 Act (FECA) liability (Note 6) 2,019 2,233 

Total Intragovernmental 11,741 9,238 

Accounts payable and other 6,414 5,852 

Salaries and benefits 17,887 17,724 

Accrued annual leave 32,104 31,770 

Actuarial FECA liability (Note 6) 13,576 14,173 

Total Liabilities 81,722 78,757 

Net Position

Unexpended appropriations 74,617 26,079 

Cumulative results of operations 4,623 1,288 

Total Net Position (Note 12) 79,240 27,367 

Total Liabilities and Net Position $160,962 $106,124 

The accompanying notes are an integral part of these financial statements.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 97 Financial Information

Financial Statements

U.S. Government Accountability Office

Statements of Net Cost

For the Fiscal Years Ended September 30, 2018 and 2017

(Dollars in thousands)

2018 2017

Net Costs by Goal

Goal 1: Well-being / Financial Security of American People

Gross Costs $223,410 $215,972 

Less: reimbursable services (629) (431)

Net goal costs 222,781 215,541 

Goal 2: Changing Security Threats / Challenges of Global 

Interdependence

Gross Costs 151,860 148,362 

Less: reimbursable services - - 

Net goal costs 151,860 148,362 

Goal 3: Help Transform the Federal Government to Address 

National Challenges

Gross Costs 161,308 159,079 

Less: reimbursable services (17,248) (14,895)

 Net goal costs 144,060 144,184 

Goal 4: Maximize the Value of GAO

Gross Costs 14,907 15,655 

Less: reimbursable services - - 

Net goal costs 14,907 15,655 

Other Costs in Support of the Congress

Gross Costs 51,077 47,000 

Less: reimbursable services (1,653) (1,277)

Net costs 49,424 45,723 

Less: Reimbursable services not attributable to above 

cost categories (Note 7) (13,988) (10,260)

 Net Cost of Operations (Note 9) $569,044 $559,205 

The accompanying notes are an integral part of these financial statements.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

98 GAO-19-1SP Financial Information

Financial Statements

U.S. Government Accountability Office

Statements of Changes in Net Position

For the Fiscal Years Ended September 30, 2018 and 2017

(Dollars in thousands)

2018 2017

Unexpended Appropriations, beginning of fiscal year $26,079 $29,706 

Budgetary Financing Sources and Uses

Appropriations received 592,917 544,506 

Appropriations transferred in (Note 10) - 1,000 

Appropriations permanently not available (3) (1)

Appropriations used (544,376) (549,132)

Total Budgetary Financing Sources and Uses 48,538 (3,627)

Total Unexpended Appropriations, end of fiscal year 74,617 26,079 

Cumulative Results of Operations, beginning of fiscal year 1,288 (6,983)

Budgetary Financing Sources - appropriations used 544,376 549,132 

Other Financing Sources

Federal employee retirement benefit costs paid by OPM and 

imputed to GAO (Note 5) 28,003 18,376 

Transfers In/(out) - (32)

Total Financing Sources 572,379 567,476 

Net Cost of Operations 569,044 559,205 

Net Change 3,335 8,271 

Cumulative Results of Operations, end of fiscal year 4,623 1,288 

Net Position $79,240 $27,367 

The accompanying notes are an integral part of these financial statements.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 99 Financial Information

Financial Statements

U.S. Government Accountability Office

Statements of Budgetary Resources

For the Fiscal Years Ended September 30, 2018 and 2017

(Dollars in thousands)

2018 2017

Budgetary Resources (Note 10)

Unobligated balance from prior year budget authority, net $43,465 $40,751 

Appropriations 592,917 544,506 

Spending authority from offsetting collections 32,166 32,023 

Total budgetary resources $668,548 $617,280 

Status of Budgetary Resources

New obligations and upward adjustments $609,667 $581,021 

Unobligated balance, end of year:

Apportioned, unexpired account 9,957 700 

Unapportioned, unexpired accounts 46,074 34,578 

Unexpired unobligated balance, end of year 56,031 35,278 

Expired unobligated balance, end of year 2,850 981 

Total unobligated balance, end of year 58,881 36,259 

Total budgetary resources $668,548 $617,280 

Outlays, Net

Outlays, net $535,357 $542,303 

Distributed offsetting receipts (36) (84)

Agency outlays, net $535,321 $542,219 

The accompanying notes are an integral part of these financial statements.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

100 GAO-19-1SP Financial Information

Notes to Financial Statements

Note 1. Summary of Significant Accounting Policies

Reporting Entity

GAO, an agency in the legislative branch of the federal government, supports the 

Congress in carrying out its constitutional responsibilities. GAO carries out its mission 

primarily by conducting audits, evaluations, analyses, research, and investigations and 

providing the information from that work to the Congress and the public in a variety 

of forms. The financial activity presented relates primarily to the execution of GAO’s 

Congressionally approved budget. GAO’s budget consists of an annual appropriation 

covering salaries and expenses as well as revenue from reimbursable audit services and 

rental income. The revenue from audit services and rental income is presented on the 

statements of net cost as “reimbursable services” and included as part of “spending 

authority from offsetting collections” on the statements of budgetary resources. The 

financial statements, except for federal employee benefit costs paid by the Office of 

Personnel Management (OPM) and imputed to GAO, do not include the effects of centrally 

administered assets and liabilities related to the federal government as a whole, such as 

interest on the federal debt, which may in part be attributable to GAO. 

Basis of Accounting and Reporting 

GAO’s financial statements have been prepared on the accrual basis and the budgetary 

basis of accounting in conformity with generally accepted accounting principles for the 

federal government. Accordingly, revenues are recognized when earned and expenses 

are recognized when incurred, without regard to the receipt or payment of cash. These 

principles differ from budgetary reporting principles used to prepare the Statement 

of Budgetary Resources. The differences relate primarily to the capitalization and 

depreciation of property and equipment, as well as the recognition of other long-term 

assets and liabilities. The statements were also prepared in accordance with OMB Circular 

A-136, Financial Reporting Requirements, Revised. 

Intragovernmental Assets

Intragovernmental assets are those assets that arise from transactions with other federal 

entities. Funds with the U.S. Department of Treasury (Treasury) comprise the majority of 

intragovernmental assets on GAO’s balance sheets.

Fund Balance with Treasury

The Treasury processes GAO’s receipts and disbursements. Fund balance with Treasury 

represents appropriated funds from which GAO is authorized to make expenditures and 

pay liabilities. 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 101 Financial Information

Accounts Receivable

GAO’s accounts receivable are due principally from federal agencies for reimbursable 

services. GAO does not recognize any allowance for loss on intragovernmental accounts 

receivable.

Property and Equipment, Net

The GAO headquarters building qualifies as a multi-use heritage asset, is GAO’s only 

heritage asset, and is reported with property and equipment on the balance sheets. The 

building’s designation as a multi-use heritage asset is a result of both being listed in the 

National Register of Historic Places and being used in general government operations. 

Statement of Federal Financial Accounting Standards No. 29 requires accounting for multiuse heritage assets as general property, plant, and equipment to be included in the 

balance sheet and depreciated. The building was depreciated on a straight-line basis over 

25 years and is fully depreciated. 

Generally, property and equipment individually costing more than $15,000 are capitalized 

at cost. Building improvements and leasehold improvements are capitalized when the 

cost is $25,000 or greater. Bulk purchases of lesser-value items that aggregate more than 

$150,000 are also capitalized at cost. Assets are depreciated on a straight-line basis over 

the estimated useful life of the property as follows: building improvements, 10 years; 

computer equipment, software, and capital lease assets, ranging from 3 to 6 years; 

leasehold improvements, 5 years; and other equipment, ranging from 5 to 20 years. GAO’s 

property and equipment have no restrictions as to use or convertibility except for the 

restrictions related to the GAO building being registered in the National Register of Historic 

Places.

Liabilities

Liabilities represent amounts that are likely to be paid by GAO as a result of transactions 

that have already occurred. Intragovernmental liabilities are those liabilities that arise from 

transactions with other federal entities. 

Accounts Payable

Accounts Payable consists of amounts owed to federal agencies and commercial vendors for 

goods and services received. The balance presented includes accounts payable recorded 

through normal business activities, as well as an estimate of unbilled payables based on 

historical data.

Federal Employee Benefits 

GAO recognizes its share of the cost of providing future pension benefits to eligible 

employees over the period of time that they render services to GAO. The pension expense 

recognized in the financial statements equals the current service cost for GAO’s employees 

for the accounting period, less the amount contributed by the employees. OPM, the 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

102 GAO-19-1SP Financial Information

administrator of the plan, supplies GAO with factors to apply in the calculation of the 

service cost. These factors are derived through actuarial cost methods and assumptions. 

The excess of the recognized pension expense over the amount contributed by GAO 

and employees represents the amount being financed directly through the Civil Service 

Retirement and Disability Fund administered by OPM. This amount is considered imputed 

financing to GAO (see Note 5).

The Federal Employees’ Compensation Act (FECA) provides income and medical cost 

protection to covered federal civilian employees injured on the job, employees who have 

incurred a work-related occupational disease, and beneficiaries of employees whose deaths 

are attributable to job-related injury or occupational disease. Claims incurred for benefits 

for GAO employees under FECA are administered by the Department of Labor (DOL) and 

are paid, ultimately, by GAO (see Note 6).

GAO recognizes a current-period expense for the future cost of post-employment health 

benefits and life insurance for its employees while they are still working. GAO accounts for 

and reports this expense in its financial statements in a manner similar to that used for 

pensions, with the exception that employees and GAO do not make current contributions 

to fund these future benefits.

Federal employee benefit costs paid by OPM and imputed to GAO are reported as a 

financing source on the Statements of Changes in Net Position and are also included as a 

component of net cost by goal on the Statements of Net Cost.

Annual, Sick, and Other Leave

Annual leave is recognized as an expense and a liability as it is earned; the liability is reduced 

as leave is taken. The accrued leave liability is principally long-term in nature. Sick leave and 

other types of leave are expensed as leave is taken. All leave is funded when taken. 

Contingencies

GAO has certain claims and lawsuits pending against it. GAO’s policy is to recognize a 

contingent liability in the financial statements for any losses considered probable and 

estimable. Management believes that the likelihood of losses from such claims and lawsuits 

is remote and, therefore, no provision for losses is included in the financial statements. 

Estimates

Management has made certain estimates and assumptions when reporting assets, liabilities, 

revenue, expenses, and in the note disclosures. Actual results could differ from these 

estimates. 

Reclassifications

Certain prior year amounts in the financial statements and notes have been reclassified to 

conform to the current year presentation.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 103 Financial Information

Note 2. Fund Balance with Treasury 

GAO’s funds with the Treasury consist of only appropriated funds. The status of these funds 

as of September 30, 2018, and September 30, 2017, is as follows:

Dollars in thousands

2018 2017

Fund balance with Treasury $135,215 $77,658

Status of Fund balance with Treasury

 Unobligated balance

 Available $41,892 $21,173

 Unavailable 2,850 981

 Obligated balance not yet disbursed 90,473 55,504

Total status of Fund balance with Treasury $135,215 $77,658

Note 3. Property and Equipment, Net

The composition of property and equipment as of September 30, 2018, is as follows:

Dollars in thousands

Classes of property and equipment Acquisition value Accumulated depreciation Book value

Land $1,191 – $1,191

Building and improvements 131,999 $122,111 9,888

Computer and other equipment and software 57,197 47,289 9,908

Leasehold improvements 2,276 1,973 303 

Total property and equipment $192,663 $171,373 $21,290

Depreciation expense for property and equipment for fiscal year 2018: $6,058,000.

The composition of property and equipment as of September 30, 2017 is as follows:

Dollars in thousands

Classes of property and equipment Acquisition value Accumulated depreciation Book value

Land $1,191 – $1,191

Building and improvements 130,638 $119,176 11,462

Computer and other equipment and software 62,438 49,837 12,601

Leasehold improvements 2,830 2,607 223

Total property and equipment $197,097 $171,620 $25,477

Depreciation expense for property and equipment for fiscal year 2017: $5,668,000.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

104 GAO-19-1SP Financial Information

Note 4. Liabilities Not Covered by Budgetary Resources

The liabilities on GAO’s balance sheets include liabilities not covered by budgetary 

resources. Although future appropriations to fund these liabilities are likely and 

anticipated, it is not certain that appropriations will be enacted to fund these liabilities. 

The composition of liabilities not covered by budgetary resources as of September 30, 

2018, and September 30, 2017, is as follows:

Dollars in thousands

 2018 2017

Intragovernmental liabilities—FECA liability $2,019 $2,233

Salaries and benefits—Comptrollers’ General retirement plan* 983 1,046

Accrued annual leave 32,104 31,770

Actuarial FECA liabilities** 13,576 14,173

Liabilities not covered by budgetary resources 48,682 49,222

Liabilities not requiring budgetary resources 25 40

Liabilities covered by budgetary resources 33,015 29,495

Total liabilities $81,722 $78,757

* See Note 5 for further discussion of the Comptrollers’ General retirement plan.

** See Note 6 for further discussion of FECA liability.

Note 5. Federal Employee Benefits

All permanent employees participate in either the contributory Civil Service Retirement 

System (CSRS) or the Federal Employees Retirement System (FERS). Temporary employees 

and employees participating in FERS are covered under the Federal Insurance Contributions 

Act (FICA). To the extent that employees are covered by FICA, the taxes they pay to the 

program and the benefits they will eventually receive are not recognized in GAO’s financial 

statements. GAO makes contributions to CSRS, FERS, and FICA and matches certain 

employee contributions to the thrift savings component of FERS. All of these payments are 

recognized as operating expenses. 

In addition, all permanent employees are eligible to participate in the contributory 

Federal Employees Health Benefit Program (FEHBP) and the Federal Employees Group Life 

Insurance (FEGLI) Program and may continue to participate after retirement. GAO makes 

contributions through OPM to FEHBP and FEGLI for active employees to pay for their 

current benefits. GAO’s contributions for active employees are recognized as operating 

expenses. Using the cost factors supplied by OPM, GAO has also recognized an expense in 

its financial statements for the estimated future cost of post-employment health benefits 

and life insurance for its employees. These costs are financed by OPM and imputed to GAO. 

Amounts owed to OPM and Treasury as of September 30, 2018, and September 30, 2017, 

are $3,774,000 and $3,665,000, respectively, for FEHBP, FEGLI, FICA, FERS, and CSRS 

contributions and are shown on the balance sheets as Federal employee benefits.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 105 Financial Information

Details of the major components of GAO’s federal employee benefit costs for the fiscal 

years ended September 30, 2018, and September 30, 2017, are as follows:

Dollars in thousands

Federal employee benefits costs 2018 2017

Federal employee retirement benefit costs paid by OPM and imputed to GAO:

Estimated future pension costs (CSRS/FERS) $9,436 $4,300 

Estimated future post-employment health/life insurance (FEHBP/FEGLI) 18,567 14,076

Total $28,003 $18,376

Pension expenses (CSRS/FERS) $46,656 $45,342

Health and life insurance expenses (FEHBP/FEGLI) $25,341 $24,589

FICA and Medicare payments made by GAO $24,417 $23,221

Thrift Savings Plan – matching contribution by GAO $15,861 $15,266

Comptrollers general and their surviving beneficiaries who qualify and elect to participate 

are paid retirement benefits by GAO under a separate retirement plan. These benefits are 

paid from current year appropriations. Because GAO is responsible for future payments 

under this plan, the estimated present value of accumulated plan benefits of $983,000 

as of September 30, 2018, and $1,046,000 as of September 30, 2017, is included as 

a component of salary and benefit liabilities on GAO’s balance sheets. The following 

summarizes the changes in the actuarial liability for current plan year: 

Dollars in thousands

Actuarial liability as of September 30, 2017 $1,046

Expense: 

Interest on the liability balance 25

Actuarial loss:

From experience 84

From assumption changes (1) 

Total expense 108

Less benefits paid (171)

Actuarial liability as of September 30, 2018 $983

Note 6. FECA Liability

GAO recorded a liability for amounts paid to claimants by DOL as of September 30, 

2018, and September 30, 2017, of $2,019,000 and $2,233,000, respectively, but not yet 

reimbursed to DOL by GAO. The amount owed to DOL is reported on GAO’s balance sheets 

as an intragovernmental liability titled, FECA liability. Additionally, GAO utilizes the services 

of an independent actuarial firm to calculate its actuarial FECA liability. GAO recorded 

an estimated liability for claims incurred but not reported as of September 30, 2018, 

and September 30, 2017, which is expected to be paid in future periods. This estimated 

liability of $13,576,000 and $14,173,000 as of September 30, 2018, and September 30, 2017, 

respectively, is reported on GAO’s balance sheets as Actuarial FECA liability.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

106 GAO-19-1SP Financial Information

Note 7. Building Lease Revenue

In fiscal year 2011, GAO entered into a lease agreement with U.S. Army Corps of Engineers 

(USACE) to lease the entire third floor, and part of the sixth floor, of the GAO headquarters 

building. The period of this agreement began in fiscal year 2011 with an option to renew 

each year through fiscal year 2020. Total rental revenue to GAO includes a fixed base rent 

plus operating expense reimbursements, with escalation clauses each year, if the option 

years are exercised. 

In fiscal year 2012, GAO entered into a lease with the Department of Justice (DOJ) to lease 

part of the first and sixth floors of the GAO headquarters building. The period of this lease 

began in fiscal year 2012 with an option to renew each year through fiscal year 2022. 

Rental revenue from space leased at GAO headquarters building for fiscal years 2018 and 

2017 was $9,621,000 and $9,586,000, respectively. These amounts are included on the 

statements of net cost as a major component of “Reimbursable services not attributable 

to above cost categories”. Total rental revenue for the future periods from both USACE and 

DOJ is as follows: 

Dollars in thousands

Fiscal year ending September 30 Total projected rental revenue*

2019 $9,825

2020 9,952

2021 2,270

2022 2,288

Total $24,335

*If options to renew are exercised. 

Note 8. Leases

Operating Leases

GAO leases office space, predominately for field offices, from the General Services 

Administration and has entered into various other operating leases for office 

communication and computer equipment. Lease costs for office space for fiscal years 2018 

and 2017 amounted to approximately $5,461,000 and $6,386,000, respectively. Leases for 

equipment under operating leases are generally for less than 1 year; therefore, there are 

no associated future minimum lease payments. Annual lease costs under the operating 

leases are included as components of net cost in the statements of net cost. Estimated 

future minimum lease payments for field office space under the current terms of the 

leases, which range from 1 to 10 years, are presented in the table below. 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 107 Financial Information

Dollars in thousands

Fiscal year ending September 30 Total

2019 $6,313

2020 3,938

2021 2,707

2022 2,663

2023 2,684

2024 and thereafter 6,142 

Total estimated future lease payments $24,447

Note 9. Net Cost of Operations

GAO’s total cost of operations for fiscal year 2018 and 2017 amounted to $602,562,000 and 

$586,068,000, respectively. The statements of net cost show revenues from reimbursable 

services of $33,518,000 in fiscal year 2018 and $26,863,000 in fiscal year 2017 as an offset 

against the total cost by goal to arrive at net costs of $569,044,000 and $559,205,000 for 

fiscal years 2018 and 2017, respectively. Earned revenues that cannot be associated with 

a major goal or other cost category are shown in total as “Reimbursable services not 

attributable to above cost categories,” the largest component of which is rental revenue 

from the lease of space in the GAO headquarters building.

The largest cost item for GAO is salary and benefits expense. This expense includes postemployment benefit costs paid by OPM and imputed to GAO. The salary and benefits 

expense funding breakout for fiscal years ending September 30, 2018 and 2017 is as follows: 

Dollars in thousands

Salary and benefits expense funding 2018 % of total 

costs of 

operations

2017 % of total 

costs of 

operations

GAO paid salary & benefits $481,115 79.8% $466,034 79.5%

Benefits paid by OPM 28,003 4.7% 18,386 3.1%

Total salary and benefits expense $509,118 84.5% $484,420 82.6%

“Other costs in support of the Congress” represents costs of work that directly supports 

Congress and represents GAO’s fulfillment of its statutory responsibilities but is not 

engagement specific. Examples of this work include support of the Federal Accounting 

Standards Advisory Board, General Counsel statutory bid protest decision writing function, 

recommendation follow-up work, and other direct support to Congress. 

The net cost of operations represents GAO’s operating costs that must be funded by 

financing sources other than revenues earned from reimbursable services. These financing 

sources are presented in the statements of changes in net position.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

108 GAO-19-1SP Financial Information

Note 10. Budgetary Resources

Budgetary resources available to GAO during fiscal years 2018 and 2017 include current 

year appropriations, prior years’ unobligated balances, reimbursements earned by GAO 

from providing goods and services to other federal entities for a price (reimbursable 

services), and cost-sharing arrangements with other federal entities. 

Earned reimbursements consist primarily of rent collected from USACE and DOJ for lease 

of space and related services in the GAO headquarters building, as well as certain program 

and financial audits of federal entities, including components of the Department of the 

Treasury, Securities and Exchange Commission, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, 

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and Federal Housing Finance Agency. Earned 

revenue from rent is available indefinitely, subject to annual obligation ceilings, and must 

be used to offset the cost of operating and maintaining the GAO headquarters building. 

Reimbursements from program and financial audits are available without limitations 

on their use and may be subject to annual obligation ceilings. GAO’s pricing policy for 

reimbursable services is to seek reimbursement for actual costs incurred, including 

overhead costs where allowed by law. 

There were no budgetary transfers in fiscal year 2018. Fiscal year 2017 budgetary resources 

include $500,000 of budget authority transferred from U.S. Agency for International 

Development and $500,000 transferred from the Department of Health and Human Services 

to GAO for oversight of activities related to research on, and responding to, the Zika virus.

A comparison of GAO’s fiscal year 2017 statement of budgetary resources with the 

corresponding information presented in the 2019 President’s Budget, is as follows: 

Dollars in thousands

Budgetary 

resources

Obligations 

incurred

Fiscal year 2017 Statement of Budgetary Resources $617,280 $581,021

Obligation adjusts, expired accounts - (9,007)

Unobligated balances, beginning of year – (funds activity, expired accounts) (3,490) -

Recovery of prior year unpaid obligations (5,125) -

Permanently not available – (funds activity, expired accounts) 1 -

Recoveries of prior year paid obligations (expired accounts) (1,376)

Spending authority from offsetting collections – (funds activity, expired accounts) 2 -

Other – rounding in President’s Budget 708 (14) 

2019 President’s Budget – fiscal year 2017, actual $608,000 $572,000

As the fiscal year 2020 President’s Budget will not be published until February 2019, a 

comparison between the fiscal year 2018 data reflected on the statement of budgetary 

resources and fiscal year 2018 data in the President’s Budget cannot be performed, though 

we expect similar differences will exist. The fiscal year 2020 President’s Budget will be 

available on the OMB’s website and directly from the Government Printing Office.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 109 Financial Information

Budgetary resources obligated for undelivered orders at the end of fiscal year 2018 and 

fiscal year 2017 totaled $57,471,000 and $26,025,000, respectively. For fiscal year 2018 

undelivered orders were comprised of $14,231,000 with federal trading partners and 

$43,240,000 with the public.

GAO’s apportionments fall under Category A, quarterly apportionment. Apportionment 

categories of new obligations and upward adjustments incurred for fiscal years 2018 and 

2017 are as follows: 

Dollars in thousands

2018 2017

Direct – Category A $578,265 $552,797

Reimbursable – Category A 31,402 28,224 

New obligations and upward adjustments $609,667 $581,021

Note 11. Reconciliation of Net Operating Costs and Net Outlays

Details of the relationship between net costs of operations and net outlays for the fiscal 

year ending September 30, 2018 is as follows: 

Dollars in thousands

2018

Net operating costs $569,044

Components of net operating costs not part of net outlays

Property and equipment depreciation, disposal and revaluation (6,239)

Increase/(decrease) in assets: 

Accounts receivable 1,456

(Increase)/decrease in liabilities not affecting net outlays:

Accounts payable (1,846) 

Salaries and benefits (336) 

Other liabilities (unfunded leave and FECA, actuarial FECA) (823) 

Other financing sources

Federal employee retirement benefit costs paid by OPM and imputed to GAO (28,003)

Total components of net operating costs not part of net outlays (35,791)

Components of net outlays that are not part of net operating costs

Acquisition of capital assets 2,064

Acquisition of inventory 12

Other 28

Total components of net outlays that are not part of net operating costs 2,104

Net outlays $535,357
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

110 GAO-19-1SP Financial Information

Note 12. Net Position

Net position on the balance sheets comprises unexpended appropriations and cumulative 

results of operations. Unexpended appropriations are the sum of the total unobligated 

appropriations and undelivered goods and services for funds directly appropriated to 

GAO. Cumulative results of operations represent the difference between financing sources 

and expenses since inception. Details of the components of GAO’s cumulative results of 

operations for the fiscal years ended September 30, 2018, and 2017, are as follows:

Dollars in thousands

2018 2017

Investment in property and equipment, net $21,290 $25,477

Net reimbursable funds activity 31,630 24,742

Other (supplies inventory and accounts receivable from public) 410 331

Liabilities not covered by, nor requiring, budgetary resources* (48,707) (49,262)

Cumulative results of operations $4,623 $1,288

*See Note 4 for components.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 111 Financial Information

Required Supplementary Information

Deferred Maintenance and Repairs for Fiscal Year 2018

Statement of Federal Financial Accounting Standards (SFFAS) 42, Deferred Maintenance and 

Repairs: Amending SFFAS 6,14, 29, and 32, defines deferred maintenance and repairs (DM&R) 

as maintenance and repairs that were not performed when they should have been or were 

scheduled to be and are put off or delayed for a future period. SFFAS No. 42 requires 

disclosure of deferred maintenance details as required supplementary information for all 

general property, plant and equipment (PP&E). 

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) operates and maintains an approximately 

two million square foot headquarters facility and approximately six acres of associated 

grounds in downtown Washington, DC. The headquarters facility is predominantly used 

for office space. GAO is responsible for ensuring the facilities entrusted to its care remain 

in a safe and suitable condition for the current and future needs of the agency and 

tenant organizations. GAO defines its acceptable level of condition of PP&E to be “fair 

to good” based on the Facility Condition Index (FCI). The index is based on GAO facility 

replacement values, which are updated every two to three years and identified as deferred 

maintenance. PP&E of less than “fair” condition are determined to require significantly 

more maintenance than facilities in better condition.

For information technology (IT) assets, GAO has a fully funded technology maintenance 

contract and manages the maintenance requirements annually through the budget process, 

reviewing all maintenance requirements to ensure all assets are covered for the new fiscal 

year. For IT assets, an acceptable asset condition is met by a vendor-supported version 

which is no more than two versions behind.

GAO’s deferred maintenance and repairs relate to capitalized general PP&E and to noncapitalized or fully depreciated general PP&E. To evaluate the condition of PP&E, GAO 

uses the Facility Condition Assessments (FCA’s) that calculates a FCI to identify deferred 

maintenance and capital improvement requirements. Maintenance and repair activities 

are first prioritized based on health, safety, and regulatory considerations at the GAO 

headquarters building. Once this is accomplished, the FCI values (Condition Ratings and 

Condition Category ratings) are then ranked based on the ratings obtained during the 

condition assessment site survey. Rankings are generally adjusted to take into account 

current capital improvement efforts underway, future capital improvement plans, asset 

disposal plans, and budgetary funding outlook.

GAO completed its latest, formal, contracted FCA in 2016 that was limited to mechanical, 

electrical, and plumbing assets (over $25,000) for the GAO headquarters building. In 

addition, GAO facilities staff and their facilities contract partners assess the building on a 

continuous basis. In 2017, the internal facilities staff assessment was performed on areas 

not covered in 2016, and GAO determined a deferred maintenance amount existed for 

several areas, including interior finishes and HVAC upgrades.

In fiscal year 2018, GAO reviewed the 2016 Asset Management Plan and updated costs. A 

full asset management planning study is scheduled for fiscal year 2020 and will include 

architectural, structural, and landscape items along with all infrastructural elements. 

GAO’s updated estimate of the amount of accumulated deferred maintenance and repair 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

112 GAO-19-1SP Financial Information

work required to bring facilities to a “fair” condition, based on the FCI and in-house 

assessments, is approximately $29.1 million as of fiscal year ended September 30, 2018. 

The majority of the increased deferred maintenance from October 1, 2017, stems from a 

need to replace interior finishes on the second, fourth, and fifth floors, replacement of the 

certain supply air shafts due to deterioration, replacement of railings as a result of safety 

inspections conducted in 2018, and replacement of certain air handling units.

Dollars in thousands

Deferred maintenance and repair costs September 30, 2018 

ending balance

October 1, 2017 

beginning balance

General PP&E $29,100 $23,500
Part IV

Inspector General’s View 

of GAO’s Management 

Challenges 

Source: Comstock (columns), GAO (The Capitol). | GAO-19-1SP

SERVING CONGRESS AND THE NATION
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

114 GAO-19-1SP Inspector General’s View of GAO’s Management Challenges

Inspector General’s Statement 

United States Government Accountability Office

Memorandum

Date: October 1, 2018

To: Comptroller General Gene L. Dodaro

From: Inspector General Adam R. Trzeciak 

Subject: GAO Management Challenges

GAO shares similar challenges to its ability to fulfill its mission as those faced by other 

federal agencies. In recent years, GAO has focused management attention in three primary 

challenge areas: managing a quality workforce, engagement efficiency, and ensuring the 

confidentiality, integrity, and availability of GAO’s information technology services. In 2018, 

GAO broadened its challenge in the area of information technology to recognize that its 

focus extends beyond security. We agree these are key management challenges facing 

GAO and with GAO’s decision to broaden its information technology challenge.

Our prior audits and on-going work have confirmed these challenge areas, their 

interconnectivity, and depth. As we have communicated to GAO management in various

audit reports and briefs, performance issues in one area can adversely impact other 

challenges and the agency’s ability to sustain mission performance. For example, key 

components of GAO’s infrastructure, such as the agency’s Virtual Desktop Infrastructure

(VDI) and Document Management/Electronic Records Management System (DM/EMRS), 

relied heavily on by GAO staff in performing its work, are aging and experiencing

performance issues. If upgrades or planned replacements for these and other key 

components of GAO’s infrastructure are not timely and effectively managed, the ability of 

GAO’s onsite and remote workforce to efficiently perform its work could be adversely 

affected. Configuration management issues, including the need for a usable inventory of 

hardware/software to effectively safeguard resources and manage equipment 

obsolescence, could also impact the success of GAO business system transformation 

efforts, including VDI and DM/EMRS. 

Regarding a quality workforce, our review of GAO’s use of law enforcement availability pay 

(LEAP) found that the agency did not appear to have a significant need for its Forensic Audit 

and Investigative Services investigators to work beyond their regular 40-hour workweek. 

Specifically, GAO paid FAIS investigators premium pay based, more often than not, on the 

availability of these investigators to work rather than on actual work performed. As a result of 

our work, GAO has initiated actions to improve its workforce planning and utilization of FAIS 

investigators eligible for LEAP premium pay. 

Challenges faced by GAO are complex and continuously evolving. GAO leadership 

understands both the risks and opportunities these challenges represent and is actively 

taking steps to address them and better prepare the agency for the future.
Part V

Appendixes 

Source: Comstock (columns), GAO (The Capitol). | GAO-19-1SP

SERVING CONGRESS AND THE NATION
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

116 GAO-19-1SP Abbreviations

AI	 Artificial Intelligence

AICPA	 American Institute of Certified Public Accountants

APQA	 Audit Policy and Quality Assurance

ARM	 Applied Research and Methods

BI	 Business Intelligence Analytics

CAO	 Chief Administrative Office(r)

CBP	 Customs and Border Protection

CDC	 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

CEAR	 Certificate of Excellence in Accountability Reporting

[the] Center	 Center for Audit Excellence

CIGIE	 Council of the Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency

CIO	 Chief Information Officer

CMS	 Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services

CR	 Congressional Relations

CRA	 Congressional Review Act

CRO	 Chief Risk Officer

CSAT	 Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) survey

CSRS	 Civil Service Retirement System

DATA Act	 Digital Accountability and Transparency Act of 2014

DHS	 Department of Homeland Security

DI	 Disability Insurance

D&I	 Diversity and inclusion

DM/ERMS	 Document Management/Electronic Records Management System

DM&R	 Deferred Maintenance and Repairs

DNI	 Director of National Intelligence

DNP	 Do Not Pay

DOD	 Department of Defense

DOE	 Department of Energy

DOJ	 Department of Justice

DOL	 Department of Labor

EHRI	 Enterprise Human Resources Integration

EPDS	 Electronic Protest Docking System

ERM	 Enterprise Risk Management

ESC	 Enterprise Services Center

ESF	 Economic Support Fund

FAIS	 Forensic Audits and Investigative Service

FASAB	 Federal Accounting Standards Advisory Board

FCA	 Facility Condition Assessment

FCC	 Federal Communications Commission

FCI	 Facility Condition Index

FECA	 Federal Employees’ Compensation Act

FEGLI	 Federal Employees Group Life Insurance Program

FEHBP	 Federal Employees Health Benefits Program

FEMA	 Federal Emergency Management Agency

FERS	 Federal Employees Retirement System

FFMIA	 Federal Financial Management Improvement Act of 1996

Appendix I: Abbreviations 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 117 Abbreviations

FHA	 Federal Housing Administration

FICA	 Federal Insurance Contributions Act

FISMA	 Federal Information Security Management Act

FMFIA	 Federal Managers’ Financial Integrity Act

FMS	 Foreign Military Sales

FRA	 Federal Railroad Administration

FTE	 full-time equivalent

FVRA	 Federal Vacancies Reform Act

FY	 Fiscal Year

GAO	 Government Accountability Office

GONE	 Grants Oversight and New Efficiency [Act]

GPS	 Global Positioning System

GPRA Government Performance and Results Act, as amended

GPRAMA	 GPRA Modernization Act of 2010

GSA	 General Services Administration

HHS	 Department of Health and Human Services

HOPD	 Hospital outpatient department

HVAC	 Heating, ventilation, and air conditioning

IC	 Intelligence Community

ICD	 Intelligence Community Directive

ID	 Identification

IDC	 INTOSAI Donor Cooperation

IFPTE	 International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers

IG	 Inspector General

Interior Department of the Interior

IMF	 International Monetary Fund

INTOSAI	 International Organization of Supreme Audit Institutions

IRS	 Internal Revenue Service

IT	 information technology

JIE	 Joint Information Environment

LBFMS	 Legislative Branch Financial Management System

LEAP	 Law Enforcement Availability Pay

LLP	 Limited Liability Partnership

MD&A	 Management Discussion and Analysis

MILPERS	 Military Personnel

MOU	 Memorandum of Understanding

NASA	 National Aeronautics and Space Administration

NBIB	 National Background Investigations Bureau

NFC	 National Finance Center

NIST	 National Institute of Standards and Technology

ODNI	 Office of the Director of National Intelligence

OGC	 Office of General Counsel

OIG	 Office of Inspector General

OMB	 Office of Management and Budget

ONDCP	 Office of National Drug Control Policy

OO&I	 Office of Opportunity and Inclusiveness

OPM	 Office of Personnel Management

PAO	 Program Analysis and Operations

PAR	 Performance and Accountability Report

PMBOK	 Project Management Body of Knowledge
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

118 GAO-19-1SP Abbreviations

PP&E Property, plant and equipment

PPIA	 Public Policy and International Affairs

PTC	 Positive Train Control

RPS-AM	 Results Phase System--Accomplishments Module

RSI Required supplement information

SAI	 Supreme Audit Institution

SAM	 System for Award Management

SBA	 Small Business Administration

SBTT	 Strategic Business and Technology Transformation

SEC	 Securities and Exchange Commission

SEP	 Special Enrollment Period

SES	 Senior Executive Service

SFFAS	 Statement of Federal Financial Accounting Standards

SPR	 Strategic Petroleum Reserve

SSA	 Social Security Administration

State	 Department of State

TIN	 Taxpayer Identification Number

Treasury	 Department of the Treasury

TSA Transportation Security Administration

UCT	 Unified communications tool

U.S.	 United States

U.S.C.	 United States Code

USCIS	 U.S Citizen and Immigration Services

USACE	 U.S. Army Corps of Engineers

USAID	 U.S. Agency for International Development

USPS	 United States Postal Service

USPTO	 U.S. Patent and Trademark Office

USSGL United States Government Standard General Ledger

VA	 Department of Veterans Affairs

VDI	 Virtual Desktop Infrastructure

VHA	 Veterans Health Administration

VTC	 Video Teleconferencing

WMATA	 Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 119 Appendix on Data Quality

Verifying and Validating Performance Data

Each year, we measure our performance with indicators of the results of our work, client

service, people management, and internal operations. To assess our performance, we use

actual, rather than projected, data for almost all of our performance measures. We believe

the data are complete and reliable based on our verification and validation procedures

to ensure quality. The specific sources of the data for our annual performance measures,

procedures for independently verifying and validating these data, and the limitations

of these data are described in table 20. See Setting Performance Targets for related

information.

Table 20: How We Ensure Data Quality for Our Annual Performance Measures

Results measures

Financial benefits

Definition 

and 

background 

Our work—including our findings and recommendations—may produce benefits to the federal 

government that can be estimated in dollar terms. These benefits can result in better services 

to the public, changes to statutes or regulations, or improved government business operations. 

A financial benefit is an estimate of the federal cost reduction of agency or congressional 

actions. These financial benefits generally result from work that we completed over the past 

several years. The estimated benefit is based on actions taken in response to our work, such 

as reducing government expenditures, increasing revenues, or reallocating funds to other 

areas. Financial benefits included in our performance measures are net benefits—that is, 

estimates of financial benefits that have been reduced by the costs associated with taking the 

action that we recommended. We convert all estimates involving past and future years to their 

net present value and use actual dollars to represent estimates involving only the current year. 

In some cases, we can claim financial benefits over multiple years based on a single agency or 

congressional action. 

Financial benefits are linked to specific recommendations or other work. To claim that financial 

benefits have been achieved, our staff must file an accomplishment report documenting that (1) 

the actions taken as a result of our work have been completed or substantially completed, (2) 

the actions generally were taken within 2 fiscal years prior to the filing of the accomplishment 

report, (3) a cause-and-effect relationship exists between the benefits reported and our 

recommendation or work performed, and (4) estimates of financial benefits were based on 

information obtained from non-GAO sources. To help ensure conservative estimates of net 

financial benefits, reductions in operating cost are typically limited to 2 years of accrued 

reductions, but up to 5 fiscal years of financial benefits can be claimed if the reductions 

are sustained over a period longer than 2 years. Multiyear reductions in long-term projects, 

changes in tax laws, program terminations, or sales of government assets are limited to 5 

years. Financial benefits can be claimed for past or future years. For financial benefits involving 

events that occur on a regular but infrequent basis—such as the decennial census—we may 

extend the measurement period until the event occurs in order to compute the associated 

financial benefits using our present value calculator. 

Managing directors decide when their staff can claim financial benefits. A managing director 

may choose to claim a financial benefit all in 1 year or over several years, if the benefit spans 

future years and the managing director wants greater precision as to the amount of the benefit.

Data sources Our Results Phase System-Accomplishments Module (RPS-AM) provides the data for 

this measure. Teams use this web-based data system to prepare, review, and approve 

accomplishments and forward them to our Audit Policy and Quality Assurance (APQA) 

office for review. Once accomplishment reports are approved, they are loaded into our data 

warehouse, which feeds official reports in our Business Intelligence Analytics (BI). 

Appendix II: Data Quality
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

120 GAO-19-1SP Appendix on Data Quality

Verification 

and 

Validation

Our policies and procedures require us to use RPS-AM to record the financial benefits that 

result from our work. They also provide guidance on estimating those financial benefits. 

The team identifies when a financial benefit has occurred as a result of our work. The team 

develops estimates based on non-GAO sources, such as the agency that acted on our work, 

a congressional committee, or the Congressional Budget Office, and files accomplishment 

reports based on those estimates. When non-GAO estimates are not readily available, GAO 

estimates—developed in consultation with our experts, such as the Chief Economist, Chief 

Actuary, or Director for the Center for Economics, are corroborated with a knowledgeable 

program official from the executive agency involved. The estimates are reduced by significant 

identifiable offsetting costs. The team develops documentation to support accomplishments 

with evidence that meets our evidence standard, supervisors review the documentation, 

and an independent person within GAO reviews the accomplishment report. For all financial 

accomplishment reports, the managing director prepares a memorandum addressed to 

the Chief Quality Officer attesting that the accomplishment report meets our standards for 

accomplishment reporting. The memorandum specifically (1) addresses how linkage to GAO 

is established, and (2) attests that the financial benefits are claimed in accordance with our 

procedures. Beginning in fiscal year 2010, teams are also required to consult with our Center 

for Economics on the calculation for financial benefits of $500 million or more. For each of 

the financial accomplishment reports, an economist reviews and approves the methodology 

for calculating the proposed financial benefit. The assessment results are documented in the 

accomplishment’s supporting documentation and provided to the second reviewers.

The team’s managing director is authorized to approve financial accomplishment reports with 

benefits of less than $100 million. The team forwards the report to APQA, which reviews all 

accomplishment reports and approves accomplishment reports claiming benefits of $100 

million or more. In fiscal year 2018, APQA approved accomplishment reports covering almost 

99 percent of the dollar value of financial benefits we reported.

In fiscal year 2018, accomplishments of $500 million or more were also reviewed by 

independent second and third reviewers (reemployed GAO annuitants), who have substantial 

experience and knowledge of our accomplishment reporting policies and procedures. Our total 

fiscal year 2018 reported financial benefits reflect the views of the independent reviewers.

Data 

limitations

Not every financial benefit from our work can be readily estimated or documented as 

attributable to our work. As a result, the amount of financial benefits is a conservative 

estimate. Estimates are based on information from non-GAO sources and are based on both 

objective and subjective data, and as a result, professional judgment is required in reviewing 

accomplishment reports. We feel that the verification and validation steps that we take 

minimize any adverse impact from this limitation.

Other Benefits

Definition 

and 

background

Our work—including our findings and recommendations—may produce benefits to the 

government that cannot be estimated in dollar terms. These other benefits can result in better 

services to the public, changes to statutes or regulations, or improved government business 

operations. 

Other benefits generally result from past work that we completed. Other benefits are linked to 

specific recommendations or other work that we completed over several years. To claim that 

other benefits have been achieved, staff must file an accomplishment report that documents 

that (1) the actions taken as a result of our work have been completed or substantially 

completed, (2) the actions generally were taken within the past 2 fiscal years of filing the 

accomplishment report, and (3) a cause-and-effect relationship exists between the benefits 

reported and our recommendation or work performed.

Data sources Our RPS-AM provides the data for this measure. Teams use this automated system to prepare, 

review, and approve accomplishments and forward them to APQA for its review. Once 

accomplishment reports are approved, they are loaded into our data warehouse, which feeds 

official reports in Business Intelligence Analytics (BI).
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 121 Appendix on Data Quality

Verification 

and 

validation

We use RPS-AM to record the other benefits that result from our findings and 

recommendations. Staff in the team file accomplishment reports to claim benefits resulting 

from our work. The team develops documentation to support accomplishments with evidence 

that meets our standards. Supervisors review the documentation; an independent staff person 

checks the facts of the accomplishment report; and the team’s managing director, director, or 

both approve the accomplishment report to ensure its appropriateness, including attribution to 

our work.

The team forwards the report to APQA, where it is reviewed for appropriateness. APQA provides 

summary data on other benefits to team managers, who check the data on a regular basis to 

make sure that approved accomplishments from their staff have been accurately recorded.

Data 

limitations 

The data may be underreported because we cannot always document a direct cause-andeffect relationship between our work and the resulting benefits. Therefore, the data represent a 

conservative measure of our overall contribution toward improving government.

Percentage of products with recommendations

Definition 

and 

background

We measure the percentage of our written reports and numbered correspondence issued 

in the fiscal year that included at least one recommendation. We make recommendations 

that specify actions that can be taken to improve federal operations or programs. We strive 

to ensure that recommendations are directed at resolving the cause of identified problems; 

that they are addressed to parties who have the authority to act; and that they are specific, 

feasible, and cost effective. Some of our products are informational and do not contain 

recommendations.

We track the percentage of our written products that are issued during the fiscal year and 

contain recommendations. This indicator recognizes that our products do not always include 

recommendations. Beginning in fiscal year 2015, GAO’s PAR no longer includes in its 

calculation of percentage of products with recommendations those products that include 

Matters for Congressional Consideration,but no recommendations to federal agencies. We 

did not recalculate the percentage of products with recommendations to exclude Matters 

for Congressional Consideration for years prior to fiscal year 2015, because such products 

account for a very small number of the products we issue annually and, therefore, would not 

have substantively changed the results for those years. 

Data sources Our Publications Database incorporates recommendations from products as they are issued. 

The database is updated daily. 

Verification 

and 

validation

Our Information Management team enters data on recommendations into a “staging” system 

where they are reviewed for accuracy and completeness. Once reviewed, the data are posted 

to the Publications Database. We provide our managers with reports on the recommendations 

being tracked to help ensure that all recommendations have been captured and that each 

recommendation has been completely and accurately stated.

Data 

limitations

This measure is a conservative estimate of the extent to which we assist the Congress and 

federal agencies because not all products and services we provide lead to recommendations. 

For example, the Congress may request information on federal programs that is purely 

descriptive or analytical and does not lend itself to recommendations.

Past recommendations implemented 

Definition 

and 

background

We make recommendations designed to improve the operations of the federal government. 

For our work to produce financial or other benefits, federal agencies must implement these 

recommendations. As part of our audit responsibilities under generally accepted government 

auditing standards, we follow up on recommendations we have made and report to the 

Congress on their status. Experience has shown that it takes time for some recommendations 

to be implemented. For this reason, this measure is the percentage rate of implementation 

of recommendations made 4 years prior to a given fiscal year (e.g., the fiscal year 2018 

implementation rate is the percentage of recommendations made in fiscal year 2014 products 

that were implemented by the end of fiscal year 2018). Our experience has shown that if a 

recommendation has not been implemented within 4 years, it is not likely to be implemented.

Beginning in fiscal year 2015, GAO’s PAR no longer includes actions taken by the Congress 

based on GAO’s Matters for Congressional Consideration in calculating past recommendations 

implemented. We did not recalculate the percentage of recommendations implemented to 

exclude Matters for Congressional Consideration for years prior to fiscal year 2015, because 

such products account for a very small number of the products we issue annually and, 

therefore, would not have substantively changed the results for those years.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

122 GAO-19-1SP Appendix on Data Quality

Data sources Our Publications Database incorporates recommendations as products are issued. The 

database is updated daily. As our staff monitor implementation of recommendations, they 

submit updated information to the database.

Verification 

and 

validation

Our policies and procedures specify that our staff must verify and document that an 

agency’s reported actions are adequately being implemented. Staff update the status of the 

recommendations at least once a year. To accomplish this, our staff may interview agency 

officials, obtain agency documents, access agency databases, or obtain information from an 

agency’s IG. Recommendations that are reported as implemented are reviewed by a senior 

executive in the team and by APQA.

Summary data are provided to the teams that issued the recommendations. The teams check 

the data regularly to make sure that the recommendations they have reported as implemented 

have been accurately recorded. We also provide to the Congress a database with the status 

of recommendations that have not been implemented, and we maintain a publicly available 

database of open recommendations that is updated daily.

Data 

limitations

The data may be underreported because, in some cases, a recommendation may require 

more than 4 years to implement. We also may not count cases in which a recommendation 

is partially implemented. Therefore, the data represent a conservative measure of our overall 

contribution toward improving government.

Client measures

Testimonies

Definition 

and 

background

The Congress asks GAO’s senior executives to provide expert testimony at hearings on 

various issues, and these testimonies are the basis for this measure. Delivering testimonies 

is one of our most important forms of communication with the Congress, and the number of 

testimonies that we are asked to deliver reflect the importance and value of our institutional 

knowledge in assisting congressional decision making. Historically, when we have had multiple 

witnesses deliver separate testimony statements at a single hearing, we have counted these as 

a “single” testimony—effectively equating the number of hearings at which GAO testified with 

the number of testimonies we have delivered. In 2016, we modified this methodology to more 

fully account for the number of discrete testimonies that GAO’s senior executives are asked to 

deliver in a given fiscal year. Specifically, when multiple senior executives are asked to testify 

on different aspects of GAO’s work and deliver their own separate written testimony statements 

at a single hearing, we will count each testimony in the total count for the fiscal year. We did not 

recalculate the number of testimonies we delivered prior to 2016, because this situation occurs 

infrequently. However, we want to be positioned to fully report our testimony performance when 

it does occur. We will continue our practice of (1) not counting statements as separate when 

two GAO teams provide a joint statement and (2) not counting statements for the record when 

our witness does not appear.

Data sources The data on testimonies are compiled in our Congressional Hearing System managed by staff 

in our Office of Congressional Relations (CR).

Verification 

and 

validation

The teams responding to requests for testimony are responsible for entering data into the 

Congressional Hearing System. After we have testified at a hearing, CR verifies that the data 

in the system are correct and records that the hearing took place and that the testimony was 

delivered. CR provides weekly status reports to unit managers, who check to make sure that 

the data are complete and accurate.

Data 

limitations

This measure does not include statements for the record that we prepare for congressional 

hearings. Also, this measure may be influenced by factors other than the quality of our 

performance in any specific year. The number of times that our senior executives are asked 

to testify at congressional hearings each year depends on the Congress’s agenda, and the 

number of times we are asked to testify may reflect congressional interest in work in progress 

as well as work completed that year or the previous year. To mitigate this limitation, we try to 

adjust our target to reflect cyclical changes in the congressional schedule. We also reach out 

to our clients on a continuing basis to increase their awareness of our readiness to testify at 

congressional hearings. 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 123 Appendix on Data Quality

Timeliness

Definition 

and 

background

The likelihood that our products will be used is enhanced if they are delivered when needed 

to support congressional and agency decision making. To determine whether our products 

are timely, we solicit feedback from the client using an electronic form. We compute the 

proportion of favorable responses to a question related to timeliness. Because our products 

often have multiple congressional clients, we often reach out to more than one congressional 

staff person per product. We send a form to key staff working for requesters of our testimony 

statements and to clients of our more significant written products—specifically, engagements 

assigned an interest level of “high” by our senior management and those requiring an expected 

investment of 500 staff days or more. One question asks the respondent whether the product 

was delivered on time. When a product that meets our criteria is released to the public, we 

electronically send relevant congressional staff an email message containing a link to the form. 

When this link is accessed, the form recipient is asked to respond to the timeliness question 

using a five-point scale—”strongly agree,” “generally agree,” “neither agree nor disagree,” 

“generally disagree,” or “strongly disagree”—or to choose “not applicable/no answer.” For this 

measure, favorable responses are “strongly agree” and “generally agree.”

Data sources To identify the products that meet our criteria (testimonies and other products that are high 

interest or expected to reach 500 staff days or more), we run a query against our Publications 

Database, which is maintained by a contractor. To identify appropriate recipients of the form 

for products meeting our criteria, we ask the engagement teams to provide in our Product 

Numbering Database email addresses for congressional staff serving as contacts on a 

product. Relevant information from both of these databases is fed into another database that 

is managed by CR staff. This database then combines product, form recipient, and data from 

our CR staff and creates an email message with a web link to the form. CR staff serve as the 

contacts for form recipients. The email message also contains an embedded client password 

and unique client identifier to ensure that a recipient is linked with the appropriate form. Our 

Client Feedback Database creates a record with the product title and number and captures the 

responses to every form sent back to us electronically.

Verification 

and 

validation

CR staff review released GAO products to check the accuracy of the addressee information in 

the Product Numbering Database. They also check the congressional staff directory to ensure 

that form recipients listed in this database appear there. In addition, our CR staff review the 

list of form recipients entered by the engagement teams and identify the most appropriate 

congressional staff person to receive a form for each client. Email messages that are 

inadvertently sent with incorrect email addresses automatically reappear in the form approval 

system. When this happens, CR staff correct the errors and resend the email message. 

Data 

limitations

Testimonies and written products that met our criteria for this measure were sent a client 

survey form, representing about 64 percent of the congressionally requested written products 

we issued during fiscal year 2018. We exclude from our timeliness measure low and mediuminterest reports expected to take fewer than 500 staff days when completed, reports addressed 

to agency heads or commissions, some reports mandated by the Congress, classified reports, 

and reports completed under the Comptroller General’s authority. Also, if a requester indicates 

that he or she does not want to complete a form, we will not send one to this person again, 

even though a product subsequently requested meets our criteria. The response rate for the 

form is 23 percent, and 99 percent of those who responded answered the timeliness question. 

We received responses from one or more people for about 52 percent of the products for which 

we sent a form in fiscal year 2018.

People measures

New hire rate

Definition 

and 

background

This performance measure is the ratio of the number of people hired to the number we 

planned to hire. Annually, we develop a workforce plan that takes into account our strategic 

goals; projected workload changes; and other changes such as retirements, other attrition, 

promotions, and skill gaps. The workforce plan for the upcoming year specifies the number of 

planned hires. The Chief Operating Officer (CAO), Chief Administrative Officer, Deputy Chief 

Administrative Officer, Chief Human Capital Officer, and Controller meet monthly to monitor 

progress toward achieving the workforce plan. Adjustments to the workforce plan are made 

throughout the year, if necessary, to reflect changing needs and conditions.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

124 GAO-19-1SP Appendix on Data Quality

Data sources The Executive Committee approves the workforce plan. The workforce plan is coordinated and 

maintained by the Chief Administrative Officer (CAO). Data on accessions—that is, new hires 

coming on board—is taken from a database that contains employee data from the Department 

of Agriculture’s National Finance Center (NFC) database, which handles payroll and personnel 

data for us and other agencies.

Verification 

and 

validation

The CAO maintains a database that monitors and tracks all our hiring offers, declinations, and 

accessions. In coordination with our Human Capital Office, our CAO staff enter workforce 

information supporting this measure into the CAO database. While the database is updated 

on a daily basis, CAO staff provide monthly reports to the Chief Operating Officer and CAO, 

which allows them to monitor progress by unit in achieving workforce plan hiring targets. The 

CAO continually monitors and reviews accessions maintained in the NFC database against its 

database to ensure consistency and to resolve discrepancies.

Data 

limitations

There is a lag of one to two pay periods (up to 4 weeks) before the NFC database reflects 

actual data. We generally allow sufficient time before requesting data for this measure to 

ensure that we get accurate results.

Retention rate

Definition 

and 

background

We continuously strive to make GAO a place where people want to work. Once we have made 

an investment in hiring and training people, we would like to retain them. This measure is one 

indicator that we are attaining that objective and is the complement of attrition. We calculate 

this measure by taking 100 percent minus the attrition rate, where attrition rate is defined as 

the number of separations divided by the average onboard strength. We calculate this measure 

with and without retirements.

Data sources Data on retention—that is, people who are on board at the beginning of the fiscal year and 

people on board at the end of the fiscal year—are taken from a CAO database that contains 

some data from the NFC database, which handles payroll and personnel data for us and other 

agencies.

Verification 

and 

validation

CAO staff continually monitor and review accessions and attritions against their database that 

contains NFC data and follow up on any discrepancies. In fiscal year 2009, we developed 

standard operating procedures, which are still in effect, to document how we calculate and 

ensure quality control over data relevant to this measure.

Data 

limitations

See New hire rate, Data limitations.

Staff development

Definition 

and 

background

One way that we measure how well we are doing and identify areas for improvement is 

through our annual employee feedback survey. This web-based survey consists of over 100 

questions and includes instructions and definitions to help ensure that employees do not 

misunderstand the questions. The survey is administered once a year to all of our employees 

who have been on board for about 2 months. It is administered by an outside contractor to 

ensure the confidentiality of every respondent. Through the survey, we encourage our staff to 

indicate what they think about GAO’s overall operations, work environment, and organizational 

culture and how they rate our managers—from the immediate supervisor to the Executive 

Committee—on key aspects of their leadership styles. Staff were instructed to answer the 

questions in terms of their experiences in the last 12 months. To further ensure confidentiality, 

the contractor also analyzed the data in fiscal year 2018.

When we developed our People Measures, we used the job satisfaction question—Overall, 

I am satisfied with my job at GAO—which appeared on our annual employee survey. We 

calculated the correlation between this question and questions that comprise the four People 

Measures. We selected those questions with the highest correlation for each of these four 

People Measures. 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 125 Appendix on Data Quality

Data sources The Staff Development People Measure is based on staff’s favorable responses to four of the 

seven questions related to staff development on our annual employee survey: (1) External 

training conferences; (2) On-the-job training that I received; (3) Help from my GAO mentor; 

(4) Help from my GAO buddy for newly hired employees; (5) I am given a real opportunity 

to improve my skills in my organization; (6) Internal (Learning Center) training courses; and 

(7) Team-led training and knowledge sharing events. Questions 1, 2, and 6 above had the 

highest correlation with job satisfaction so they were used to create the Staff Development 

People Measure. Because many teams were delivering training through team-led training and 

knowledge sharing events, question 7 was added to the Staff Development People Measure. 

Staff were asked to respond to these four questions on a five-point scale or choose “no basis 

to judge/not applicable” or “no response.” For questions 1 and 2 the rating scale was very 

positive impact, generally positive impact, neither positive nor negative impact, generally 

negative impact, or very negative impact. The two positive impact choices were selected to 

determine the favorable responses. For questions 6 and 7, the rating scale was very greatly 

useful and relevant, generally useful and relevant, moderately useful and relevant, somewhat 

useful and relevant, and little or not useful and relevant. The three choices of very greatly, 

generally, and moderately useful and relevant were used to determine the favorable responses.

From staff who expressed an opinion, we calculated the percentage of staff selecting the 

favorable response across the four questions. Responses of “no basis to judge/not applicable” 

or “no response” were excluded from the calculation. While including “no basis to judge/

not applicable” or “no response” in the calculation would result in a different percentage, our 

method of calculation is an acceptable survey practice, and we believe it produces a better and 

more valid measure because it represents only those employees who have an opinion on the 

questions.

Verification 

and 

validation

The employee feedback survey gathers staff opinions on a variety of topics. The survey is 

password protected, and only the outside contractor has access to passwords. In addition, 

when the survey instrument was developed, extensive focus groups and pretests were 

undertaken to refine the questions and provide definitions as needed. In fiscal year 2018, our 

response rate to this survey was about 67 percent, which indicates that its results are largely 

representative of the GAO population. In addition, many teams and work units conduct followon work to gain a better understanding of the information from the survey.

Data 

limitations

The information contained in the survey is the self-reported opinions of staff expressed under 

conditions of confidentiality. Accordingly, there is no way to further validate those expressions 

of opinion.

The practical difficulties of conducting any survey may introduce errors, commonly referred 

to as nonsampling errors. These errors could result from, for example, respondents 

misinterpreting a question or data entry staff incorrectly entering data into a database used to 

analyze the survey responses. Such errors can introduce unwanted variability into the survey 

results. We took steps in the development of the survey to minimize nonsampling errors. 

Specifically, when we developed the survey instrument, we held extensive focus groups 

and pretests to refine the questions and define terms used to decrease the chances that 

respondents would misunderstand the questions. We also limited the chances of introducing 

nonsampling errors by creating a web-based survey for which respondents entered their 

answers directly into an electronic questionnaire rather than having administrative staff enter 

the data into a database, thus eliminating a potential source of error.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

126 GAO-19-1SP Appendix on Data Quality

Staff utilization

Definition 

and 

background

This measure is based on staff’s favorable responses to three of six questions related to staff 

utilization in our annual employee survey: (1) My job made good use of my skills and abilities; 

(2) GAO provided me with opportunities to do challenging work; (3) My workload is reasonable; 

(4) I experienced multitasking in my work (multitasking is being significantly involved in more 

than one major concurrent work activity); (5) I experienced matrixing in my work (matrixing is 

when you are a significant contributor on work activities that cross organizational boundaries); 

and (6) In general, I was utilized effectively. When we developed our People Measures, 

we used the job satisfaction question—Overall, I am satisfied with my job at GAO—which 

appeared on our annual employee survey and calculated the correlation between this question 

and questions that comprised the People Measures. Questions 1, 2, and 6 above had the 

highest correlation in this section of the survey so they were used to create the Staff Utilization 

People Measure. Likewise, this question was used to select the questions that comprised 

the other three People Measures. Staff were asked to respond to these three questions that 

comprised the other three People Measures. Staff were asked to respond to these three 

questions on a five-point scale or choose “no basis to judge/not applicable” or “no response.” 

Question 3 was originally in the Organizational Climate section of the survey. It did not have 

the highest correlation with job satisfaction when the People Measures were developed. In 

2015 question 3 was moved to the Staff Utilization section of the survey since it better fit with 

that topic. (For background information about our entire employee feedback survey, see Staff 

development.) 

Data sources This measure is based on staff’s favorable responses to three of six questions related to staff 

utilization on our annual employee survey: (1) My job made good use of my skills and abilities; 

(2) GAO provided me with opportunities to do challenging work; (3) My workload is reasonable; 

(4) I experienced multitasking in my work (multitasking is being significantly involved in more 

than one major concurrent work activity); (5) I experienced matrixing in my work; and (6) In 

general, I was utilized effectively. Questions 1, 2, and 6 above had the highest correlation with 

job satisfaction in this section of the survey so they were used to create the Staff Utilization 

People Measure. 

Staff were asked to respond to these three questions on a five-point scale or choose “no basis 

to judge/not applicable” or “no response.” For these three questions, the rating scale was 

always or almost always, most of the time, about 1/2 of the time, some of the time, or never or 

almost never. The three choices of always, almost always, and most of the time were used to 

determine the favorable responses.

From staff who expressed an opinion, we calculated the percentage of staff selecting 

the favorable response across the three questions. Responses of “no basis to judge/not 

applicable” or “no response” were excluded from the calculation. While including “no basis to 

judge/not applicable” or “no response” in the calculation would result in a different percentage, 

our method of calculation is an acceptable survey practice, and we believe it produces a better 

and more valid measure because it represents only those employees who have an opinion on 

the questions. 

Verification 

and 

validation

See Staff development, Verification and validation.

Data 

limitations

See Staff development, Data limitations.

Effective leadership by supervisors

Definition 

and 

background

This measure is based on staff’s favorable responses to 10 of 20 questions related to six 

areas of supervisory leadership on our annual employee survey. We correlated each of the 

questions with job satisfaction and selected those questions with the highest correlation. 

Specifically, our calculation included responses to 1 of 4 questions related to empowerment, 

2 of 4 questions related to trust, all 3 questions related to recognition, 1 of 3 questions related 

to decisiveness, 2 of 3 questions related to leading by example, and 1 of 3 questions to work 

life. Staff were asked to respond to these 10 questions on a five-point scale or choose “no 

basis to judge/not applicable” or “no response.” In fiscal year 2009, we changed the name of 

this measure from “Leadership” to its current nomenclature to clarify that the measure reflects 

employee satisfaction with the immediate supervisor’s leadership.
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 127 Appendix on Data Quality

Data sources This measure is based on staff’s favorable responses to 10 of 20 questions related to 

leadership by supervisors on our annual employee survey. These 20 questions were organized 

into six subgroups. 

Empowerment: (1) Gave me the flexibility I needed to do my job effectively, (2) Gave me the 

authority to do my job effectively, (3) Gave me the opportunity to do what I do best, and (4) 

Encouraged my creativity and innovation. 

Trust: (5) Treated me fairly, (6) Supported open and honest discussions/feedback with me, (7) 

Acted with honesty and integrity toward me, and (8) Made a sufficient effort to get my opinion 

and thinking.

Recognition: (9) Ensured that there was a clear link between my performance and recognition 

of it, (10) Gave me the sense that my work is valued, and (11) Provided me meaningful 

incentives for high performance.

Decisiveness: (12) Made decisions in a timely manner, (13) Set clear goals and priorities for 

me, and (14) Anticipated potential needs and problems and planned for them rather than 

reacting to them after the fact.

Leading by Example: (15) Demonstrated GAO’s core values of accountability, integrity, and 

reliability; (16) Encouraged matrix management across organizational boundaries; and (17) 

Implemented change effectively. 

Work/Life: (18) Respected and valued differences among individuals, (19) Dealt effectively with 

EEO and discrimination issues, and (20) Supported GAO’s programs to balance my work and 

personal life. 

Questions 3, 5, 7, 9, 10, 11, 12, 15, 17, 18 above had the highest correlation with job 

satisfaction so they were used to create the Leadership by Supervisors People Measure.

Staff were asked to respond to these 10 questions on a five-point scale or choose “no basis to 

judge/not applicable” or “no response.” For these 10 questions, the rating scale was always or 

almost always, most of the time, about 1/2 of the time, some of the time, and never or almost 

never. The two choices of always or almost always were used to determine the favorable 

responses.

From staff who expressed an opinion, we calculated the percentage of staff selecting the 

favorable response across the 10 questions. Responses of “no basis to judge/not applicable” 

or “no response” were excluded from the calculation. While including “no basis to judge/

not applicable” or “no response” in the calculation would result in a different percentage, our 

method of calculation is an acceptable survey practice, and we believe it produces a better and 

more valid measure because it represents only those employees who have an opinion on the 

questions. In addition, by excluding the “no basis to judge/not applicable” or “no response” in 

the calculation of the percentage favorable, our trend analysis would not be influenced simply 

because the amount being excluded changed.

Verification 

and 

validation

See Staff development, Verification and validation.

Data 

limitations

See Staff development, Data limitations.

Organizational climate

Definition 

and 

background

This measure is based on staff’s favorable responses to 5 of the 9 questions related to 

organizational climate on our annual employee survey. We correlated each of the questions 

with job satisfaction and selected those questions with the highest correlation. Staff were 

asked to respond to these five questions on a five-point scale or choose “no basis to judge” or 

“no response.”
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

128 GAO-19-1SP Appendix on Data Quality

Data sources This measure is based on staff’s favorable responses to five of the nine questions related to 

organizational climate on our annual employee survey: (1) My peers make a positive impact 

on the work environment in my work unit; (2) A spirit of cooperation and teamwork exists in my 

work unit; (3) Communication in my work unit is effective; (4) I am treated fairly and with respect 

in my work unit; (5) My morale is good; (6) Sufficient effort is made in my work unit to get the 

opinions and thinking of people who work here; (7) In my work unit, creativity and innovation 

are encouraged; (8) I have sufficient resources (e.g., people, materials, budget, etc.) to get my 

job done; and (9) Overall, I am satisfied with my job at GAO. Questions 2, 4, 5, 6, and 9 above 

had the highest correlation with job satisfaction so they were used to create the Organizational 

Climate People Measure. 

Staff were asked to respond to these five questions on a five-point scale or choose “no basis to 

judge/not applicable” or “no response.” For these five questions, the rating scale was strongly 

agree, generally agree, neither agree nor disagree, generally disagree, and strongly disagree. 

The two choices of strongly agree and generally agree were used to determine the favorable 

responses. 

From staff who expressed an opinion, we calculated the percentage of staff selecting the 

favorable response across the five questions. Responses of “no basis to judge/not applicable” 

or “no response” were excluded from the calculation. While including “no basis to judge/

not applicable” or “no response” in the calculation would result in a different percentage, our 

method of calculation is an acceptable survey practice, and we believe it produces a better and 

more valid measure because it represents only those employees who have an opinion on the 

questions. 

See also Staff development, Data sources.

Verification 

and 

validation

See Staff development, Verification and validation.

Data 

limitations

See Staff development, Data limitations.

Internal operations measures

Help get job done, improve quality of work life, and IT tools

Definition 

and 

background

To measure how well we are delivering internal administrative services to our employees and 

identify areas for improvement, we conduct a web-based customer satisfaction survey. The 

survey asks employees to indicate how satisfied they are with services that help them get 

their jobs done, services that affect their quality of work life, and IT tools. In 2018, as part of 

our continuing effort to learn about and address problems with internal services as quickly 

as possible, we administered the survey at two different times. We tested the approach last 

year and found it beneficial in promptly responding to staff suggestions. To conduct the survey 

twice, we divided the employee population into two groups using the last digit of their unique 

employee identification (ID) number. The February 2018 group included employees with IDs 

ending in an odd number and excluded anyone hired after October 1, 2017, since they had 

limited GAO experience. The August group included employees with IDs ending in an even 

number and excluded anyone hired after May 1, 2018. We undertook this strategy rather 

than a random selection approach because of the excessive burden of drawing samples and 

accounting for people who left and joined GAO during the year. 
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

GAO-19-1SP 129 Appendix on Data Quality

Data sources These data come from our employees’ responses to a web-based survey. To determine how 

satisfied our employees are with internal administrative services, we calculate composite 

scores for three measures and combine the responses from each of the two data collection 

periods. No weighting or other adjustments were made. The composite score calculation is 

made by adding all of the generally and very satisfied ratings across all of the relevant services 

and dividing it by the number of respondents who provided any satisfaction rating. Of the three 

composite scores that we calculate, one measure reflects satisfaction with the services that 

help employees get their jobs done, such as records management, information technology 

customer support, mail services, and travel support services. The second measure reflects 

satisfaction with services that affect quality of work life. These services include assistance 

related to pay and leave, building maintenance and security, and transit benefits. The third 

measure is for IT tools, such as our engagement management system, tools for working 

remotely, and the intranet. Employees were asked to rate only their satisfaction with services 

used during the past year, or to indicate if they did not use a service. 

Verification 

and 

validation

The survey was administered by GAO’s Web Product Development Group in the Applied 

Research and Methods team. While the two managers of this unit can access individual 

responses, they complied with the privacy statement that was posted on the website to only 

provide aggregated data to GAO management that could not be used to identify responses of 

any individual. We analyzed responses by self-reported demographic data such as unit, tenure, 

and location. Each unit responsible for administrative services will conduct follow-on work, 

including analyzing written comments to gain a better understanding of the information from 

the survey and developing action plans to address problem areas. 

Data 

limitations

The information contained in the survey is the self-reported opinions of staff expressed under 

conditions of confidentiality. We do not plan any actions to remedy this limitation because we 

feel it would violate the pledge of confidentiality that we make to our staff regarding the survey 

responses.

The practical difficulties of conducting any survey may introduce errors, commonly referred 

to as nonsampling errors. These errors could result, for example, from respondents 

misinterpreting a question or entering their data incorrectly. Such errors can introduce 

unwanted variability into the survey results. We limit the chances of introducing nonsampling 

errors by using a web-based survey for which respondents enter their answers directly into an 

electronic questionnaire. This eliminates the need to have the data entered into a database by 

someone other than the respondent, thus minimizing a potential source of error.

Source: GAO. | GAO-19-1SP
GAO Performance and Accountability Report 2018

130 GAO-19-1SP

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listed adjacent to the image or graphic. 

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