First, it should take a hard look at how the Results Act is beingimplemented in each agency. The Government Accounting Office s work inthis area has been an asset to both Congress and the Clintonadministration, and several inspectors general are developing theability to audit their agencies strategic and annual performance plans,as well as the underlying performance measures. The new administration should pay close attention to methodology issuesin reviewing these reports. Some IGs are not as far along as others indeveloping approaches to evaluating ostensibly identical issues ofResults Act implementation. Second, there is general agreement that most agencies did not take theResults Act seriously before the advent of congressional report cards in1998.
Agencies have two to three years experience managing for results.
Implementing the Results Act is still more a paperwork exercise than aprogram-management initiative. Program managers rarely play more than aminor role in developing agencies annual performance plans and reports. Even more rare is the program manager who actually uses Results Actperformance measures to make outcome-oriented resource allocationdecisions, to improve service quality or service delivery, to encourageinnovation or to provide regulatory flexibility. Third, the incoming administration will need to show that it understandsthe basic problems in performance measurement. Only a few agencies haveidentified all the outcomes their programs are intended to accomplish.