The teams designed the blueprint of their designated operation to build the Service of the future. However, there has been a morale drop, especially in certain areas where there is anxiety and confusion around certain provisions in RRA 98 such as section 1203. We have heard many concerns from employees and have spent a great deal of time trying to deal with these by improving training and improving communication vehicles. There is no doubt that the complexity of the tax code is a burden. IRS cannot let complexity become an excuse for inaction but must tackle workable administrative solutions.
Guidance can deal with complexity by having an approach targeted to specific taxpayer sections.
This guidance process is embedded in the new design. The tax code as a whole is enormous, but when you apply it to the average taxpayer, it is much more manageable. The new design will help us think from this perspective. We eventually realized that assigning this project out to different organization units to resolve independently, as has been done in the past, would not work. We needed a senior manager to oversee a combined effort, and as a result, we were able to make significant strides in understanding how to process these claims thoroughly, efficiently and in the spirit of the law.