Immigration enforcement includes, among other things, patrolling 8,000 miles of international boundaries to prevent illegal entry into the United States; inspecting over 500 million travelers each year to determine their admissibility; apprehending, detaining, and removing criminal and illegal aliens; disrupting and dismantling organized smuggling of humans and contraband as well as human trafficking; investigating and prosecuting those who engage in benefit and document fraud; blocking and removing employers’ access to undocumented workers; and enforcing compliance with programs to monitor visitors. Immigration functions also include providing services or benefits to facilitate entry, residence, employment, and naturalization of legal immigrants; processing millions of applications each year; making the right adjudicative decision in approving or denying the applications; and rendering decisions in a timely manner. When INS was abolished in 2003 by the Homeland Security Act of 2002, its enforcement functions were transferred to two bureaus within the DHS. First, INS’s interior enforcement programs—investigations, intelligence, and detention and removal—were placed in ICE. Within ICE, investigators and intelligence analysts from former INS and the U.S. Customs Service were merged into the investigations and intelligence offices, while staff from former INS’s detention and removal program were placed in the detention and removal office. Second, inspectors from former INS, Customs, and Agriculture and Plant Health Inspection Service, as well as former INS’s Border Patrol agents were incorporated into CBP. Both CBP and ICE report to the Undersecretary for Border and Transportation Security, who in turn reports to the Deputy Secretary of the DHS. For service functions, INS’s Immigration Services Division, responsible for processing applications for immigration benefits, was placed in Citizenship and Immigration Services (CIS), which reports directly to the Deputy Secretary of DHS. Figure 1 shows the transition of INS functions into DHS. Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) (Secretary) Transition efforts for CBP posed fewer challenges than for ICE. Specifically, CBP brought together INS and Customs inspections programs that, prior to the transition, largely worked side by side in many land ports of entry around the country and that shared similar missions. In contrast, ICE is a patchwork of agencies and programs that includes INS’s investigations and intelligence programs, Customs’ investigations and intelligence programs, the Federal Protective Service, and the Federal Air Marshals. In combining the investigations programs, ICE has been tasked with merging former INS investigators who specialized in immigration enforcement (e.g., criminal aliens) with former Customs investigators who specialized in customs enforcement (e.g., drug smuggling). The integration of INS and Customs investigators into a single investigative program has involved the blending of two vastly different workforces, each with its own culture, policies, procedures, and mission priorities. Both programs were in agencies with dual missions that prior to the merger had differences in investigative priorities. For example, INS primarily looked for illegal aliens and Customs primarily looked for illegal drugs. In addition, INS investigators typically pursued administrative violations, while Customs investigators typically pursued criminal violations. Whether further structural changes are warranted is one of the topics that this hearing is to address. Some observers have proposed merging ICE and CBP. For example, the Heritage Foundation and the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), in a report on DHS management, suggested a possible merger of ICE and CBP to address some of these management problems. A Senior Research Fellow at The Heritage Foundation stated in a March 2005 congressional testimony, “DHS needs to be organized not to accommodate the present, but to build toward the ideal organization of the future. Therefore, the department needs to articulate how it envisions conducting its missions five to ten years from now and let this vision drive the organizational design, particularly the structure of border security operations.” Another witness stated, “Whether the decision is ultimately made to merge ICE and CBP or not, the real issues will remain unless the underlying mission, vision, and planning occur in a unified manner.” Over the years, we have issued numerous reports that identified management challenges INS experienced in its efforts to achieve both effective immigration law enforcement and service delivery. For example, in 1997 we reported that INS lacked clearly defined priorities and goals and that its organizational structure was fragmented both programmatically and geographically. Additionally, after reorganization in 1994, field managers still had difficulty determining whom to coordinate with, when to coordinate, and how to communicate with one another because they were unclear about headquarters offices’ responsibilities and authority. We also reported that INS had not adequately defined the roles of its two key enforcement programs—Border Patrol and investigations— which resulted in overlapping responsibilities, inconsistent program implementation, and ineffective use of resources. INS’s poor communication led to weaknesses in policies and procedures. In later reports, we showed that broader management challenges affected INS’s efforts to implement programs to control the border, deter alien smuggling, reduce immigration benefit fraud, reduce unauthorized alien employment, remove criminal aliens, and manage the immigration benefit application workload and reduce the backlog. In 1999 and 2001, we testified on these management challenges before this subcommittee. Our 2001 testimony was delivered at the time when Congress, the Administration, and others had offered various options for restructuring the INS to deal with its management challenges. We testified that while restructuring may help address certain management challenges, we saw an organization (INS) that faced significant challenges in assembling the basic building blocks that any organization needs: clearly delineated roles and responsibilities, policies and procedures that effectively balance competing priorities, effective internal and external communications and coordination, and automation systems that provide accurate and timely information. We noted that unless these elements were established, enforcing our immigration laws, providing services to eligible aliens, and effectively participating in the government-wide efforts to combat terrorism would be problematic regardless of how INS was organized. In 2004, we reported DHS experienced management challenges similar to those we had found at INS. For example, some officials noted that in some areas related to investigative techniques and other operations, unresolved issues regarding the roles and responsibilities of CBP and ICE give rise to disagreements and confusion, with the potential for serious consequences. As in 1999 and 2001, we reported in 2004 that selected operations had reportedly been hampered by the absence of communication and coordination between CBP and ICE. Further, we reported in 2004 that CBP and ICE lacked formal guidance for addressing some overlapping responsibilities. As this Subcommittee, DHS officials, and other stakeholders consider potential structural changes to ICE and CBP, we have identified three factors to consider for resolving management challenges including (1) a management framework for ICE and CBP, (2) systems and processes to support this framework, and (3) the context of the larger DHS transformation. These factors are important to help identify the most suitable and appropriate course of action to address management challenges. Based on our work on the creation and development of DHS, and additional work on transformation and mergers, we have identified a number of key success factors. Those factors that I would like to focus on today include clarity of mission, strategic planning, organizational alignment, performance measures, and leadership focus and accountability. Clarity of Mission: We have previously reported on the importance of establishing a coherent mission that defines an organization’s culture and serves as a vehicle for employees to unite and rally around. As such, a comprehensive agency mission statement is the first GPRA- required element of a successful strategic plan. In successful transformation efforts, developing, communicating, and constantly reinforcing the mission gives employees a sense of what the organization intends to accomplish, as well as helps employees figure out how their positions fit in with the new organization and what they need to do differently to help the new organization achieve success. However, as noted above, while CBP was created from programs that generally shared similar missions, ICE blended agencies with distinct mission priorities and cultures, and thus faces a greater challenge in creating a unified bureau. Strategic Planning: Closely related to establishing a clear mission is strategic planning—a continuous, dynamic, and inclusive process that provides the foundation for the fundamental results that an organization seeks to achieve. The starting point for this process is the strategic plan that describes an organization’s mission, outcome- oriented strategic goals, strategies to achieve these goals, and key factors beyond the agency’s control that could impact the goals’ achievement, among other things. As with the mission, strategic goals for a transforming organization must be clear to employees, customers, and stakeholders to ensure they see a direct personal connection to the transformation. Organizational Alignment: To ensure that form follows function, an organizational alignment that supports the mission and strategic goals is another component of the management framework. Leading organizations recognize that sound planning is not enough to ensure their success. An organization’s activities, core processes, and resources must be aligned to support its mission and help it achieve its goals. Such organizations start by assessing the extent to which their programs and activities are structured to accomplish their mission and desired outcomes. Performance Measures: Effective implementation of this framework requires agencies to clearly establish results-oriented performance goals in strategic and annual performance plans for which they will be held accountable, measure progress towards those goals, determine the strategies and resources to effectively accomplish the goals, use performance information to make the programmatic decisions necessary to improve performance, and formally communicate results in performance reports. Leadership Focus and Accountability: To be successful, transformation efforts must have leaders, managers, and employees who have the individual competencies to integrate and create synergy among the multiple organizations involved in the transformation effort. Leaders need to be held accountable for ensuring results, recognizing when management attention is required and taking corrective action. High-performing organizations create this clear linkage between individual performance and organizational success and thus transform their cultures to be more results-oriented, customer-focused, and collaborative in nature. As we have reported, a Chief Operating Officer (COO)/Chief Management Officer (CMO) may effectively provide the continuing, focused attention essential to successfully completing these multi-year transformations in agencies like DHS.