[Federal Register Volume 81, Number 114 (Tuesday, June 14, 2016)]
[Notices]
[Pages 38707-38709]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2016-13982]


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DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

[60Day-16-16AOW; Docket No. CDC-2016-0050]


Proposed Data Collection Submitted for Public Comment and 
Recommendations

AGENCY: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Department of 
Health and Human Services (HHS).

ACTION: Notice with comment period.

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SUMMARY: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), as part 
of its continuing effort to reduce public burden and maximize the 
utility of government information, invites the general public and other 
Federal agencies to take this opportunity to comment on proposed and/or 
continuing information collections, as required by the Paperwork 
Reduction Act of 1995. This notice invites comment on the CDC I-
Catalyst program. The I-Catalyst program is intended to help CDC 
employees get their ideas out of the starting blocks and down the track 
through a discovery,

[[Page 38708]]

ideation, and prototyping process. The expected result is that CDC 
staff will be empowered to implement innovative strategies and 
solutions that create value for a set of beneficiaries.

DATES: Written comments must be received on or before August 15, 2016.

ADDRESSES: You may submit comments, identified by Docket No. CDC-2016-
0050 by any of the following methods:
     Federal eRulemaking Portal: Regulations.gov. Follow the 
instructions for submitting comments.
     Mail: Leroy A. Richardson, Information Collection Review 
Office, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1600 Clifton Road 
NE., MS-D74, Atlanta, Georgia 30329.
    Instructions: All submissions received must include the agency name 
and Docket Number. All relevant comments received will be posted 
without change to Regulations.gov, including any personal information 
provided. For access to the docket to read background documents or 
comments received, go to Regulations.gov.

    Please note: All public comment should be submitted through the 
Federal eRulemaking portal (regulations.gov) or by U.S. mail to the 
address listed above.


FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: To request more information on the 
proposed project or to obtain a copy of the information collection plan 
and instruments, contact the Information Collection Review Office, 
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1600 Clifton Road NE., MS-
D74, Atlanta, Georgia 30329; phone: 404-639-7570; Email: [email protected].

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Under the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 
(PRA) (44 U.S.C. 3501-3520), Federal agencies must obtain approval from 
the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for each collection of 
information they conduct or sponsor. In addition, the PRA also requires 
Federal agencies to provide a 60-day notice in the Federal Register 
concerning each proposed collection of information, including each new 
proposed collection, each proposed extension of existing collection of 
information, and each reinstatement of previously approved information 
collection before submitting the collection to OMB for approval. To 
comply with this requirement, we are publishing this notice of a 
proposed data collection as described below.
    Comments are invited on: (a) Whether the proposed collection of 
information is necessary for the proper performance of the functions of 
the agency, including whether the information shall have practical 
utility; (b) the accuracy of the agency's estimate of the burden of the 
proposed collection of information; (c) ways to enhance the quality, 
utility, and clarity of the information to be collected; (d) ways to 
minimize the burden of the collection of information on respondents, 
including through the use of automated collection techniques or other 
forms of information technology; and (e) estimates of capital or start-
up costs and costs of operation, maintenance, and purchase of services 
to provide information. Burden means the total time, effort, or 
financial resources expended by persons to generate, maintain, retain, 
disclose or provide information to or for a Federal agency. This 
includes the time needed to review instructions; to develop, acquire, 
install and utilize technology and systems for the purpose of 
collecting, validating and verifying information, processing and 
maintaining information, and disclosing and providing information; to 
train personnel and to be able to respond to a collection of 
information, to search data sources, to complete and review the 
collection of information; and to transmit or otherwise disclose the 
information.

Proposed Project

    CDC I-Catalyst Program--New--Office of the Associate Director for 
Science, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Background and Brief Description

    The CDC Office of Technology and Innovation (OTI) within Office of 
the Associate Director for Science (OADS) fosters innovative science 
and promotes the testing and implementation of innovative ideas that 
improve CDC's ability to have public health impact. To arm CDC staff 
with an expanded skill-set and tools to evaluate and translate their 
insights and ideas into solutions, CDC developed an experiential 
innovation curriculum called I-Catalyst. The program was created with 
the belief that innovation should be customer driven, be based on user 
research, and is something people at all levels of an organization can 
engage in.
    The goal of the I-Catalyst program is to help CDC employees test 
and explore their ideas through a discovery, ideation, and prototyping 
process. I-Catalyst offers a process for defining problems and 
developing strategies to solutions that will help improve the quality 
and efficiency of innovation efforts and, as a result, overall 
performance. Through the I-Catalyst Program, teams work to define and 
articulate their problem space to find effective solutions. 
Participating teams will go through a hypothesis-testing, scientific 
method of discovery to gather important insights and identify issues 
associated with their projects. Teams are forced ``out of the 
classroom'' to conduct interviews, study customer/stakeholder needs, 
collect feedback, and find partnership opportunities. It is expected 
that participants will leave the program with the ability to evaluate 
and translate their insights into solutions.
    The I-Catalyst program provides CDC staff with real-world, hands-on 
entrepreneurship training. Through I-Catalyst CDC staff make hypothesis 
about how the world works, and then test them by getting out of the 
building and talking to customers and/or stakeholders. Only 
conversations with potential customers/stakeholders can provide the 
facts from which hypotheses are proven or disproven about whether a 
solution (whether a product, process, etc.) creates value for the 
intended beneficiaries. Participants have to go out into the world and 
learn by doing. The process will engage customers/stakeholders in a 
process that will identify what they most value and need and what their 
top barriers and pain points are, and source solutions that will have 
high levels of efficacy and user acceptability.
    I-Catalyst combines in-class lectures with out-of-class learning 
and interactions with various customers/stakeholders. This curriculum 
requires full participation from the entire team. The program guides 
teams and individuals through a series of workshops that helps 
participants articulate a problem, create evidence-based plan for 
assessment, and conduct unstructured interviews with customers/
stakeholders. Ongoing technical assistance and support from a cadre of 
experts is provided to teams as they define the problem, map their 
operational model, and identify and interact with customers/
stakeholders. Each team member must commit to in-depth preparation, 
attendance at the lectures and workshops, and at least 15 additional 
hours per week for customer discovery.
    Teams will be spending a significant amount of time in between each 
of the lectures outside the class talking to customers. Each week teams 
will conduct a minimum of five customer interviews with individuals who 
represent different segments of customers/stakeholders whom they expect 
will gain value through their solution or will benefit from value 
streams that are being produced by their solution (in terms of social 
and/or environmental impact). The types of customers or stakeholders 
teams'

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interview will be specific to the proposed solution and context. For 
example, teams may interview government employees if the solution is 
intended to improve how government employees do their work. On the 
other hand, teams may interview individuals who work industry and 
businesses if the teams determines that they are the intended 
beneficiaries.
    Using a generic information collection plan, this data collection 
covers qualitative information to be obtained through on-site, 
unstructured interviews with individuals who represent the customers or 
stakeholders CDC teams are attempting to serve or benefit. CDC 
anticipates conducting I-Catalyst with three cohorts of teams over the 
next two years. With each I-Catalyst cohort teams will interview their 
customers/stakeholders for an average of 30 minutes. Each team will 
interview approximately 50 respondents. With 8-10 teams participating 
in each of the three I-Catalyst training cohorts, approximately 1,500 
respondents will be interviewed. Of these, approximately 40% of 
individuals will be internal CDC/ATSDR staff and 60% will be external 
partners, stakeholders, or customers. Data to be collected includes 
information regarding what they most value and need and their top 
barriers and pain points.
    CDC expects that teams participating in the I-Catalyst will be 
empowered to implement innovative strategies and solutions that create 
value for a set of beneficiaries. The ultimate goal of the I-Catalyst 
program is to give CDC staff skills to successfully transfer knowledge 
into value-based solutions that benefit society and broaden the 
agency's impact.
    Participation in the I-Catalyst interviews is completely voluntary. 
A three-year approval is requested. There is no cost to respondents 
other than their time.

                                        Estimated Annualized Burden Hours
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                                                                                      Average
                                                     Number of       Number of      burden per     Total  burden
      Type of respondents           Form name       respondents   responses  per   response  (in     (in hrs.)
                                                                     respondent        hrs.)
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Cohort 1:
    External Partners,          Forms will not               500               1               1             500
     Stakeholders, or            be used.
     Customers.
Cohort 2:
    External Partners,          Forms will not               500               1               1             500
     Stakeholders, or            be used.
     Customers.
Cohort 3:
    External Partners,          Forms will not               500               1               1             500
     Stakeholders, or            be used.
     Customers.
                                                 ---------------------------------------------------------------
        Total.................  ................  ..............  ..............  ..............           1,500
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Leroy A. Richardson,
Chief, Information Collection Review Office, Office of Scientific 
Integrity, Office of the Associate Director for Science, Office of the 
Director, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
[FR Doc. 2016-13982 Filed 6-13-16; 8:45 am]
 BILLING CODE 4163-18-P