Architect of the Capitol: Committed, Sustained Leadership Needed
to Continue Progress (28-FEB-07, GAO-07-407).
The Architect of the Capitol (AOC) is responsible for the
operation, maintenance, renovation, and new construction of the
Capitol Hill complex, including the U.S. Capitol, the Library of
Congress, and the Senate and House Office Buildings. In 2003, at
the request of Congress, GAO issued a management review of AOC
that contained recommendations designed to help AOC become more
strategic and accountable. Subsequently, Congress directed GAO to
monitor AOC's progress in implementing recommendations. This is
the fourth status report on AOC's progress and summarizes GAO's
assessment of AOC's overall progress and remaining actions in
becoming more strategic and accountable, including AOC's
responses to specific recommendations GAO made in January 2003
and subsequently. To assess AOC's progress, GAO analyzed AOC
documents; interviewed AOC officials; and relied on the results
of related GAO reviews, including reviews of the Capitol Visitor
Center (CVC). AOC generally agreed with GAO's assessment of its
progress, but noted that 2 additional recommendations--1 on
financial management practices and 1 on collecting worker safety
data--should be considered implemented. GAO acknowledges AOC's
efforts in these areas, but maintains that further steps are
necessary to fully implement these recommendations.
-------------------------Indexing Terms-------------------------
REPORTNUM: GAO-07-407
ACCNO: A66368
TITLE: Architect of the Capitol: Committed, Sustained Leadership
Needed to Continue Progress
DATE: 02/28/2007
SUBJECT: Accountability
Agency evaluation
Architects
Facility management
Federal office buildings
Financial management
General management reviews
Internal controls
Personnel management
Program management
Strategic planning
Capitol Visitor Center Project
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GAO-07-407
* [1]
* [2]Results in Brief
* [3]Background
* [4]AOC Is Making Progress in Becoming More Strategic and Accoun
* [5]Leadership Continuity and Planning Are Key to New
Management
* [6]AOC Revised Its Strategic Plan, but Has Not Clearly
Delineat
* [7]Service Delivery
* [8]Workforce Planning
* [9]Improved Communication Procedures Need to Be Sustained
* [10]Further Progress in Improving Financial Management, IT
Manag
* [11]Financial Management
* [12]IT Management
* [13]Project Management
* [14]Agency Comments and Our Evaluation
* [15]Appendix I: Status of AOC's Progress on Recommendations
* [16]Strategic Management
* [17]Human Capital Management
* [18]Financial Management
* [19]Information Technology Management
* [20]Project Management
* [21]Facilities Management
* [22]Worker Safety
* [23]Capitol Power Plant Management
* [24]Recycling
* [25]Appendix II: GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments
* [26]GAO Contact
* [27]Staff Acknowledgments
* [28]Order by Mail or Phone
Report to Congressional Requesters
United States Government Accountability Office
GAO
February 2007
ARCHITECT OF THE CAPITOL
Committed, Sustained Leadership Needed to Continue Progress
GAO-07-407
Contents
Letter 1
Results in Brief 3
Background 5
AOC Is Making Progress in Becoming More Strategic and Accountable, but
Completing the Management Transition and Other Critical Actions Remain 7
Agency Comments and Our Evaluation 18
Appendix I Status of AOC's Progress on Recommendations 20
Strategic Management 20
Human Capital Management 26
Financial Management 31
Information Technology Management 37
Project Management 44
Facilities Management 49
Worker Safety 51
Capitol Power Plant Management 55
Recycling 57
Appendix II GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments 59
Tables
Table 1: Current Status of Recommendations on Strategic Management 21
Table 2: Current Status of Recommendations on Human Capital Management 26
Table 3: Current Status of Recommendations on Financial Management 32
Table 4: Current Status of Recommendations on Information Technology
Management 38
Table 5: Current Status of Recommendations on Project Management 45
Table 6: Current Status of Recommendations on Facilities Management 49
Table 7: Current Status of Recommendations on Worker Safety 52
Table 8: Current Status of Recommendations on CPP Management 55
Table 9: Current Status of Recommendations on Recycling 57
Figure
Figure 1: New Senior-Level Managers at AOC since January 2006 8
Abbreviations
AOC Architect of the Capitol
BSMO Business Systems Modernization Office
CFO Chief Financial Officer COO Chief Operating Officer CPP Capitol Power
Plant
CVC Capitol Visitor Center EA enterprise architecture
FMIS Facilities Management Information System
FTE full-time equivalent
ICS Inventory Control System
IRB Investment Review Board
IT information technology
JHA job hazard analysis
MOR Management Operations Reporting
OAP Office of the Attending Physician
OIRM Office of Information and Resource Management
OOC Office of Compliance
PRB Project Review Board
SDLC systems development life-cycle
SHEC Safety, Health, and Environment Council
This is a work of the U.S. government and is not subject to copyright
protection in the United States. It may be reproduced and distributed in
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separately.
United States Government Accountability Office
Washington, DC 20548
February 28, 2007
The Honorable Mary L. Landrieu
Chairman
The Honorable Wayne Allard Ranking
Minority Member
Subcommittee on Legislative Branch
Committee on Appropriations
United States Senate
The Honorable Debbie Wasserman Schultz
Chair
The Honorable Zach Wamp
Ranking Minority Member
Subcommittee on Legislative Branch
Committee on Appropriations
House of Representatives
The Honorable Dianne Feinstein
Chairman
The Honorable Bob Bennett
Ranking Minority Member
Committee on Rules and Administration
United States Senate
The Architect of the Capitol (AOC) is responsible for the operations,
maintenance, renovation, and new construction of the Capitol Hill complex,
including such high-profile and historic buildings as the U.S. Capitol
Building, Senate and House Office Buildings, Library of Congress, and
Supreme Court. AOC also is managing the construction of the Capitol
Visitor Center (CVC)--the largest incremental growth in the history of the
Capitol complex. Preserving and modernizing these buildings while meeting
the needs of Congress and the visiting public poses challenges for AOC. In
2001, Congress raised concerns about management shortcomings at AOC and
asked us to review the management of AOC's operations. In response, we
issued a report in January 2003 containing recommendations that were
designed to help AOC establish a strong strategic management and
accountability framework.1 Congress subsequently directed us to monitor
AOC's progress in implementing these recommendations. This report is the
fourth in a series of status reports on AOC's progress.2 In our previous
report on AOC's progress, we emphasized the need for improvement in
communication with external stakeholders and in development of internal
controls and stressed the importance of leadership support for these
improvements.
1GAO, Architect of the Capitol: Management and Accountability Framework
Needed for Organizational Transformation, [29]GAO-03-231 (Washington,
D.C.: Jan. 17, 2003).
To continue our efforts in monitoring AOC's progress, this report includes
an assessment of AOC's overall progress and remaining actions in becoming
more strategic and accountable, including responses to specific
recommendations we made in January 2003 and subsequently. The
recommendations involve nine areas--strategic management, human capital
management, financial management, information technology (IT) management,
project management, facilities management, worker safety, Capitol Power
Plant (CPP) management, and recycling.
To assess AOC's progress in implementing our recommendations and identify
remaining actions, we analyzed documents related to AOC's actions and
interviewed AOC officials responsible for implementing the
recommendations. Our analysis also relies on the results of other work we
conducted during this past year--including reviews of the extent to which
AOC outsources operations,3 AOC's procedures to estimate project costs,4
and AOC's efforts to improve the CPP's utility tunnels5--as well as our
ongoing oversight of the construction of the CVC.6 We conducted our work
from September 2006 through February 2007 in accordance with generally
accepted government auditing standards.
2GAO, Architect of the Capitol: Management Challenges Remain,
[30]GAO-06-290 (Washington, D.C.: Feb. 21, 2006); Architect of the
Capitol: Midyear Status Report on Implementation of Management Review
Recommendations, [31]GAO-04-966 (Washington, D.C.: Aug. 31, 2004); and
Architect of the Capitol: Status Report on Implementation of Management
Review Recommendations, [32]GAO-04-299 (Washington, D.C.: Jan. 30, 2004).
3In September 2006, we briefed the House Appropriations Committee on AOC's
outsourcing efforts.
4In June 2006, we briefed the Senate Appropriations Committee on AOC's
procedures for estimating project costs and a comparison of AOC's and
other agencies' project costs.
5GAO, Capitol Power Plant Utility Tunnels, [33]GAO-07-227R (Washington,
D.C.: Nov. 16, 2006).
6Since February 2006, we have testified at nine hearings on the status of
the CVC project. Our most recent testimony was in February 2007. See GAO,
Capitol Visitor Center: Update on Status of Project's Schedule and Cost as
of February 16, 2007, GAO-07-507T (Washington, D.C.: Feb. 16, 2007.
Results in Brief
AOC has made progress in becoming a more strategic and accountable
organization, but critical actions remain for the agency to sustain and
build on this progress. Specifically, AOC has filled seven existing
leadership positions--including the Chief Operating Officer (COO) and the
Chief Financial Officer (CFO)--and two new leadership positions
established to help AOC better meet the needs of its customers. In
addition, AOC revised its strategic plan, improved communication with
congressional stakeholders, and continued initiatives to improve financial
management, IT management, and project management. Through these actions,
AOC is establishing a foundation for becoming more strategic and
accountable. However, completing the transition to new
leadership--including the transition to a new Architect of the Capitol (a
position that is now vacant)--and other actions are needed to bring about
lasting improvements in performance. For example, AOC's new managers
enhance its ability to advance the agency's strategic transformation, but
AOC must integrate these new managers into the agency while ensuring its
continued progress. Furthermore, the agency must sustain this progress
despite the vacancy in the position of the Architect of the Capitol
(Architect). The COO is performing the Architect's responsibilities in
addition to his own; however, it will be challenging for one person to
fulfill the critical roles of the Architect and the COO in completing the
CVC project and continuing AOC's progress in becoming more strategic and
accountable. In addition, although AOC has revised its strategic plan to
better focus on its mission and goals, it has not identified how best to
deliver the services that support its mission and goals and has not
determined whether its workforce has the skills and capacity to deliver
those services. Finally, a continued focus on improving communication and
other areas, including financial management, IT management, and project
management, is needed to ensure that improvements already made in these
areas are sustained and further progress is made. For example, sustained
commitment is required to fully implement the cost accounting system to
more effectively track costs across all of AOC's operations. For project
management, AOC's management of the CVC project provides lessons learned
that can be applied to all projects, such as the importance of
communicating with stakeholders throughout all phases of the project.
Appendix I provides a summary of AOC's progress on recommendations that we
have made in January 2003 and subsequently. Over the last year, AOC has
implemented 21 recommendations. For example, AOC implemented 6 of our
strategic management recommendations by involving congressional and other
stakeholders in the development of its revised strategic plan, finalizing
procedures to facilitate communication with congressional stakeholders,
and revising its employee feedback process manual to establish a process
for regularly collecting and reporting employee feedback information,
among other things. In the project management area, AOC implemented 7
recommendations by taking several steps, such as developing tools to
communicate priorities and progress of projects, informing congressional
stakeholders on how and why specific projects are submitted for funding,
and establishing project-management-related performance measures.
Implementing these 21 recommendations brings the total number of
implemented or closed recommendations to 43 out of 64, or 67 percent.
These 64 recommendations were designed to help AOC establish a strong
strategic management and accountability framework and were made in nine
areas--strategic management, human capital management, financial
management, IT management, project management, facilities management,
worker safety, CPP management, and recycling.7
In responding to a draft of this report, AOC generally agreed with our
assessment of the agency's overall progress, but noted that the following
2 additional recommendations--1 on institutionalizing financial management
practices to support budgeting, financial, and program management and 1 on
developing a rigorous approach for collecting worker safety data--should
be considered implemented. According to AOC officials, the agency has made
significant progress over the past year and installed a solid foundation
for further improvements. The officials also recognized that continued
focused attention to the agency's improvement initiatives is essential to
maintaining progress. For our recommendation on financial management
practices, AOC suggested that the two remaining actions for this
recommendation--fully developing and implementing an appropriate
risk-based internal control framework and cost accounting and management
reporting initiatives--are addressed in the other financial management
recommendations. We maintain that these two remaining actions are key
strategies for institutionalizing internal control and accountability and
strengthening and supporting effective budgeting, financial, and
performance management at AOC and are necessary to fulfill this
recommendation. For the recommendation on collecting worker safety data,
AOC officials noted that they believe their current practices--including
conducting biennial focus groups, conducting daily shop safety meetings,
and establishing a safety hazards hotline--sufficiently meet the
requirements of this recommendation. While we recognize that these
initiatives provide the agency with some information on worker safety,
these initiatives do not provide a rigorous and confidential approach for
collecting employee perceptions of AOC's safety climate, such as
perceptions of management commitment, discipline policies, and hazard
corrections. This lack of confidentiality can impede the quality of
information collected. AOC also made clarifying and technical comments
that we addressed in the text of this report.
7Although this report draws on our ongoing work on the CVC, we did not
include the status of the specific recommendations made to AOC on the
management of the CVC project.
Background
AOC is responsible for the operation, maintenance, renovation, and new
construction of the buildings and grounds of the Capitol Hill complex.
Organizationally, AOC consists of nine separate jurisdictions responsible
for the day-to-day operations of the U.S. Capitol Building, Capitol
Grounds, Senate Office Buildings, House Office Buildings, Library of
Congress Buildings and Grounds, Supreme Court Buildings and Grounds, CPP,
Botanic Garden, and Security Programs. AOC also has centralized staff that
perform administrative and project management functions. AOC has managed
major projects throughout the Capitol Hill complex and is currently
managing the construction of the CVC. The historic nature and high profile
of many of these buildings create a complex environment for AOC to carry
out its mission; AOC must balance the diverse and sometimes divergent
needs of congressional leaders, committees, members, and staffs as well as
the visiting public.
Congress has raised concerns about management shortcomings at AOC.8 For
example, in 2001, the Senate Appropriations Committee cited several
management issues, including a lack of strategic planning, inadequate
financial and project management controls, and an unacceptably high level
of worker injuries. Congress subsequently directed GAO to conduct a review
of the management of AOC's operations9 and, later, to monitor AOC's
progress in addressing recommendations that arose from the review.10
Our January 2003 report contained 35 recommendations designed to assist
AOC in transforming itself into a more strategic and accountable
organization. The recommendations were in seven areas, including strategic
management, human capital management, financial management, project
management, IT management, worker safety, and recycling. The report
recognized this transformation as a long-term effort that involves a
fundamental change in AOC's culture. For example, AOC faces the challenge
of how best to marshal its jurisdiction-based resources to address the
strategic planning and other functional issues that cut across the
organization. Changes of this magnitude require the sustained commitment
of the agency's top leadership.11
8Sen. Rep. No. 107-37, at 28-29 (2001) and H.R. Conf. Rep. No. 107-148, at
73 (2001).
9Pub. L. No. 107-68, 115 Stat. 560, 580 (2001), 2 U.S.C. S 1801 note.
10H.R. Conf. Rep. No. 108-10, at 1225 (2003), accompanying Pub. L. No.
108-7 (2003).
Subsequent reports on AOC's progress that we issued in 2004 and 2006
concluded that, while AOC was making progress on all recommendations,
substantial work remained to achieve the goal of becoming more strategic
and accountable, and that sustained commitment and assertive involvement
by AOC's leadership would be key to instilling long-term management
improvements. Specifically, our last report in this series, issued in
February 2006, concluded that the agency had not addressed two
issues--communication with external stakeholders and development of
internal controls--that affect a wide range of AOC operations, including
cost accounting, procurement, and information security. Furthermore,
leadership support is vital to ensure that needed improvements are
implemented and sustained, but key leadership positions--including those
of the COO, CFO, Chief Administrative Officer, and Director of CPP--were
vacant and the term of the agency head, the Architect, was due to expire
in less than a year. Therefore, it was critical for AOC to quickly fill
the vacant management positions with qualified people so AOC would have a
cohesive management team in place in preparation for a change in the
agency's top leadership. These reports and two others on the CPP included
assessments of two additional areas--facilities management and the
CPP--and 29 additional recommendations for AOC, bringing the total number
of recommendations to 64.12
11 [34]GAO-03-231 .
12The 29 additional recommendations include 4 issued in January 2004, 13
issued in August 2004, 9 issued in February 2006, and 3 issued on the
management of CPP. The recommendations to improve the management of CPP
were issued in April 2005 and February 2006. See GAO, Capitol Power Plant:
Actions Needed to Improve Operating Efficiency (Washington, D.C.: Apr. 8,
2005), which was issued as an unnumbered correspondence; and Architect of
the Capitol: Addressing Staffing and Training Issues Is Important for
Efficient and Safe West Refrigeration Plant Operations, [35]GAO-06-321R
(Washington, D.C.: Feb. 10, 2006) for the CPP recommendations.
In addition, we and AOC recently worked together to identify lessons
learned from the ongoing CVC project, including practices that could be
applied to AOC's future projects and practices that could have been done
better or differently. The lessons covered four areas--acquisition
planning and policy; decision making, coordination, and communication;
project and contract management; and worksite safety and security--and
included such lessons as the importance of communicating and coordinating
with all relevant stakeholders and identifying and mitigating risks early
in the development of a major construction project.
AOC Is Making Progress in Becoming More Strategic and Accountable, but
Completing the Management Transition and Other Critical Actions Remain
During the last year, AOC has filled nine key leadership positions,
revised its strategic plan to better align its activities with its mission
and goals, and continued initiatives to improve internal controls and
accountability. These actions have furthered AOC's progress in
establishing a foundation for becoming a more strategic and accountable
organization. It is now important for AOC to continue to build on this
foundation by transitioning to new management; determining how best to
provide services to AOC's customers; and making further improvements in
communication, financial management, IT management, and project
management.
Leadership Continuity and Planning Are Key to New Management Transition
The nine leadership positions that AOC has filled during the last year are
vital to sustain improvements that have already been achieved, support
further transformation efforts, and maintain operations during the
transition to a new Architect. These new managers comprise 9 of the 20
managers that report directly to the Architect or the COO. (See fig. 1.)
Most of these positions, including those of the CFO and the Chief
Administrative Officer, were vacant because of retirements and
resignations. To help AOC better meet the needs of its customers, AOC also
created and filled two new leadership positions--the Director of
Congressional and External Relations and the Director of Planning and
Project Management. In addition to these nine positions, AOC has filled
seven other management positions over the past year, such as the Deputy
Director for the Office of the Chief Administrative Officer, Deputy
Director of the Project Management Division, and Director of the
Information Technology Division.
Figure 1: New Senior-Level Managers at AOC since January 2006
Note: The Office of the Attending Physician (OAP) is organizationally
aligned under AOC and reports administratively to the Architect (e.g.,
time and attendance). The OAP receives direction from the Attending
Physician (a separate and distinct officer of Congress) and is not an AOC
senior manager.
While these new managers can bring new energy and ideas to the agency, the
introduction of so many new managers within a short period makes it
challenging to integrate them into AOC while sustaining the progress made
thus far. The turnover in AOC's senior leadership over the past year
resulted in a loss of leadership continuity, institutional knowledge, and
expertise--a loss that could adversely affect AOC's ability to continue
its progress, at least in the short term. AOC has taken steps to mitigate
these factors and integrate the new managers into the agency by, for
example, holding weekly senior leadership meetings and monthly detailed
briefings on various AOC construction projects. These managers are also
part of AOC's senior executive performance management system, which links
the managers' performance plans to AOC's mission-critical goals and holds
the managers accountable for results. AOC officials also noted that 4 of
the 9 new managers have been promoted from within the agency and have the
institutional knowledge and expertise gained from several years of
experience at AOC.
The current vacancy in the Architect's position further challenges AOC's
ability to sustain progress. The process for hiring the new Architect is
in the early stages, and according to the COO, hiring the previous
Architect took over a year.13 Until a new Architect is in place, the COO
is authorized to act as the Architect and is assuming the Architect's
duties along with his own.14 In general, the Architect's responsibilities
include overall management of AOC, support and representation on boards
and commissions--including the Capitol Police Board--and management of the
CVC project, while the COO's responsibilities involve developing the
agency's strategic and performance plans, proposing organizational and
staffing changes needed to carry out AOC's mission, and reviewing and
directing the operational functions of AOC. The COO identified the
management of the CVC project as one of the agency's major challenges to
becoming more strategic and accountable, because the CVC requires
significant management attention that could otherwise be focused on AOC's
transformation initiatives. The management responsibilities for the CVC
project could increase if, as scheduled, the CVC reaches a critical
juncture in the next year as the construction phase ends and operations
begin. For example, before the CVC becomes operational, the roles and
responsibilities for managing CVC operations, including those of AOC, will
need to be determined. Furthermore, the CVC project executive is planning
to leave the agency in March 2007, which is likely to place additional
responsibilities on the COO. Given these factors, it will be challenging
for one person to fulfill the critical roles of the Architect and the COO
in completing the CVC and continuing AOC's progress in becoming more
strategic and accountable.
13Pursuant to 2 U.S.C. S 1801, the process for hiring a new Architect
involves the establishment of a commission composed of the Speaker of the
House; the President Pro Tempore of the Senate; the majority and minority
leaders of the Senate and House, and the Chairmen and Ranking Minority
Members of the House Oversight Committee, the Senate Rules and
Administration Committee, and the Senate and House Appropriations
Committees. The commission recommends at least three individuals to the
President for the position of the Architect. An Architect is then
appointed by the President with the advice and consent of the Senate for a
term of 10 years.
142 U.S.C. S 1804.
AOC has begun preparing for the transition to a new Architect by
determining how to support the COO in the absence of an Architect and
establishing a transition team for bringing in a new Architect. To support
the COO, AOC has begun identifying individuals to assist the COO in
managing various areas, such as project management and facilities
management. While this strategy will provide support to the COO, it
remains to be seen whether the strategy will provide the necessary support
during the transition. AOC has also established a transition team that is
chaired by the Director of Congressional and External Relations and that
includes the COO and the Chief Administrative Officer, among others. This
team has begun to prepare background materials for quickly bringing the
new Architect up to speed on the agency and its initiatives, once a new
Architect has been selected. The team also plans to be involved in
preparing potential candidates for the confirmation hearings by providing
the candidates with information on AOC's responsibilities and structure,
including its strategic plan.
AOC Revised Its Strategic Plan, but Has Not Clearly Delineated a Strategy for
Best Delivering Its Services
Over the past year, AOC has revised its strategic plan to better focus on
its mission and provide a means to demonstrate results. In January 2007,
AOC issued the revised plan, which sets forth AOC's mission--to provide
Congress and the public with a wide range of professional expertise and
services to preserve and enhance the Capitol complex and related
facilities. The revised plan also has three strategic goals--congressional
and Supreme Court operations support, heritage asset stewardship, and
leadership and administrative support--which cover all of AOC's
operations. The plan includes performance measures that allow AOC to
regularly monitor progress in achieving its strategic goals and convey the
results of its activities in its annual performance and accountability
report. AOC's revised strategic plan is an important building block in the
agency's efforts to become more strategic and accountable and provides a
framework for assessing and prioritizing the agency's activities.
While AOC has defined its mission and goals in its revised strategic plan,
the agency has not identified how best to deliver the services--through
outsourcing or in-house resources--that support the mission and goals and
has not determined whether its workforce has the skills and capacity to
deliver those services. These two initiatives--identifying how best to
deliver services and developing a workforce plan--are interrelated. For
example, contracting out for a service requires a different set of skills
to manage the contract than to conduct the work. While AOC has included
both initiatives in its strategic plan and COO action plan15 and
recognizes that coordinating these initiatives is important, the agency's
workforce planning efforts do not include an analysis of potential
outsourcing opportunities that may arise as the result of AOC's
identification of how best to deliver services.
Service Delivery
Given recent trends and long-range fiscal challenges, we have reported the
need for the federal government to engage in a fundamental review,
reassessment, and reprioritization of what the government does, how the
government does business, and who does the government's business.16 In
fiscal year 2005, AOC outsourced about 23 percent of the agency's
operations and maintenance expenditures; this percentage was within the
range of operations outsourced by similar organizations (12 to 41
percent).17 However, AOC has not comprehensively reviewed all the services
it provides to determine whether the services could better be provided
through outsourcing or in-house resources. Consequently, few activities
are outsourced consistently throughout AOC, and contracts are seldom
consolidated to obtain similar services across jurisdictions.18 In 2006,
the House Appropriations Committee instructed AOC to develop a plan that
analyzes the costs, cost-effectiveness, benefits, and feasibility of the
Architect's entering into contracts with private entities for managing and
operating its facilities.19 AOC submitted a plan to Congress that outlines
a long-term strategy for comprehensively reviewing operations and
identifying opportunities for additional contracting; however, the plan
does not provide time frames for executing this strategy. AOC officials
told us that the time frames for the long-term strategy depend on
coordination with the new congressional leadership to brief them on AOC's
outsourcing plan.
15In August 2006, AOC also issued a COO action plan, which is a 1- to
2-year plan that sets forth "quick hit" tactical actions intended to help
AOC become a more strategic and accountable organization. According to the
plan, once these actions are completed, the action plan will no longer be
necessary, since the strategic plan will serve as the vehicle for change
and process improvement.
16GAO, Commercial Activities Panel: Improving the Sourcing Decisions of
the Federal Government, [36]GAO-02-847T (Washington, D.C.: Sept. 27,
2002).
17AOC also outsourced about 90 percent of capitalized expenditures for
fiscal year 2005; however, AOC's capitalized expenditures were not
comparable with similar organizations.
18We provided this finding in our September 2006 briefing to the House
Appropriations Committee on AOC's outsourcing efforts.
19House Rep. No. 109-485, at 14 (2006).
In 2002, the Commercial Activities Panel issued guiding principles for
federal agencies to follow when making decisions on whether to outsource
services.20 In briefings to congressional committees, we have reported
that these principles could guide AOC in determining how best to deliver
its services. For example, the panel recommended that the decision on
whether to outsource services should
o support agency missions, goals, and objectives (as defined in
the agency's strategic plan);
o be based on a clear, transparent, and consistently applied
process;
o avoid arbitrary full-time equivalent or other arbitrary
numerical goals;
o ensure that competitions involve a process that considers both
quality and cost factors; and
o provide for accountability in connection with all decisions.
Workforce Planning
In addition, AOC has not assessed its current workforce to
determine whether it has the appropriate balance of skills needed
to provide services and manage contracts for services that are
outsourced. An assessment of AOC's workforce can help AOC
leadership further refine their decisions on whether to deliver
AOC's services with outsourcing or in-house resources. As we
recommended, AOC has taken steps to identify current and future
workforce needs and address potential skill gaps by hiring a
contractor to assist in the development of a strategic workforce
plan. Although the scope of the contractor's work will include
collecting and analyzing data on AOC's workforce, it does not
include an analysis of potential outsourcing opportunities that
may arise as the result of AOC's identification of how best to
deliver services. Furthermore, the COO requested that the
workforce planning efforts include an analysis of potential
outsourcing opportunities, but the COO's guidance came after AOC
had finalized its workforce planning contract. An AOC official
responsible for the contract stated that this level of analysis
either would require additional resources for the current contract
or would need to be incorporated into a second phase of its
workforce planning efforts. Another initiative in AOC's workforce
planning efforts--the implementation of a skills assessment
survey--has been delayed to revise the survey instrument and make
a more useful tool for collecting data on AOC's current workforce.
An official stated that AOC does not expect the skills assessment
survey to be completed in the near future. Consequently, data from
the skills assessment survey will not be taken into account in the
work being done by AOC's contractor responsible for developing the
strategic workforce plan.
Improved Communication Procedures Need to Be Sustained
AOC took several steps over the past year to improve communication
with its external stakeholders, and stakeholders are responding
positively to these efforts. To improve communication with
congressional stakeholders, AOC hired a Director of Congressional
and External Relations. The director is responsible for developing
and maintaining positive relations with congressional
stakeholders, and she regularly provides them with updates on AOC
issues. Other AOC officials, including the COO and the Director of
Planning and Project Management, also periodically brief
congressional stakeholders on a variety of issues, such as
revisions to the strategic plan, the COO's action plan, and AOC's
budget submission and the status of projects. As a result of these
efforts, the COO believes that AOC better understands what
Congress wants and is able to set expectations, obtain feedback,
and make changes on the basis of that feedback. Congressional
stakeholders we spoke with generally agree that AOC's outreach
efforts have improved, and they said that the addition of the
Director of Congressional and External Relations has improved
AOC's responsiveness to congressional questions and requests for
information.
Although AOC has taken steps to improve communication with its
congressional stakeholders, it is critical for these improvements
to be formalized and sustained. AOC is finalizing written
procedures for communicating with congressional and other external
stakeholders and plans to brief congressional leadership on these
procedures. In instituting these procedures, AOC is working to
establish "one voice" for the agency and set expectations for
AOC's response time to stakeholder inquiries. Although
congressional stakeholders generally agree that communication has
improved, documentation of AOC's communication procedures can help
ensure that AOC deals with its congressional customers using
clearly defined, consistently applied, and transparent policies
and procedures.21
AOC also has taken actions to improve communication with its
employees, but the effectiveness of these efforts remains to be
seen. AOC recently revised its process for collecting and
assessing data on employee satisfaction to address our
recommendations on systematically collecting and communicating
employee feedback. AOC continues to distribute newsletters to its
employees; hold biannual town hall meetings and monthly,
small-group sessions with the COO; and address issues that were
identified in employee focus groups, first held in 2004.22 AOC
also contracted for an ombudsperson to serve as a confidential
resource for responding to employee complaints, concerns, and
questions on employment-related matters. Although these are
positive steps, AOC will not be able to determine the extent to
which communication has been improved until the next round of
employee focus groups is completed and compared with the results
of the 2004 focus groups. AOC originally planned to conduct the
next round of focus groups in fiscal year 2007; however, because
of fiscal constraints and ongoing transformation efforts, AOC is
considering the possibility of conducting focus groups in fiscal
year 2008.
The effectiveness of AOC's communication improvements also depends
on how well AOC can identify and address issues that may arise as
well as communicate the actions that are being taken to address
the issues. For example, in 2006, employees involved in repairing
AOC's utility tunnels expressed concerns over how AOC management
communicated with them. Although AOC developed a plan to address
problems in the utility tunnels, the tunnel workers expressed
concern that they had no clear idea of when the problems would be
solved. To improve communication, AOC began holding weekly
meetings with the tunnel shop workers in April 2006 to discuss
tunnel issues and the actions being taken, but workers continued
to express frustration about the lack of progress in addressing
their safety and health concerns.23 As issues such as worker
safety arise, it is important for employees to see that AOC's
leadership not only listens to their concerns, but also takes
action and makes appropriate adjustments in a visible and timely
way.24
Further Progress in Improving Financial Management, IT
Management, and Project Management Requires Ongoing Commitment
AOC has made progress in financial management, IT management, and
project management, but sustained commitment is required to
continue progress on the long-term efforts in these areas, many of
which are needed to improve AOC's internal controls and
accountability. Internal control and accountability are critical
elements in managing an organization. Internal control involves
the plans, methods, and procedures used to meet missions, goals,
and objectives and, in doing so, to support performance-based
management. Accountability represents the processes, mechanisms,
and other means by which AOC managers demonstrate their
stewardship and responsibility for resources and performance.
Internal control and accountability initiatives require sustained
and committed leadership to ensure successful implementation.
While AOC has made progress in all nine areas that are important
to a strong strategic management and accountability framework,
work remains to develop significant and lasting internal control
and accountability improvements in the areas of financial
management, IT management, and project management. (See app. I for
more information on the status of recommendations in all nine
areas, including strategic management, human capital management,
facilities management, worker safety, CPP management, and
recycling.)
Financial Management
AOC has made progress in preparing its financial statements and
implementing a new financial management system, but significant
work remains to establish an effective internal control framework
and cost accounting system. AOC achieved its goal of preparing
auditable comprehensive agencywide financial statements with the
successful audit of its fiscal year 2005 and 2006 financial
statements. To a significant extent, these achievements reflect
the increased focus and attention by AOC's senior management on
financial accountability and control. For example, AOC's senior
management regularly meets with the AOC Audit Committee and its
internal and external auditors to discuss the status of the
financial statement audits, any related findings, and AOC's
corrective plans. In 2006, AOC also implemented the final phase of
its new financial management system. AOC has begun efforts to
establish a risk-based internal control framework, although
progress has been impacted by staffing shortages and limited
resources. To improve accountability across the agency, AOC has
begun the implementation of its cost accounting system, including
working to get employees to charge their time to specific
activities and project codes in the time and attendance system and
working to develop reporting formats that demonstrate the types of
information that can be generated when the system is fully
implemented. Although these are important steps, the system will
have to be further developed to link AOC's cost information to the
strategic plan, performance measures, and performance-based
budgeting--actions that are important to producing reliable
information for decision making and performance evaluation. AOC
officials noted that further progress in implementing the internal
control framework and the cost accounting system will be limited
by current resource constraints. Implementing this key effort
impacts other AOC initiatives. For example, while AOC has taken
steps to improve its cost and timeliness measures for facilities
management, it will not be able to accurately and routinely track
or benchmark these measures until the cost accounting system is
further developed and linked with the facilities management
information system. AOC officials noted that it will take several
years for the systems and processes to evolve to the point that
the system can be fully implemented. Successful implementation of
these systems and processes that impact all of AOC's operations
will require sustained organizational commitment to ensure these
efforts are appropriately funded, staffed, and monitored. Until
these efforts are implemented and operating effectively, AOC
continues to face substantial risk in the area of linking cost and
financial information to organizational performance.
20Section 832 of the Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2001, Pub.
L. No. 106-398, 114 Stat. 1654 (2000) required the Comptroller General of
the United States to convene a panel of experts to study the process used
by the federal government to make sourcing decisions. After a year-long
study, this panel published its report in April 2002. See Commercial
Activities Panel, Improving the Sourcing Decisions of the Government:
Final Report (Washington, D.C.: Apr. 30, 2002), on the GAO Web site,
http://www.gao.gov.
21 [37]GAO-03-231 .
22AOC established employee focus groups as a method for collecting
employee feedback information on a regular basis.
23 [38]GAO-07-227R .
24 [39]GAO-04-299 and [40]GAO-04-966 .
IT Management
AOC has made progress in improving IT management controls and
accountability, but work remains to fully implement an effective
agencywide approach to IT management. To improve management
controls in AOC's IT investment management process, AOC developed
and approved an IT investment management policy that describes the
agency's investment management process and the roles and
authorities of the boards involved in overseeing IT investments.
AOC also has begun to plan for and implement the practices in our
IT investment management guide associated with corporate,
portfolio-based investment decision making. However, AOC has yet
to prioritize all IT investments, develop an IT investment
portfolio, and oversee each investment from a portfolio approach
to ensure that it achieves its cost, benefit, schedule, and risk
expectations. According to AOC officials, AOC has begun the
process of establishing an IT portfolio management program that
will arrange IT investment into a single portfolio and provide
visibility, control, and decisions based on project objectives
such as costs, resources, and risks. However, until AOC fully
institutes these practices, it cannot ensure that the investments
address the agency's strategic goals, objectives, and mission.
Project Management
AOC also took actions to improve internal controls and
accountability in the area of project management, but sustained
commitment is needed to continue progress in managing project
costs and developing a project information system to help manage
and track projects. For example, AOC made internal control and
accountability improvements by developing and tracking
project-management-related performance measures, clarifying the
roles and responsibilities of staff in the Project Management
Division, and revising its project management manuals. However,
AOC's lack of accurate cost data for the Construction
Division--the division that provides construction services
in-house (rather than by contractors)--hampers its efforts to
fully account for the costs of projects. In April 2006, a peer
review group within AOC issued recommendations designed to better
track cost data for the division, including standardizing the cost
estimating process. AOC is taking steps to address the peer review
recommendations, such as developing centralized planning and
estimating capabilities to provide better cost estimates for all
Construction Division projects, but, according to AOC officials,
the agency will not be able to fully account for project costs
until the cost accounting system is in place. In addition, AOC
plans to modify its project information system to improve AOC's
ability to manage, track, and communicate the status of projects.
AOC has developed the requirements for this system, which includes
the automation of AOC's quarterly construction projects progress
report. AOC plans to begin modifications to the current system
with available in-house resources in fiscal year 2007 and
requested funding for further modifications in its fiscal year
2008 budget. Sustained support of these project management
initiatives is critical to improving AOC's efforts to manage
projects, identify reasons for project cost and schedule changes,
and report to the stakeholders.
On the basis of our ongoing work and issued testimonies on AOC's
management of the CVC project, we and AOC worked together to
identify lessons learned from the ongoing CVC project, some of
which are also relevant for project management across AOC. For
example, one lesson suggests the importance of establishing and
maintaining a detailed, realistic, and complete project schedule
and ensuring that the schedule sufficiently reflects the impact of
problems and changes and the likely impact of known risks. Another
lesson suggests the importance of clearly identifying
qualifications and limitations associated with cost and schedule
estimates; understanding risks and uncertainties; and providing
Congress with accurate, timely updates on the project's status,
completion date, and costs. Recognizing the need to improve how
AOC manages large projects, the agency is adding capital project
administrators to its Project Management Division to lead the
design and construction activities of larger projects.
Agency Comments and Our Evaluation
In responding to a draft of this report, AOC generally agreed with
our assessment of the agency's overall progress, but noted that 2
additional recommendations--1 on institutionalizing financial
management practices to support budgeting, financial, and program
management and 1 on developing a rigorous approach for collecting
worker safety data--should be considered implemented. According to
AOC officials, the agency has made significant progress over the
past year and installed a solid foundation for further
improvements. The officials also recognized that continued focused
attention to the agency's improvement initiatives is essential to
maintaining progress. For our recommendation on financial
management practices, AOC suggested that the two remaining actions
for this recommendation--fully developing and implementing an
appropriate risk-based internal control framework and cost
accounting and management reporting initiatives--are addressed in
the other financial management recommendations. In our August 2004
report, we noted the AOC's limited progress on the financial
management initiatives, which lead us to make additional
recommendations calling for senior management to provide strong
and visible support and commitment to helping ensure that these
important initiatives are successfully implemented. While some
progress has been made on these initiatives, AOC officials noted
that further progress will be limited by staffing shortages and
resource constraints. The potential limited, near-term progress
leads us to observe in this report that successful implementation
of these systems and processes, which impact all of AOC's
operations, will require sustained organizational commitment to
ensure these efforts are appropriately funded, staffed, and
monitored. We maintain that full implementation of these
initiatives is necessary for institutionalizing internal control
and accountability and strengthening and supporting effective
budgeting, financial, and performance management at AOC. For the
recommendation on collecting worker safety data, AOC officials
noted that they believe their current practices--including
conducting biennial focus groups, conducting daily shop safety
meetings, and establishing a safety hazards hotline--sufficiently
meet the requirements of this recommendation. While we recognize
that these initiatives provide the agency with some information on
worker safety, these initiatives do not provide a rigorous and
confidential approach for collecting employee perceptions of AOC's
safety climate, such as perceptions of management commitment,
discipline policies, and hazard corrections. This lack of
confidentiality can impede the quality of information collected.
Furthermore, although AOC established a schedule to collect
employee feedback every other year, AOC has not conducted focus
groups since fiscal year 2004 and does not have plans to do so
until possibly fiscal year 2008. AOC's recently revised employee
feedback manual specifies that AOC can use other means or tools to
collect and provide employee feedback information. This would
allow AOC to pursue another, more rigorous and confidential method
for collecting worker safety data. AOC also made clarifying and
technical comments that we addressed in the text of this report.
We are sending copies of this report to the appropriate
congressional committees. We are also sending this report to the
Acting Architect of the Capitol. We will make copies available to
others upon request. In addition, this report will be available at
no cost on the GAO Web site at http://www.gao.gov. Contact points
for our Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may
be found on the last page of this report.
If you or your staffs have any questions about this report, you
may contact me at (202) 512-6923 or at [email protected]. Major
contributors to this report are listed in appendix II.
Terrell G. Dorn
Director, Physical Infrastructure Issues
Appendix I: Status of AOC�s Progress on Recommendations
Since January 2003, we have made 64 recommendations in nine areas
to improve the Architect of the Capitol's (AOC) strategic
management and accountability framework, which is needed to drive
the agency's transformation effort and address long-standing
program issues. These nine areas are strategic management, human
capital management, financial management, information technology
(IT) management, project management, facilities management, worker
safety, Capitol Power Plant (CPP) management,1 and recycling. Over
the past year, AOC has implemented 21 recommendations, bringing
the total number of implemented or closed recommendations to 43
out of 64, or 67 percent.
This appendix provides (1) the overall progress and remaining
actions in each of the nine issue areas and (2) details on the
status of the recommendations made in each area (see tables 1
through 9). For the recommendations that have been implemented,
the "status" column in the tables includes the month and year of
the GAO report that acknowledges the completion of that
recommendation. Recommendations implemented since our February
2006 report were given an implementation date of February 2007.
Strategic Management
AOC has made progress in improving its strategic planning and
organizational alignment, establishing meaningful performance
measures, improving the process to obtain feedback from employees
and customers, and strengthening the relationship between AOC and
congressional stakeholders. As a result, AOC has implemented 6 of
our strategic management recommendations over the year.
Specifically, AOC has issued its revised strategic plan and the
Chief Operating Officer (COO) action plan and provided periodic
briefings to update congressional stakeholders on these plans and
related organizational changes. To improve communication with its
employees, AOC revised its employee feedback process manual to
establish a process for regularly collecting and reporting
employee feedback information. Finally, to improve communication
with its external stakeholders, AOC is establishing procedures for
communicating with congressional and other external stakeholders
and has taken a more proactive approach to communicating with
these stakeholders.
Although AOC has made progress in the area of strategic
management, sustained commitment from the agency's new leaders is
necessary to build upon this progress. To ensure that the
strategic plan is current and useful to the agency, AOC leadership
should review and update the strategic plan regularly and
incorporate any changes that may result from AOC's review of
options and strategies for delivering its services and operations.
Furthermore, AOC should continue to work with congressional
stakeholders to develop and report key measures that are
meaningful to AOC's customers and reflect the agency's day-to-day
operations. See table 1 for more information on the implementation
status of our recommendations on strategic management.
1During this same time period, GAO made an additional 8 recommendations
related to the Capitol power plant master plan. See GAO, Capitol Power
Plant Utility Master Plan, [41]GAO-04-456RNI (Washington, D.C.: Mar. 1,
2004). AOC implemented 6 of the recommendations and is making progress in
implementing the remaining 2 recommendations. Due to the security
sensitive nature of these recommendations, we did not include these
recommendations in this report.
Table 1: Current Status of Recommendations on Strategic Management
Status
GAO recommendation and date (month/year of
of the recommendation GAO report) Progress and remaining action
1. Improve strategic Implemented AOC has fulfilled our
planning and organizational (February 2007) recommendation by involving
alignment by involving key congressional and other
congressional and other stakeholders in drafting the
external stakeholders in January 2007 version of the
AOC's strategic planning strategic plan. For example,
efforts and in any AOC conducted briefings with
organizational changes that stakeholders on the strategic
may result from these plan and COO action plan,
efforts. sought feedback, and
integrated the suggested
January 2003 changes into the plans. In
addition, AOC has hired a
permanent COO and a Director
of Congressional and External
Relations to coordinate the
flow of information between
Congress and the Architect of
the Capitol (Architect) and
the COO.
2. To strengthen the Making progress Progress
relationship between AOC and
its congressional and other o AOC has developed a
stakeholders, we recommend mixture of outcome and
that the Architect of the output measures that are
Capitol direct the COO to clearly linked to its
actively consult with strategic goals, and AOC
Congress on the design and has worked with
implementation of meaningful congressional stakeholders
outcome-based and to develop, review, and
performance-based measures revise three documents
that are useful to both AOC designed to assist AOC in
and Congress. This effort becoming a more strategic
will enable AOC and Congress and accountable
to assess AOC's progress. organization. All three
documents track
August 2004 performance toward
specific targets that are
linked to the agency's
strategic goals.
o The strategic plan
contains AOC's three
strategic goals and a
performance plan that
outlines specific
objectives and associated
activities as well as
performance measures that
are linked to the
strategic goals. This plan
is used by the COO and the
Architect to move AOC
forward and track progress
on AOC's strategic goals.
o The COO action plan is
for use by the COO and the
Architect in tracking
progress on a set of
complimentary tasks to
AOC's strategic plan. The
action plan contains
several short-term "quick
hit" items intended to
help AOC become a more
strategic and accountable
organization.
o The AOC dashboard
summarizes AOC's
performance and contains a
series of tactical or
operational indicators
that are tracked on a
monthly basis and are for
use by the COO and the
Architect, as well as
superintendents and
division heads, to discuss
AOC's performance.
Remaining action
o Congressional
stakeholders noted that
they would like to see key
measures that are
meaningful to AOC's
customers and reflect the
agency's day-to-day
operations. For example,
response time on cleaning
requests (such as a
request to clean up a
spill in a hallway) is
important to AOC's
building occupants, but
AOC does not have a
measure that captures how
quickly the agency
responds to this type of
request. Stakeholders also
suggested that AOC could
develop a top 10 key
indicators list that
succinctly shows AOC's
overall performance.
3. Develop a comprehensive Implemented AOC has established a process
strategy to improve internal (February 2006) for obtaining employee input
and external communications and feedback and finalized a
by providing opportunities process manual for employee
for routine employee input feedback. The process manual
and feedback. provides guidance for
obtaining employee feedback
January 2003 using a four-step approach:
identifying concerns,
obtaining data, giving
feedback, and following up on
results. The process manual
also details responsibilities
for staff and provides an
implementation plan. While
AOC has provided
opportunities for routine
employee feedback, it is
important for AOC to collect
a consistent and
comprehensive set of data on
a regular basis in order to
monitor progress against an
established baseline.
4. Gather and analyze Implemented AOC held focus group sessions
employee feedback from focus (February 2006) in September 2004 and has
groups or surveys before communicated planned actions
fiscal year 2005, as well as to employees by issuing three
communicate how it is taking brochures. According to AOC,
actions to address any it has begun to implement
identified employee several of the planned
concerns. actions and will continue to
communicate with employees as
January 2004 each action plan is
implemented. In addition, AOC
has issued a focus group
guide that outlines
procedures for conducting
focus groups and reporting on
the results.
5. To improve communication Implemented AOC implemented the basic
with employees, we recommend (February 2006) framework in its
that the Architect of the communications plan through a
Capitol direct the COO to variety of communication
fully and effectively methods to convey information
implement the basic to employees, including a
framework as defined in its weekly newsletter on project
communications plan and updates, policy
process manuals, and announcements, management and
finalize its draft employee communication tips, and other
feedback manual to ensure agencywide messages. AOC has
that the current progress also distributed a process
already made is maintained. manual for employee feedback.
August 2004
6. Develop a comprehensive Implemented AOC is finalizing its
strategy to improve internal (February 2007) congressional protocols,
and external communications designed to facilitate and
by completing the improve internal and external
development of congressional communications. AOC has
protocols by involving worked closely with its
stakeholders. congressional stakeholders to
develop these protocols to
January 2003 ensure that they are useful
to AOC, Congress, and other
external stakeholders. The
Director of Congressional and
External Relations has sought
and incorporated input from
both internal and external
stakeholders during the
development of these
protocols.
7. Conduct a pilot of its Implemented AOC has chosen to pilot its
congressional protocols in (February 2007) congressional protocols
one or more of its agencywide to avoid potential
jurisdictions to determine confusion among jurisdictions
how well its protocols would operating under different
work in addressing customer protocols and to take
requests for service, while advantage of the benefits of
balancing the need of training all employees
multiple requests with the concurrently. AOC officials
strategic plan and stated that AOC expects to
corresponding project receive feedback from its
priorities of the agency. stakeholders during the
protocol's implementation and
January 2004 will revise the protocols, as
appropriate.
8. Develop a comprehensive Implemented AOC fulfilled our
strategy to improve internal (February 2006) recommendation through the
and external communications release of its fiscal year
by improving annual 2003 accountability report
accountability reporting and plans to publish annual
through annual performance accountability reports
planning and reporting. thereafter. In addition, AOC
released a performance plan
January 2003 in April 2005 that details
steps to achieve its
strategic goals and
objectives. AOC staff, AOC
Audit Committee staff, GAO,
and other congressional
stakeholders are involved in
the development of these
reports. AOC plans to monitor
the progress toward meeting
milestones outlined in its
performance plan through
monthly assessment meetings.
9. Develop a comprehensive Implemented AOC has fulfilled our
strategy to improve internal (January 2004) recommendation by
and external communications implementing the annual
by continuing to regularly building services customer
measure customer satisfaction survey.
satisfaction AOC-wide. Information from the survey
will be incorporated into
January 2003 AOC's business plan and will
be useful in monitoring the
quality of AOC's services and
the progress of AOC's
improvement initiatives.
10. To strengthen the Implemented AOC has fulfilled our
relationship between AOC and (February 2006) recommendation by releasing
its congressional and other the results of the 2003
stakeholders, we recommend building services customer
that the Architect of the satisfaction survey in its
Capitol direct the COO to 2004 report. The report
expedite the release of the tracked customer satisfaction
2003 building services between 2002 and 2004. In
customer satisfaction addition, AOC provided
survey, as a transparency customers with letters
and accountability detailing actions planned to
mechanism, and to provide address their concerns.
Congress and other
stakeholders with assurance
that actions are being taken
in response to their
feedback.
August 2004
11. Establish Implemented AOC fulfilled our
action-oriented (January 2004) recommendation by issuing its
implementation goals over draft performance plan in
the long term and a timeline March 2003, which was
with milestone dates to prepared to satisfy a
track the organization's congressional requirement for
progress toward achieving the development of a
those implementation goals. management improvement plan.
The Architect of the Capitol This draft performance plan
should work with key for fiscal years 2003-2007
congressional and other established action-oriented
stakeholders to develop implementation goals over the
plans. long term and a timeline with
milestone dates to track the
January 2003 organization's progress
toward achieving those goals.
12. To enhance the Implemented AOC fulfilled this
usefulness of the COO action (February 2007) recommendation by taking
plan, we recommend that the several actions.
Architect of the Capitol and
the COO consult with Members o In March 2006, AOC hired
of Congress and key a permanent COO.
committees on the specific o In August 2006, the COO
information regarding AOC's issued an action plan,
plans, policies, procedures, including actions related
actions, and proposed to project management. For
organizational changes. As example, the action plan
part of this effort, the includes establishing
Architect of the Capitol and technical expertise in
the COO should work with project scheduling to
Congress to determine improve AOC's estimating
Congress's information needs process and enhancing
and the timing and format of project delivery services
delivery of that information through continued use of
that will best meet an effective project
Congress's needs. process and monitoring of
Furthermore, consistent with all projects to ensure
our findings and completion of projects on
recommendations with respect time and within budget.
to congressional and other o To ensure project
stakeholder involvement in priorities are determined,
general and the Capitol AOC continues to meet with
complex master plan in congressional stakeholders
particular, as well as our to discuss how AOC targets
original January 2003 its resources and
management review, specific prioritizes projects and
emphasis should be placed on revised its project
AOC's project management. prioritization process to
Particular issues to be more clearly articulate
discussed could include how the criteria for assigning
project ratings.
o AOC's projects' o To monitor projects, AOC
priorities are continues to issue
determined; quarterly reports to
o AOC monitors and Congress on the cost and
controls project cost, schedule of active
quality, and timeliness; projects.
o AOC uses lessons o To benefit from lessons
learned from projects and learned, AOC developed and
seeks to incorporate best implemented design
practices; services and construction
o project management services surveys. Also,
accountability is AOC developed and
assigned and managed; and implemented an acquisition
strategy process with an
acquisition strategy board
that meets on a regular
basis to discuss, among
other things, lessons
learned from previous
projects. AOC's
acquisition strategy board
also discusses the best
mix of in-house and
contractor support as part
of their regular meetings.
o AOC determines the best o To improve
mix of in-house and accountability, AOC
contractor support when established a project
designing projects. management organization
with a project manager
Subsequent COO action plans dedicated to each project
and status reports will from start to finish.
likely be most helpful to Also, AOC uses its
Congress to the extent that dashboard (see table 2,
they are rigorously specific recommendation 1) to
as to the problem or issue monitor project management
that needs to be addressed, performance and discuss
the actions that are being performance issues with
taken in response, the AOC senior management each
progress to date, and month.
milestones for additional o AOC officials, including
actions. the COO and the Director
of Planning and Project
August 2004 Management, also regularly
brief congressional
stakeholders on a variety
of issues, including AOC's
budget submission, status
of projects, and project
priorities.
13. AOC should further Implemented AOC has recently revised its
refine its employee feedback (February 2007) employee feedback process
efforts by establishing a manual, which establishes a
method(s) to collect process for regularly
consistent and comprehensive collecting employee feedback
information on a regular information. In the revised
basis and to allow AOC to employee feedback manual, AOC
track results over time established the results of
against an established its 2004 focus groups as a
baseline. baseline for its work
environment assessment and
October 2005 planned to conduct focus
groups every 2 years. AOC
originally planned to conduct
the next round of focus
groups in fiscal year 2007;
however, because of the
fiscal constraints and
ongoing transformation
efforts, AOC may conduct
focus groups in fiscal year
2008, according to AOC
officials. AOC also plans to
conduct other feedback
efforts, such as surveys of
customer satisfaction, as
needed.
14. AOC should improve its Implemented AOC has improved its
communications strategy for (February 2007) communication strategy for
employee feedback (as employee feedback by revising
documented in its employee its employee feedback process
feedback manual) to ensure manual to reflect GAO's
that employees and external recommendations on the
stakeholders receive an timeliness of feedback to
adequate level of detail employees and is completing
about employee feedback final edits on the manual.
initiative results and For the next biennial
related agency actions in a assessment, AOC plans to make
timely manner. The one person responsible for
communications strategy also preparing initial feedback to
should emphasize the need to employees as soon as
summarize the documents and practicable and for
provide a consistent level developing a feedback plan
of detail. that provides information to
stakeholders within 4 months
October 2005 of completing the assessment.
AOC's revised employee
feedback manual also states
that the level of detail on
feedback should be tailored
for each audience and
purpose. Although AOC has set
up a process to fulfill this
recommendation, AOC needs to
demonstrate that it has
improved its communication
strategy in its next series
of focus groups by providing
employees and stakeholders
with timely information on
focus group results and
initiatives.
Source: GAO analysis of AOC data.
Human Capital Management
AOC has taken steps to strengthen performance management and strategic
human capital management by implementing our recommendation to develop the
capacity for collecting and analyzing workforce data. Additionally, AOC
has hired a contractor to begin developing a strategic workforce plan
intended to provide AOC with information on its current and future
workforce as well as recommendations on how AOC could meet its strategic
goals. Although hiring the contractor is an important step, AOC's current
effort to develop a strategic workforce plan will not include an
assessment of how best to deliver (either through outsourcing or in-house
resources) the services it provides. Without this type of assessment,
AOC's strategic workforce plan will not provide AOC leadership with the
appropriate set of strategies to acquire, develop, and retain its current
and future workforce. See table 2 for more information on the
implementation status of our recommendations on human capital management.
Table 2: Current Status of Recommendations on Human Capital Management
GAO recommendation and Status
date of the (month/year of
recommendation GAO report) Progress and remaining action
1. Strengthen Implemented AOC has implemented a performance
performance measurement (February 2006) management approach that includes
and strategic human strategic planning, annual
capital management by performance planning and
developing annual goals reporting, and assessment of AOC's
and measuring progress in meeting agencywide
performance. milestones and measures. AOC has
identified four strategic goals:
January 2003 facilities management, project
management, human capital
management, and organizational
excellence. AOC also has
identified a number of measures to
monitor and evaluate performance,
and these measures will serve as
the basis for employees' annual
performance goals as well as the
assessment of AOC's overall
success in meeting its strategic
goals. The measures include
quality facility management;
projects delivered on time, on
budget, and of high quality;
highly skilled and motivated
employees; and effects of
managerial oversight. In addition,
AOC has developed a document--the
AOC dashboard--that summarizes
performance in each of its
strategic focus areas: project
management, facilities management,
human capital management, and
organizational excellence. The
dashboard includes several
high-level indicators to track
performance for each of the
strategic goals as well as a
target goal for each indicator.
2. Strengthen Implemented AOC's senior executive performance
performance measurement (February 2006) management system and its employee
and strategic human performance evaluation system are
capital management by linked to AOC's mission-critical
creating "a line of goals. Employees are expected to
sight" by linking AOC's ensure completion of a performance
senior executive and plan that outlines performance
employee performance standards for each critical task
management systems to related to the employee's
mission-critical goals. position. The employee's
performance is evaluated against
January 2003 the established performance plan
as it relates to AOC's strategic
goals and objectives. The employee
is given a rating of
"outstanding," "fully successful,"
or "unsuccessful" for each element
as well as a summary rating.
3. Strengthen Making progress Progress
performance measurement
and strategic human o AOC previously identified
capital management by core competencies for most of
establishing agencywide the agency's positions and has
core and technical linked these competencies to
competencies and the positions' critical tasks.
holding employees
accountable for these Remaining actions
competencies as a part
of the performance o AOC is working with a
management system. contractor to develop a process
to link identified core
January 2003 competencies to an individual's
training plan and performance
assessment. AOC has not set a
specific completion date for
this phase.
o Employees still need to be
notified of the competencies
that they will be evaluated
against. AOC is currently
working to develop a
communications plan for this
notification.
4. Strengthen Implemented AOC's Workforce Planning and
performance measurement (February 2007) Management Office has identified
and strategic human numerous ways to collect, report,
capital management by and analyze workforce data.
developing the capacity Additionally, several data sources
to collect and analyze have been identified for analyzing
workforce data. the agency's workforce and
developing products such as AOC's
January 2003 retirement report. AOC also has
developed a system to report and
monitor full-time equivalents
(FTE) on a regular basis using
man-hours required for projects
rather than estimating FTEs on the
basis of funding.
5. Strengthen Making progress Progress
performance measurement
and strategic human o AOC has awarded a contract
capital management by for the development of a
identifying current and strategic workforce plan, which
future workforce needs AOC expects will identify and
and developing detail the (1) goals of the
strategies to fill agency for the next 5 years,
gaps. (2) areas where progress has
previously been made, and (3)
January 2003 current and future changes that
should be made to preclude gaps
in staffing. The final plan was
to be delivered in March 2007,
but because of the increase in
AOC's workload resulting from
office moves for the new
Congress, the contractor was
unable to hold focus groups as
planned. AOC now anticipates
receiving the completed plan in
May 2007.
o To assess and analyze current
skill sets, AOC has developed a
skills assessment survey and a
draft communications plan for
rolling out the survey. This
survey, which will identify,
measure, and track employee
skills agencywide, was tested
in a focus group as it was
developed, and AOC has
consulted the unions and
jurisdictions about
implementing the skills
assessment survey and a
strategy for the data
collection. However, these
consultations have been
suspended because of the recent
congressional election and
related office moves as well as
because of needed revisions to
the survey instrument.
Remaining actions
o AOC needs to assess how best
to deliver its
services--through outsourcing
or in-house resources--that
support AOC's mission and
goals. This assessment is an
important input into the
development of a strategic
workforce plan, which focuses
on developing strategies to
acquire, develop, and retain an
organization's total workforce
(including full- and part-time
in-house staff and contractors)
to meet future workforce needs.
o AOC's contractor needs to
complete work relating to a
strategic workforce plan,
including conducting focus
groups with managers to
ascertain the future direction
of the agency.
o AOC needs to complete the
skills assessment survey. AOC
plans to continue working with
the contractor responsible for
developing the survey to revise
the survey instrument to
produce the desired data. Once
the revisions are completed and
the survey has been approved by
the union and AOC managers, AOC
employees will complete the
survey online. The results of
the survey should be used as
input into the strategic
workforce planning process to
identify the skill gaps of
AOC's current workforce and
develop strategies to fill
AOC's future workforce needs.
o To strengthen its
organizational capacity and to
leverage information collected
in its Retirement Forecasting
(2005-2009) Report, AOC should
begin developing a succession
plan for its workforce. We have
previously reported that
leading organizations use
succession planning efforts
that (1) receive the active
support of top leadership; (2)
link to the agencies' strategic
planning; (3) identify talent
from staff at multiple
organizational levels, early in
their careers, or identify
staff with critical skills; (4)
emphasize developmental
assignments in addition to
formal training; and (5)
address specific human capital
challenges, such as diversity.
6. Strengthen AOC's Implemented AOC has approved a policy
human capital policies, (February 2006) development schedule to revise
procedures, and human capital policies as part of
processes by continuing its human capital plan. In
to develop and addition, AOC developed a document
implement agencywide for supervisors, Supervisors'
human capital policies Tools of the Trade, which provides
and procedures and by supplemental guidance on human
holding management and capital policies as needed.
employees accountable Supervisors are rated for
for following these performance in human capital
policies and management as part of AOC's
procedures. evaluation system. However, it is
important that AOC continue to
January 2003 monitor whether supervisors and
managers are fairly administering
the policies as the revisions are
implemented.
7. Strengthen AOC's Implemented AOC has fulfilled this
human capital policies, (February 2006) recommendation by holding monthly
procedures, and meetings between the Human
processes by assessing Resources Director, the Equal
ways in which AOC Employment Opportunity and
management could better Conciliation Program Director, the
gather and analyze data chair of the employee advisory
from the various council, the employment council,
employee relations the employee assistance program
offices and the manager, and the Deputy Chief of
employee advisory Staff to review and discuss
council while employee relations data. The group
maintaining employee makes recommendations to senior
confidentiality. management on the basis of
findings and takes action on the
January 2003 items. According to AOC, the
importance of maintaining employee
confidentiality is emphasized at
each meeting.
8. To improve Closed - not Although AOC has not completed an
communications with implemented assessment of the capacity of
employees, we recommend existing offices to resolve
that the Architect of employee concerns and issues and
the Capitol direct the does not plan to do so, the agency
COO to conduct an has implemented a variety of
analysis of both AOC mechanisms to resolve employee
management and employee concerns and issues. According to
needs with respect to AOC, multiple offices and programs
resolving employee address employee concerns and
concerns and issues as issues, including the Equal
well as assessing the Employment Office, the Employee
capacity of existing Assistance Programs, the standard
offices to fulfill grievance process, and the
those needs. external Office of Compliance
process. In addition, AOC holds
August 2004 monthly meetings between
representatives of these offices
to review and discuss employee
relations data. The group makes
recommendations to senior
management on the basis of
findings and takes action on the
items. Employees in bargaining
units are also represented by the
union and have a process in place
to resolve individual employee
issues. In October 2005, AOC
issued a brochure to all employees
on all Equal Employment Office
policies and the available
programs. In addition, AOC is
currently developing a proposal
that would establish a mediation
program as part of AOC's
operational business strategy.
After implementing the pilot
program, AOC plans to assess its
use and effectiveness and make any
needed modifications before making
it a permanent program and
expanding the group of trained
mediators. AOC should continue to
monitor the effectiveness of the
programs through employee
feedback.
9. Establish a direct Implemented According to AOC, a direct
reporting relationship (February 2006) reporting relationship has been
between the established between the
ombudsperson and the ombudsperson and the Architect.
Architect of the Officials noted that the
Capitol consistent with ombudsperson has the ability to
professional standards. speak directly with the Architect
at any time about any issue that
January 2003 the ombudsperson feels necessary
to bring to the Architect's
attention.
Source: GAO analysis of AOC data.
Financial Management
Since our initial follow-up effort in January 2004, AOC has made
progress--to varying degrees--on key control and accountability
initiatives. AOC has developed agencywide audited financial statements,
implemented a new financial management system, and continued to develop
and implement a risk-based internal control framework and a cost
accounting system that, when fully implemented, should generate meaningful
cost and performance reporting information for managers. However, AOC's
senior management needs to continue supporting the full implementation of
key financial management and accountability efforts that are critical to
AOC's operations. Although AOC senior management has helped to strengthen
AOC's financial accountability by regularly monitoring and overseeing
AOC's efforts to prepare agencywide comprehensive financial statements and
have them audited, it needs to increase focus and attention on completing
the development and implementation of the other three key financial
management improvement initiatives--an internal control framework, a cost
accounting system, and a management reporting system. According to AOC
officials, current staffing shortages and funding constraints will likely
limit meaningful near-term progress on these efforts. To continue AOC's
progress, it will be essential for AOC's senior management to provide the
commitment, attention, and resources needed to ensure the successful
implementation of these important control and accountability initiatives.
See table 3 for more information on the implementation status of our
recommendations on financial management.
Table 3: Current Status of Recommendations on Financial Management
Status
(month/year
GAO recommendation and date of of GAO
the recommendation report) Progress and remaining action
1. Continue to improve AOC's Making Progress
approach to financial progress
management by developing AOC has reported continued
strategies to institutionalize progress on key financial
financial management practices management initiatives intended
that will support budgeting, to improve budgeting, financial
financial, and program management, and accountability
management at AOC. Such agencywide.
strategies could include
developing performance goals o According to AOC, it
and measures and associated follows established
roles aimed at increasing the governmentwide policies and
accountability of nonfinancial procedures (OMB Circular
managers and staff, such as A-11) for formulating and
jurisdictional executing its budgets, but
superintendents, program has not formally documented
managers, and other AOC AOC-specific budget policies
staff--whose support is and procedures.
critical to the success of o AOC officials reported
AOC's financial management that with the exception of
initiatives--and ensuring that two policies that are being
these staff received the drafted or revised, all
training needed to effectively accounting and financial
carry out their roles and reporting policies,
responsibilities. procedures, and operating
practices have been
January 2003 documented and implemented.
o According to AOC, in
January 2006, it completed
the final phase of its
multiyear implementation of
a financial management
system with the
implementation of its
inventory module. AOC
reported that the financial
management system as
implemented satisfies all of
the agency's functional
system requirements.
o AOC has achieved its goal
of preparing auditable
comprehensive agencywide
financial statements with
the successful audit of its
fiscal years 2005 and 2006
financial statements, which
received unqualified
opinions on all statements
audited.
o AOC has initiated a
multiphase approach for
documenting and implementing
a risk-based internal
control framework. The
approach calls for
documenting relevant
processes and policies;
identifying, analyzing, and
implementing needed
controls; and monitoring the
effectiveness of the
controls. Initially, AOC is
applying its approach to its
three highest-risk
areas--procurement (from
purchase authorization
through payment), payroll,
and project management. AOC
reported substantially
completing the documentation
of relevant processes and
policies and identification
and analysis of needed
internal controls for both
the procurement and the
payroll areas, continuing to
develop documentation of the
current project management
processes, and substantially
implementing needed internal
controls for the procurement
area. AOC reported that it
has begun manually
monitoring implemented
controls and hopes to
implement an automated tool
to monitor the effectiveness
of its internal controls in
the near future.
o AOC reported making
progress on its cost
accounting/Management
Operations Reporting (MOR)
initiative by initiating its
cost accounting system.
Under this system, employees
charge their payroll time to
specific activities and
project codes in the time
and attendance system. AOC
also reported rolling out an
interim cost reporting
structure to all
jurisdictions and working
with operating units to
demonstrate the types of
cost, finance, and
performance-reporting
information that can be
generated when the cost
accounting system is fully
implemented. To make
progress on these important
initiatives, AOC has relied
heavily on support
contractors. According to
AOC officials, further
progress on these important
efforts is likely to be
limited by staffing
shortages and funding
constraints.
Remaining actions
While AOC has made considerable
progress on key financial
management initiatives since we
made our recommendation in
2003, additional actions are
needed to fully implement two
important remaining
initiatives--its risk-based
internal control framework and
its cost accounting/MOR
initiative.
o AOC needs to complete the
documentation, analysis,
implementation, and
monitoring of internal
controls associated with
project management, payroll,
and procurement high risk
areas. In addition, AOC
needs to identify all other
areas of its operations
where internal controls need
to be documented, analyzed,
implemented, and monitored.
o AOC needs to continue its
development and
implementation of its cost
accounting/MOR initiative by
ensuring that all applicable
employees are coding their
time charges; by developing
mechanisms for rationally
assigning applicable
indirect costs--those not
directly tied to specific
project codes; and by
working to refine and
improve the usefulness of
the cost, finance, and
performance information
available to managers.
Adequate resources in the form
of AOC staff or contractor
support and sustained
leadership and management
attention and support are
needed to help ensure progress
in institutionalizing these
important financial management
improvement initiatives.
2. To help strengthen and Making Progress
sustain AOC's emerging progress
foundation of financial AOC senior management reported
accountability and control, we supporting the development of
recommend that the Architect annual AOC-wide financial
of the Capitol, the COO, the statements and an effective
Chief Financial Officer, and internal control framework.
other senior management
provide strong and visible o According to AOC, senior
support for efforts to prepare management and the Audit
auditable financial statements Committee, which senior
and implement an effective management established, have
internal control framework by provided regular monitoring
monitoring the implementation and oversight of AOC's
and related milestones for efforts to prepare
each effort, ensuring the agencywide comprehensive
commitment to and support for financial statements and
each effort by participating have them independently
AOC units, and acting to audited.
resolve any impediments that o While these audits have
may arise. resulted in unqualified
opinions on the statements,
August 2004 they also have continued to
note material internal
control weaknesses that
adversely limit AOC's
ability to establish a
foundation for financial
accountability and control.
o Because AOC lacks in-house
expertise, AOC senior
management approved a
permanent staff position and
funding for contractor
support needed to develop
and implement an effective
internal control framework.
AOC is implementing this
framework through a
multiphased approach that
documents processes and
policies, identifies and
implements needed controls,
and establishes mechanisms
to monitor the effectiveness
of internal controls for its
three highest-risk
areas--procurement (from
purchase authorization
through payment), payroll,
and project management. In
implementing the framework,
AOC officials applied
available resources to these
highest-risk areas.
o AOC officials, however,
noted that staffing
shortages and limited
resources have hampered
progress in implementing
internal controls for the
three highest-risk areas.
For example, AOC officials
reported that they had
difficulty finding qualified
candidates for the permanent
staff position approved by
senior management to manage
the development of the
internal control framework
and the contractor support
provided for developing and
implementing the internal
control framework will be
affected in fiscal year 2007
by current constraints on
AOC's annual appropriations.
o Senior management support
for the internal control
framework also included
periodic presentations and
discussions on ongoing
implementation efforts at
bimonthly meetings of AOC's
Management Council. AOC also
reported developing a
high-level executive
briefing on the internal
control framework and
training for those with a
role or responsibility in
designing or operating the
controls within the three
highest-risk areas.
Remaining actions
o To expedite the
implementation of an
effective internal control
framework, which represents
an important accountability
initiative, AOC senior
management needs to enhance
its management, monitoring,
and oversight of AOC's
current efforts to analyze,
implement, and monitor
needed internal controls in
AOC's three highest-risk
areas. As part of this
initiative, AOC senior
management needs to monitor
and oversee efforts to
develop and implement
actions needed to resolve
various material weaknesses
identified as part of AOC's
annual financial statement
audit. AOC officials noted
that they are developing a
team of top executives and
managers to act as a
steering committee over
internal control issues, but
no date has been set for
establishing the committee.
Through such a committee,
AOC senior management could
regularly assess the
progress on internal
control-related efforts and
identify and address
impediments to planned
progress (including those
associated with limited
staffing and resources).
o Once the framework for the
three highest-risk areas is
fully implemented, AOC
management needs to assess
the rest of AOC's operations
to determine the extent to
which other areas need to be
included in the risk-based
internal control framework.
3. To enhance the successful Implemented AOC reported that it has made
development of useful (February considerable progress since
financial, cost, and 2007) last year on efforts to develop
performance reporting for useful cost, financial, and
major operating units and performance information;
appropriate cost accounting, develop agencywide performance
we recommend that the measures; and start
Architect of the Capitol implementing its cost
direct the COO and the Chief accounting system. AOC reported
Financial Officer to work with that the Architect and the COO
operating managers to assess have taken an active role in
the usefulness of developing of the revised
financial-statement-level strategic plan and related
information, take an active agencywide performance measures
role in AOC near-term efforts and in supporting the cost
to develop agencywide accounting/MOR initiative.
performance measures, and
review all available options o As part of its efforts to
to determine whether implement its cost
substantial work can begin, accounting/MOR initiative,
prior to fiscal year 2006, on AOC determined that
the analyses needed to financial-statement level
identify changes necessary to information was of limited
implement useful cost use to jurisdictional
accounting at AOC. managers. As a result, AOC
management focused its
August 2004 attention on how it could
provide useful cost,
financial, and performance
information to its
operational managers. In so
doing, AOC reported that it
developed potential formats
for MOR information that
demonstrates to operating
unit managers the types of
cost, financial, and
performance information that
can be generated when the
cost accounting system is
fully implemented. AOC also
reported that it now
generates biweekly cost
accounting/MOR reports for
each jurisdiction and
division.
o AOC reported that it
recently completed the
development of a
results-based strategic plan
that includes comprehensive
agencywide outcome
(performance) measures. This
effort started with the
Architect and the COO
revising AOC's Strategic
Goals, which were then used
to develop the revised
strategic plan. The
Architect and the COO
monitored the plan's
development and actively
participated in the plan's
review and finalization.
o AOC reported that during
fiscal year 2006, it
completed a pilot test of
its cost accounting system
and began implementing the
system, including gathering
cost data. In addition, AOC
has begun recording
salary-related cost
information in its cost
accounting system by working
with all employees to charge
their payroll time to
specific activity and
project codes in the time
and attendance system.
The collective actions taken on
this recommendation are
sufficient to close out this
recommendation.
4. To enhance the successful Making Progress
development of useful progress
financial, cost, and o As previously noted, AOC
performance reporting for reported that it has
major operating units and developed AOC-wide
appropriate cost accounting, performance measures and has
we recommend that the taken actions to develop a
Architect of the Capitol cost accounting system and
direct the COO and the Chief related cost, financial, and
Financial Officer to have performance reporting. AOC
senior management visibly senior management has been
demonstrate its continuing taking an active role in
commitment to and support for supporting these
making AOC-wide system, initiatives. Effectively
procedural, and cultural implementing these
changes necessary to provide initiatives, as well as
managers with timely other important financial
financial, cost, and management improvement
performance information by initiatives has required and
monitoring the efforts' will continue to require
implementation and related AOC-wide system, procedural,
milestones, ensuring the and cultural changes.
commitment to and support for
the efforts by participating Remaining action
AOC units, and acting to
resolve any impediments that Implementing effective cost
may arise. accounting and reporting
systems--ones that provide
August 2004 operating managers with useful
cost, financial, and
performance information--will
require continuing leadership
attention from AOC senior
management to help ensure that
needed system, procedural, and
cultural changes occur.
o To do so successfully, the
COO, the Chief Financial
Officer, and other AOC
senior managers need to
continue demonstrating their
commitment and support for
making the needed changes by
working to ensure that these
initiatives have sufficient
staff and resources, by
regularly monitoring
progress against established
milestones, and by working
with senior managers
AOC-wide to identify and
resolve impediments to
successful implementation.
For example, AOC's senior
management may wish to apply
its leadership and attention
by establishing a senior
management level steering
committee, similar to the
one planned to monitor and
oversee internal control
issues, to help ensure that
the cost accounting and
management reporting
initiatives are effectively
implemented. Such a
committee could regularly
review the initiative's
progress and work with AOC
senior managers to resolve
impediments as they arise.
Source: GAO analysis of AOC data.
Information Technology Management
AOC continues to make progress toward adopting an agencywide approach to
information management and has implemented 2 IT recommendations over the
year. Specifically, AOC has developed, approved, and implemented a
process, including those practices in our IT investment management guide,
for controlling existing projects. AOC also has established the management
structure for developing, implementing, and maintaining an enterprise
architecture (EA) and has made significant progress toward planning for
and implementing the practices in our architecture management guide. These
practices include ensuring that adequate resources (i.e., funding, people,
tools, and technology) are devoted to the program and developing a written
policy for architecture development and maintenance.
In addition, AOC has made progress toward addressing our remaining
recommendations. For example, it has developed a policy that describes the
procedures, practices, and guidelines that govern the management of its IT
systems and the required processes that are to be followed when acquiring
and developing these systems. Furthermore, AOC has taken steps toward
establishing and implementing an effective information security program by
designating a chief information security officer with the authority to
implement an agencywide security program and by certifying and accrediting
its general support systems and major applications. However, more work
remains to fully implement our recommendations. For example, AOC has yet
to prioritize all IT investments, develop an IT investment portfolio, and
oversee each investment using a portfolio approach to ensure that AOC
achieves its cost, benefit, schedule, and risk expectations. Until AOC
completes these activities, it cannot ensure that the investments address
not only the agency's mission and strategic goals and objectives, but also
the impact of the investments on each other. Moreover, AOC has yet to
fully implement key architecture practices, such as defining "as is" and
"to be" architecture descriptions in terms of performance. Without
instituting these practices, AOC risks limiting the quality and utility of
its architecture and may not realize the benefits of a well-managed
architecture program. In addition, the agency has not consistently
demonstrated quality assurance, configuration management, and contract
tracking and oversight processes. Until AOC consistently demonstrates
these key acquisition processes, the agency runs the risk of projects not
performing as intended, being delivered late, and not meeting estimated
cost and schedule goals. AOC also has yet to develop system contingency
plans for all of its systems and implement a security process to monitor
and evaluate policy and control effectiveness. Without instituting these
practices, AOC's data and systems are at risk of inadvertent or deliberate
misuse, fraud, improper disclosure, or destruction, possibly without
detection. See table 4 for more information on the implementation status
of our recommendations on IT management.
Table 4: Current Status of Recommendations on Information Technology
Management
Status
GAO recommendation and (month/year
date of the of GAO
recommendation report) Progress and remaining action
1. Establish a chief Implemented AOC has fulfilled this
information officer or (January recommendation by issuing a
comparable senior 2004) centralized IT management policy
executive, with the that assigned a senior
responsibility, executive--namely, the Office of
authority, and adequate Information and Resource Management
resources for managing IT (OIRM) director--the role,
across the agency, who is responsibility, and authority for
a full participant in managing IT across the agency,
AOC's senior including the development,
decision-making processes management, and oversight of IT. In
and has clearly defined addition, the policy made the OIRM
roles, responsibilities, director a key participant in
and accountabilities. executive decision making, such as
serving as the principal adviser to
January 2003 the Architect of the Capitol in
applying IT to improve business
processes. The OIRM director's role
also includes controlling AOC's IT
budget and chairing the IT project
management board.
2. Develop and implement Implemented AOC has fulfilled this
IT investment management (February recommendation by developing and
processes with the full 2007) implementing an IT investment
support and participation management process with support and
of AOC's senior participation of AOC's senior
leadership. Specifically, leadership and in accordance with
the Architect of the our guidance through the development
Capitol must develop a and approval of an IT investment
plan for developing and management policy. Consistent with
implementing the best practices, AOC has divided its
investment management investment management process into
processes, as three phases: select, control, and
appropriate, that are evaluate. To effectively control
outlined in our IT existing and future projects through
investment management these phases, AOC established and
guide. At a minimum, the assigned specific roles and
plan should specify responsibilities to three boards:
measurable tasks, goals, Business Systems Modernization
time frames, and Office (BSMO), Investment Review
resources required to Board (IRB), and Project Review
develop and implement the Board (PRB). BSMO provides guidance
processes. The Architect during the select phase on items,
of the Capitol should such as the procurement schedule and
focus first on the stakeholder involvement, while the
management processes IRB and the PRB participate during
associated with the select, control, and evaluate
controlling existing phases. In particular, the PRB
projects and establishing reviews specific areas of the
the management structures project, including status, schedule
to effectively implement and system development life-cycle
an IT management process. documentation, and the IRB, among
other things, provides approval and
January 2003 advice on items, including
additional funding and critical
issues that may arise on the
project. Membership on these boards
includes senior-level officials from
various departments and offices
throughout the agency.
AOC has demonstrated this investment
management process as evidenced by
our review of two of AOC's
large-size IT systems--Facilities
Management Information System (FMIS)
2005 and Inventory Control System
(ICS). Both systems were approved by
the appropriate management
structures in accordance with AOC's
IT investment management process.
Status
GAO recommendation and (month/year
date of the of GAO
recommendation report) Progress and remaining action
3. Plan for and implement Making Progress
those practices in our IT progress
investment management o AOC has begun to plan for and
guide associated with implement those practices in our
corporate, IT investment management guide
portfolio-based associated with corporate,
investment decision portfolio-based investment
making, such as (1) decision making.
implementing criteria to o AOC has developed criteria to
select investments that select investments that best
will best support the support the organization's
organization's strategic strategic goals, objectives, and
goals, objectives, and mission.
mission; (2) using these o According to AOC officials, the
criteria to consistently agency has begun the process of
analyze and prioritize outlining an IT portfolio
all IT investments; (3) management program that will
ensuring that the optimal arrange IT investments into a
investment portfolio with single portfolio and provide
manageable risks and visibility, control, and
returns is selected and decisions on the basis of project
funded; and (4) objectives, such as costs,
overseeing each resources, and risks.
investment within the
portfolio to ensure that Remaining action
it achieves its cost,
benefit, schedule, and o AOC has yet to prioritize all
risk expectations. IT investments, develop an IT
investment portfolio, and oversee
January 2004 each investment from a portfolio
approach to ensure that it
achieves its cost, benefit,
schedule, and risk expectations.
Until AOC completes these activities
it cannot ensure that the
investments address not only the
agency's strategic goals,
objectives, and mission, but also
address the impacts that the
projects have on each other.
4. Develop, implement, Implemented AOC has fulfilled this
and maintain an EA to (February recommendation by developing and
guide and constrain IT 2007) approving an agencywide IT policy
projects throughout AOC. that provides for developing,
The Architect of the implementing, and maintaining an EA.
Capitol should implement The agency also has established an
the practices, as EA Executive Steering Committee,
appropriate, as outlined composed of senior-level officials
in the Chief Information from across the agency, to direct,
Officer Council's oversee, and approve the AOC EA. The
architecture management latest version of the EA--EA FY06
guide. As a first step, version 1.0--was approved by the
the Architect should executive committee in December
establish the management 2005. In addition, AOC has assigned
structure for developing, responsibility for guiding EA
implementing, and development to the Chief Enterprise
maintaining an EA by Architect. According to program
implementing the officials, the Chief Enterprise
following actions: Architect position was filled in
February 2007. The chief architect's
o developing an responsibilities include reviewing
agencywide policy investments and investment-related
statement providing a projects to ensure that they are in
clear mandate for compliance with the EA; developing
developing, and maintaining the EA documents to
implementing, and ensure that they continue to reflect
maintaining the the AOC strategic plan, business
architecture; needs, and technological
o establishing an advancement; and providing expertise
executive body to the business systems
composed of modernization office and AOC
stakeholders from AOC management on EA concepts and
mission-critical implementation.
program offices to
guide the strategy for
developing the EA and
ensure agency support
and resources for it;
and
o designating an
individual who serves
as a chief enterprise
architect to develop
policy, lead the
development of the EA,
and manage it as a
formal program.
January 2003
Status
GAO recommendation and (month/year
date of the of GAO
recommendation report) Progress and remaining action
5. Plan for and implement Making Progress
the practices in our progress
architecture management In April 2003, we published version
guide associated with 1.1 of our EA management maturity
leveraging an EA for framework, which is a five-stage
organizational architecture framework for managing
transformation, such as the development, maintenance, and
(1) ensuring that implementation of an architecture
adequate resources are and understanding the extent to
devoted to the program which effective architecture
(funding, people, tools, management practices are being
and technology); (2) performed and where an organization
ensuring that the is in its progression toward having
architecture describes a well-managed architecture program.
both the "as is" and the In short, the framework consists of
"to be" environments in 31 core elements that relate to
terms of performance; (3) architecture governance, content,
ensuring that use, and measurement. These elements
architecture business, reflect research by us and others
performance, information showing that architecture programs
and data, applications should be founded upon institutional
and services, and architecture commitment and
technology descriptions capabilities, and measured and
address security; and (4) verified products and results.
ensuring that metrics are
used to measure EA o AOC has made significant
progress, quality, progress toward planning for and
compliance, and return on implementing the core elements in
investment. our architecture framework.
o Specifically, AOC has fully
January 2004 satisfied 25 (81%), partially
satisfied 4 (13%), and has not
satisfied 2 (6%) of the 31 core
elements identified in our EA
management maturity framework.
o Among the core elements that
AOC has fully satisfied are
ensuring that adequate resources
are devoted to the program
(funding, people, tools, and
technology); developing a written
policy for architecture
development and maintenance; and
measuring and reporting progress
against architecture plans.
o AOC has developed metrics for
measuring and reporting EA
progress, quality, and
compliance.
Remaining actions
o AOC has yet to fully implement
some key elements. Specifically,
AOC has yet to complete an "as
is" and "to be" architecture
description in terms of
performance that also addresses
security.
o AOC has not yet implemented the
measuring and reporting of EA
return on investments and
reported on the percentage of
systems in compliance with the
EA.
Without these core elements, AOC may
face the risk of limiting the
quality and utility of the
architecture and may not realize the
significant benefits of a
well-managed architecture program.
Status
GAO recommendation and (month/year
date of the of GAO
recommendation report) Progress and remaining action
6. Require disciplined Making Progress
and rigorous processes progress
for managing the o AOC has developed a systems
development and development life-cycle (SDLC)
acquisition of IT systems policy that describes the
and implement the procedures, practices, and
processes throughout AOC. guidelines that govern the
Specifically, these management of IT systems and
processes should include processes that are to be followed
the following: when acquiring and developing
these systems. Specifically,
o quality assurance these processes include the
processes, including following:
developing a quality
assurance plan and o A quality assurance
identifying applicable process that requires the
process and product development of a quality
standards that will be assurance plan and
used in developing and several quality
assessing project checkpoint reviews during
processes and products; a project's life cycle.
o A configuration
o configuration management process that
management processes, requires a configuration
including establishing a management plan that
repository or identifies configurations
configuration management at given points in time,
system to maintain and controls changes to the
control configuration configuration, and
management items; maintains the records of
all changes.
o risk management o A risk management
processes, including process that requires the
developing a project risk development of a risk
management plan, management plan; the
identifying and identification of risks,
prioritizing potential risk assessments, risk
problems, implementing impact and status,
risk mitigation probability of
strategies, as required, occurrence, and
and tracking and mitigation strategies;
reporting progress and the tracking and
against the plans; and reporting of progress
against the plan. For
o contract tracking and FMIS 2005 and ICS
oversight processes, systems, AOC demonstrated
including developing a its risk process by
plan for tracking developing risk reports
contractor activities, that included the
measuring contractor identification,
performance and description, owner,
conducting periodic impact, status,
reviews, and conducting probability, and
internal reviews of mitigation of the risks.
tracking and oversight
activities. o AOC also has developed and
approved a policy for contract
January 2003 administration, which assigns
authority for administering
contracts to the contracting
officer. Further, the agency
requires a communications plan,
which directs senior management
and stakeholders to monitor
program management activities,
use a project plan to manage and
control contract activities and
requirements, and develop change
control procedures to manage
contract changes.
Remaining actions
AOC has not consistently
demonstrated quality assurance,
configuration management, and
contract tracking and oversight
processes.
o Although AOC developed quality
assurance plans, not all quality
checkpoint reviews were completed
to ensure that the projects met
the contractual agreements and
quality standards or complied
with SDLC processes. According to
officials, quality checkpoint
reviews were determined a best
practice and developed in June
2006 and, therefore, had occurred
after the implementation of the
FMIS 2005 system.
o For configuration management,
although AOC had developed a
configuration management plan for
the ICS system, it did not
develop a plan for the FMIS 2005
system and did not control and
maintain project changes for both
systems.
Status
GAO recommendation and (month/year
date of the of GAO
recommendation report) Progress and remaining action
o Although AOC has a policy for
contract administration, it has
not developed and implemented
contract tracking and oversight
processes that include measuring
contractor performance by
developing and using metrics of
software and system quality.
Development and use of such
metrics is a recognized best
practice. For example, a
communications plan was not
developed for FMIS 2005 and
metrics were not developed and
used to measure product quality
for both FMIS and ICS.
Until AOC consistently demonstrates
these key acquisition processes, the
agency runs the risk of projects not
performing as intended, being
delivered late, and not meeting
estimated cost and schedule goals.
7. Establish and Making Progress
implement an information progress
security program. o AOC has designated the chief
Specifically, the information security officer with
Architect of the Capitol the authority to implement an
should establish an agencywide security program and
information security has reported that adequate
program by taking the resources (funding and staff)
following steps: have been assigned to implement
the program.
(1) designate a security o AOC designated a chief
officer and provide him information security officer in
or her with the authority January 2007.
and resources to o AOC also has developed a policy
implement an agencywide to perform risk assessments on 50
security program, major applications by March 2008.
o In March 2006, AOC completed
(2) develop and implement its certification and
policy and guidance to accreditation of its general
perform risk assessments support systems and major
continually, applications and, according to
officials, findings from the risk
(3) use the results of assessment have been placed into
the risk assessments to a plan of action and milestones,
develop and implement the as a control measure, to track
appropriate controls, the corrective actions taken by
the agency.
(4) develop policies for o According to AOC, it is on
security training and target in certifying and
awareness and provide the accrediting mission-critical
training, and applications by March 2007 and
mission-support and essential
(5) monitor and evaluate applications by March 2008.
policy and control o AOC also has developed and
effectiveness. issued policies for security and
awareness training, which,
January 2003 according to the agency
officials, has been completed by
all employees.
o Additionally, AOC has developed
a process to monitor and evaluate
the effectiveness of policies and
controls.
Status
GAO recommendation and (month/year
date of the of GAO
recommendation report) Progress and remaining action
Remaining actions
o AOC has yet to implement the
process of monitoring and
evaluating policy and control
effectiveness or to provide us
with evidence that training is
based on user roles and
responsibilities, and that
identified risks are being
documented in system security
plans. These practices are
important because if they are not
in place, AOC's data and systems
are at risk of inadvertent or
deliberate misuse, fraud,
improper disclosure, or
destruction, possibly without
detection.
o Additionally, system
contingency plans have yet to be
developed for all systems.
Source: GAO analysis of AOC data.
Project Management
AOC has made progress on several initiatives that should improve project
management and accountability and has implemented 7 project management
recommendations over the year. For example, AOC has established
performance measures, including measures to track the quality and costs of
projects. AOC also has clarified the roles and responsibilities for staff
in the Project Management Division and updated guidance for managing
projects. In addition, AOC is continuing efforts on longer-term
initiatives to improve project management and accountability. For example,
AOC plans to modify its project information system to assist managers in
more proactively managing projects, provide needed cost and schedule data
on projects, and track reasons for changes across all projects. AOC has
developed the requirements for this system, which includes the automation
of AOC's quarterly construction projects progress report, and plans to
begin modifications with available in-house resources in fiscal year 2007.
Additionally, AOC has conducted a review of Construction Division
operations and management in 2006 and is currently implementing the
recommendations from that review, including recommendations to improve
project cost estimating and tracking. However, the new cost accounting
system--a system that will be phased in over several years--must be
completed before AOC can implement all of the recommendations intended to
improve accountability for the Construction Division. Furthermore, AOC is
reviewing its methods for estimating Construction Division project costs,
including contingency costs and allocations for construction management
and administration, to improve the accuracy of project cost estimates. AOC
also is finalizing the Capitol complex master plan and anticipates that a
draft of the plan will be ready for congressional review in the spring of
2007. See table 5 for more information on the implementation status of our
recommendations on project management.
Table 5: Current Status of Recommendations on Project Management
Status
(month/year
GAO recommendation and date of GAO
of the recommendation report) Progress and remaining action
1. Develop a Capitol complex Making Progress
master plan and complete progress
condition assessments of all o The Capitol complex master
buildings and facilities plan has three
under the jurisdiction of components--the vision
AOC. statement, framework
(concept) plan, and
January 2003 jurisdiction plans.
o AOC is working with the
leadership of each
jurisdiction (e.g., the
Librarian of Congress and the
Marshal of the Supreme Court)
and the consultant working on
the plan to finalize these
documents for consultation
with congressional
stakeholders.
o As we reported last year,
AOC has completed facility
condition assessments for all
facilities within the
complex, except the Library
of Congress and the Supreme
Court.
Remaining actions
o AOC needs to finalize the
Capitol complex master plan.
We reported last year that
the master plan was scheduled
to be completed at the end of
2006. AOC told us that the
plan was delayed to obtain
additional input from within
the agency and the new
congressional leadership. AOC
estimates that a draft of the
plan will be ready for
congressional review in the
spring of 2007.
o AOC needs to complete the
facility condition assessment
for the Library of Congress
and has requested funding for
that assessment in its fiscal
year 2007 and 2008 budget.
o AOC needs to complete the
facility condition assessment
for the Supreme Court and
plans to do so when
renovations of the Supreme
Court are completed. The
renovations are estimated to
be completed in 2009.
2. To improve Capitol complex Making Progress
master planning efforts, we progress
recommend that the Architect o AOC has involved
of the Capitol, with support congressional stakeholders
from the COO, lead efforts to and AOC stakeholders in the
ensure that congressional and development of the Capitol
other stakeholders are complex master plan.
engaged early and throughout o AOC's planning team has met
the development of the with Senate Rules committee
Capitol complex master plan. staff and House leadership
staff to discuss a strategy
August 2004 for communication and
outreach related to the
master plan.
Remaining action
o AOC needs to formulate and
carry out a communication and
outreach strategy for vetting
the master plan. AOC expects
to formulate this strategy in
early 2007 and vet the master
plan between April and June
2007.
3. Develop a process for Implemented AOC implemented a program
assigning project priorities (February development process in 2003 that
that is based on clearly 2006) rated projects in the following
defined, well-documented, five categories: (1) historic
consistently applied, and preservation and stewardship;
transparent criteria. (2) fire, life, safety, and code
compliance; (3) impact on
January 2003 mission; (4) economics; and (5)
security, with a score from 1 to
100. In the spring of 2004, AOC
improved the program development
process by establishing
extensive procedures designed to
ensure that project scopes fully
met both customer needs and all
criteria and standards. The
project evaluation criteria are
currently being expanded to
include urgency (such as
immediate, high, medium, or low)
and classification of a project
(such as deferred maintenance or
capital improvement). This
expansion of the evaluation
criteria results from
information being received from
facility condition assessments.
In September 2005, the AOC's
project prioritization panel
will evaluate these recommended
changes.
4. To improve the process for Implemented AOC fulfilled this
prioritizing projects, we (February recommendation by taking steps
recommend that the Architect 2007) to inform congressional
of the Capitol, with support stakeholders on how and why
from the COO, lead efforts to specific projects are submitted
ensure that AOC informs and for funding. For example, AOC
obtains agreement from has held and continues to hold
congressional and other regular briefings with
stakeholders on how and why congressional staff on AOC's
specific projects are funding requests and project
submitted for funding. prioritization process. In
August and September 2006, AOC
August 2004 briefed congressional
stakeholders on the status and
results of facility condition
assessments, its project
prioritization process, and the
future direction of AOC's
facility programs. Congressional
stakeholders noted that AOC has
made improvements in developing
a transparent process for
understanding how and why
projects are submitted for
funding.
5. Develop tools to Implemented AOC has established tools to
effectively communicate (February effectively communicate
priorities and progress of 2007) priorities and progress of
projects, as a part of a projects. For example, AOC has
broader communication developed and continues to
strategy. communicate its project
prioritization processes through
January 2003 regular briefings to
congressional stakeholders.
According to feedback from
congressional and other
stakeholders, AOC made changes
to the project prioritization
process and plans to implement
those changes in its fiscal year
2008 budget proposal. AOC
continues to produce a quarterly
status report on the budget and
schedule status of projects that
are released to congressional
appropriators.
6. Define Implemented AOC has defined
project-management-related (February project-management-related
performance measures to 2007) performance measures through its
achieve mission-critical quarterly status report,
strategic and annual dashboard, and performance plan.
performance goals. These measures include the
status of project schedule,
January 2003 budget, cost, and safety. AOC
also developed and implemented
surveys on the quality of design
and construction services. AOC
could consider tracking the
safety of its construction
contractors, as is currently
being done with the Capitol
Visitor Center project.
7. To strengthen the Implemented AOC fulfilled this
relationship between AOC and (February recommendation by taking steps
its congressional and other 2007) to develop and implement a
stakeholders, we recommend transparent process for how AOC
that the Architect of the targets its efforts and
Capitol direct the COO to resources to highest project
work with Congress on the priorities. AOC continues to
design and implementation of meet with congressional
a transparent process to stakeholders to discuss how it
facilitate an understanding targets its resources and
between AOC and its prioritizes projects. On the
congressional stakeholders basis of its experience in
about how AOC targets its evaluating projects for the
efforts and resources to the fiscal year 2007 budget and
highest project priorities input from congressional and
and how strategic and other stakeholders, AOC revised
tactical decisions and its project prioritization
trade-offs are made. process to more clearly
articulate the criteria for
August 2004 assigning project ratings. In
October 2006, AOC prepared an
interim project prioritization
guide to facilitate the
prioritization of projects for
the fiscal year 2008 budget
submission. AOC issued a revised
guide in February 2007.
Congressional stakeholders noted
that AOC has made improvements
in developing a transparent
process for understanding how
and why projects are submitted
for funding.
8. Align project management Implemented In October 2005, AOC implemented
staff and resources with (February a project management
AOC's mission-critical goals. 2006) organization. The organization
includes 32 personnel with
January 2003 responsibilities for project
management, construction
management, and inspection. The
organization is focused on
"cradle-to-grave" project
delivery. Duties considered to
be "collateral," such as design
reviews, are being reassigned to
other AOC officials outside of
the new organization.
9. Develop a method to Making Progress
establish and track more progress
accurate budget targets. This o AOC has established
method could include tracking additional measures that
and reporting on the should help the agency
following to help AOC refine develop and track more
targets: accurate budget targets for
projects.
o accuracy of cost o In addition to measures for
estimates compared with (1) the ratio of the
bids; government estimate to the
o accuracy of budget average of the bid amount and
compared with final (2) the contract award cost
project costs; versus the government
o amount of excess project estimate, AOC has implemented
funds and how funds are the use of a project closeout
used; and sheet that project managers
o cost data for the are required to complete at
Construction Branch (which the conclusion of each
is within the Construction project. The sheet includes
Division), including information on the accuracy
current working estimates. of the budget compared with
final project costs and the
September 2005 disposition of excess project
funds.
Remaining actions
o AOC must develop the
capability to better track
cost data for the
Construction Division,
including current working
estimates for projects
conducted by the division. A
peer review group within AOC
issued recommendations in
April 2006 designed to
improve the agency's ability
to track cost data for the
division, including
standardizing the cost
estimating process.
o AOC is also reviewing its
methods for estimating
Construction Division project
costs, including contingency
costs and allocations for
construction management and
administration, to improve
the accuracy of project cost
estimates.
10. Expedite the development Implemented AOC completed the development of
of a customer satisfaction (February its customer satisfaction survey
survey for construction 2007) for construction services in
services. March 2006.
September 2005
11. Clarify roles and Implemented AOC defined roles and
responsibilities of staff, (February responsibilities and completed
including the role of 2007) position descriptions for the
jurisdictional executives and jurisdictional executives,
responsibility for developing project managers, and
Programs of Requirements. construction managers. AOC has
discussed and plans to continue
September 2005 discussing these roles and
responsibilities at its staff
meetings and individually with
the jurisdictional executives,
project managers, and
construction managers.
12. Revise project management Implemented AOC has identified revisions for
manuals to reflect changes in (February and continuously revises its
how AOC plans for, designs, 2007) project management manuals.
and constructs projects; These manuals are made available
develop management controls through AOC's internal network.
to ensure compliance with AOC tracks compliance with the
manuals. manuals through its project
performance measures.
September 2005
13. Develop or modify Making Progress
information systems to progress
provide needed cost and o AOC currently tracks cost
schedule data on projects and and schedule data and reasons
track reasons for changes for changes across all
across all projects. projects in its quarterly
status report--a report that
September 2005 is manually prepared and not
supported by AOC's current
information systems.
o AOC's steering group, the
Project Information Center
Business Reengineering Task
Force, identified AOC's
project information system
requirements, which includes
the automation of AOC's
quarterly construction
projects progress report.
o AOC officials noted that
reengineering of the project
information system is one of
AOC's top project management
priorities for AOC.
o AOC requested funding for
an assessment of the current
system in its fiscal year
2007 budget.
o In the interim, AOC plans
to begin modifying the
current project information
system with available
in-house resources in fiscal
year 2007 and requested
funding for further
modifications in its fiscal
year 2008 budget.
Remaining action
o AOC needs to complete the
modification of its project
information system to assist
managers in more proactively
managing projects, provide
needed cost and schedule data
on projects, and track
reasons for changes across
all projects.
Source: GAO analysis of AOC data.
Facilities Management
AOC has taken steps to improve how it measures performance and tracks
demand work orders. For example, in May 2006, AOC began implementing a new
facilities management information system that will enhance its tracking
and reporting capabilities. Currently, all jurisdictions are using the new
system to track demand work orders. As implementation continues, AOC plans
to continue analyzing its workload data to develop metrics for the new
system. Additionally, AOC officials plan to benchmark AOC's performance
measures with peer organizations. These officials said that they used the
International Facilities Management Association's key performance
indicators to develop performance measures for AOC's revised strategic
plan. While these are important steps, AOC must complete the development
of its metrics and input its preventive maintenance work orders before it
can more accurately track performance. Furthermore, the new facilities
management information system must be used in conjunction with the new
cost accounting system--a system that will be phased in over several
years--before AOC will be able to fully use data provided by the new
facilities management information system. See table 6 for more information
on the implementation status of our recommendations on facilities
management.
Table 6: Current Status of Recommendations on Facilities Management
Status
GAO recommendation and date (month/year of Progress and remaining
of the recommendation GAO report) action
1. To improve how AOC Making progress Progress
measures its performance in
the areas of timeliness and o To develop more
cost, the agency should do specific timeliness
the following: develop more measures, AOC made
specific timeliness measures timeliness a requirement
that more accurately reflect in the system
the amount of time required specifications for the
to complete tasks; develop new facilities management
the capability to information system--a
comprehensively and routinely system that is currently
track cost performance being implemented.
measures; and benchmark Although this new system
performance measures against currently has the
those of similar capability to collect
institutions, such as the data as granular as
Smithsonian Institution and needed, AOC has not been
state capitols. collecting data at a
level less than 30 days.
December 2005 AOC plans to assess
whether there is a need
for data in other
timeliness categories.
o As part of the
implementation process
for the new system, AOC
officials told us they
are collecting and
analyzing data on their
workload to develop more
accurate metrics.
o To benchmark
performance measures, AOC
has plans to reach out to
peer organizations,
including the Smithsonian
Institution and Texas
state capital. AOC
officials told us that
that they used the
International Facilities
Management Association's
operations and
maintenance benchmarks to
develop performance
measures for AOC's
revised strategic plan.
Remaining actions
o AOC needs to continue
analyzing its workload
data to develop more
accurate timeliness and
cost metrics.
o Although AOC continues
to develop more accurate
cost metrics, the new
facilities management
information system must
be used in conjunction
with the new cost
accounting system--a
system that will be
phased in over several
years--before AOC will be
able to fully use data
provided by the
facilities management
information system.
o AOC needs to continue
with its benchmarking
efforts with peer
organizations.
2. Use the new facilities Making progress Progress
management information system
to track preventive o Currently, all AOC
maintenance and demand work jurisdictions are using
orders across all the new facilities
jurisdictions, including the management information
time taken to complete work system to track demand
orders. work orders.
December 2005 Remaining action
o AOC needs to input its
preventive maintenance
work orders into the new
facilities management
information system to
improve the tracking of
these work orders across
all jurisdictions.
According to AOC, these
work orders will be
implemented case by case,
on the basis of funding
and data availability.
Source: GAO analysis of AOC data.
Worker Safety
AOC has taken steps to improve worker safety and has implemented 1 worker
safety recommendation over the past year. Specifically, AOC has
implemented 7 of 34 specialized safety policies,2 completed a job hazard
analysis process to identify hazards, and implemented a system to track
investigations of incidents and follow-up. AOC also has selected a data
management system that will track and record employee training, licensing,
and certification and clarified the role of the Office of the Attending
Physician (OAP), including having OAP provide reports to AOC jurisdictions
when employees are due or past due for their medical surveillance
examinations. Overall, AOC's injury and illness rate declined from 17.9 in
fiscal year 2000 to 4.9 in fiscal year 2006. However, several critical
actions remain to further improve worker safety. For example, AOC will not
be able to fully achieve its goal of long-term cultural change until it
fully implements the specialized safety policies, which current draft
plans indicate will not occur until the end of fiscal year 2009. AOC also
needs to align its training system with its system to track and identify
corrective actions for hazards and incidents in order to target training
needs to address high-risk areas. Finally, although AOC added worker
safety as a standard topic in its biennial employee focus group script,
AOC needs a more rigorous (and anonymous) approach to measuring employee's
perceptions of AOC's safety climate, which may identify successful
strategies to expand and areas that need focused attention to improve. See
table 7 for more information on the implementation status of our
recommendations on worker safety.
While AOC is making progress in improving worker safety, in March 2006,
the utility tunnel workers sent a letter to Congress complaining of unsafe
working conditions in the tunnels, including falling concrete, asbestos,
and extreme heat. In February 2006, the Office of Compliance (OOC) filed a
complaint against AOC concerning hazards in the tunnels, including falling
concrete, an inadequate communication system for these confined spaces,
and inadequate escape exits. AOC has taken steps to address these
issues--including establishing safety and access procedures for the
tunnels and upgrading 15 tunnel entry and exit points--and continues to
work with the tunnel workers and the OOC to address these issues.
2AOC reduced the number of specialized safety policies from 43 to 34.
Table 7: Current Status of Recommendations on Worker Safety
GAO recommendation and Status
date of the (month/year of
recommendation GAO report) Progress and remaining actions
1. Identify performance Making Progress
measures for safety progress
goals and objectives, o As of December 2006, AOC's
including measures for plan is to consolidate
how AOC will implement individual safety policies into
the 43 specialized a safety manual (with a
safety programs and how tentative completion date of
superintendents and December 31, 2007). The
employees will be held individual safety policies,
accountable for which now number 34, remain at
achieving results. various stages of
implementation. Seven policies
January 2003 have been implemented; AOC has
identified draft implementation
dates for the remaining
policies, ranging from September
2007 to September 2009. In
addition to these 34, AOC has
implemented 2 additional safety
policies covering safety
meetings among senior management
officials (Safety, Health, and
Environment Council (SHEC)) and
jurisdiction-level officials
(Jurisdiction Occupational
Safety and Health Committees).
o AOC has developed workbooks to
help AOC staff implement the
safety policies. AOC employee
evaluations contain a broad
safety evaluation criterion,
which can be customized to
individual employees.
Remaining action
o AOC has yet to fully implement
the safety policies. AOC plans
to complete its safety manual by
the end of calendar year 2007.
It has developed draft plans to
finish implementing the policies
by the end of fiscal year 2009.
2. Establish clearly Implemented AOC has completed a job hazard
defined and documented (February analysis (JHA) process including
policies and procedures 2007) describing the steps associated
for reporting hazards with each job task, identifying
similar to those that potential hazards associated with
apply to injury and each task, developing the
illness reporting. appropriate controls to eliminate
or reduce the hazards, developing a
January 2003 training program to perform JHAs,
and assisting first-line
supervisors with performing
qualitative JHAs. In addition, AOC
has completed a "step-by-step plan"
that provides a general approach
for jurisdictions to manage their
implementation of the JHA process.
Finally, AOC has included a
telephone number for reporting
hazards in its monthly safety
newsletters, which are distributed
AOC-wide. The Architect has
approved the Hazard Assessment and
Control Policy.
3. Establish a Implemented AOC has fulfilled this
consistent AOC-wide (February recommendation with the approval of
system for conducting 2006) its interim incident notification,
investigations and investigation, and reporting
follow-up. policy. AOC also implemented the
incident analysis module, a
January 2003 component of the facility
management assistant program. This
module provides an electronic
recordkeeping approach to track the
investigation of incidents
associated with AOC personnel and
property. In addition, the module
interfaces with the facility
management assistant program by
creating a deficiency report when
corrective actions associated with
an incident are identified.
Moreover, an AOC-wide incident
investigation form has been
implemented across the
jurisdictions. Finally, lessons
learned are shared in a number of
ways, including through AOC's
safety support group.
4. Establish a Implemented AOC has fulfilled this
safety-training (February recommendation in establishing
curriculum that fully 2006) training that supports the goals of
supports all of the the current safety policies. For
goals of the safety example, during the implementation
program and further review process, AOC revalidated
evaluate the training requirements against
effectiveness of the regulatory requirements. Moreover,
training provided. Safety Policy Managers have worked
with the Human Resources Management
January 2003 Division to ensure that training
required by upcoming policies has
been identified. In addition, AOC
has completed a training workbook
exercise to assess the overall
impact of required safety policy
training on its budget. Also,
central staff safety professionals
continue to audit training courses
and provide feedback to course
instructors. Finally, AOC has been
using injury and illness data to
identify training needs.
5. Assign clear Making Progress
responsibility for progress
tracking and recording o AOC has chosen a data
training received by management system--AVUE--that
AOC employees, will, among other things, track
including maintaining and record employee training,
an inventory of licensing, and certification.
employees' Safety personnel have met with
certifications and AVUE designers to ensure that
licenses. the designers fully understand
AOC's safety training needs.
January 2003
Remaining action
o AOC needs to develop AVUE's
capacity to track employee
training. AOC expects to
implement the first phase of
AVUE in July 2007. This phase
would establish an automated
training request and approval
process. The second phase of
AVUE implementation will expand
the system's capacity to track
required training, licenses, and
certification, but AOC has not
set a specific completion date
for the second phase.
6. Clarify and explore Implemented AOC has fulfilled this
the possibility of (February recommendation by working with OAP
expanding the role of 2006) to ensure that the lists of medical
the Office of the surveillance program participants
Attending Physician are current. In addition, OAP is
(OAP) in helping AOC providing reports to AOC
meet its safety goals, jurisdictions when employees are
consistent with the either (1) due or (2) past due for
broad responsibilities their medical surveillance
laid out in the 1998 examinations. AOC is also drafting
Memorandum of a document on the scope of medical
Understanding between surveillance services to better
AOC and OAP. define and communicate the agency's
requirements to OAP to ensure a
January 2003 common understanding and set of
expectations.
7. Establish a senior Implemented AOC has fulfilled this
management work group (August 2004) recommendation by developing
that will routinely performance measures to assess the
discuss workers' long-term impact and trends of
compensation cases and workers' compensation injuries and
costs, and develop costs. In addition, through SHEC,
strategies to reduce safety and human resource officials
these injuries and are exchanging information and data
costs. to control workers' compensation
injuries and costs. Finally,
January 2003 through SHEC, the relationship
between safety and workers'
compensation injuries and illnesses
is being promoted.
8. To enhance worker Making Progress
safety performance progress
measures at AOC, the o AOC has added worker safety as
Architect of the a standard topic in its biennial
Capitol should direct focus group script, indicated it
the COO to expand upon conducts daily shop safety
its safety perception meetings, and included a
survey by developing a telephone number for reporting
more rigorous hazards in its monthly safety
methodological approach newsletters.
and collecting such
information on a more Remaining action
regular basis.
o AOC needs to adopt a more
August 2004 rigorous (and anonymous)
approach to measuring employee's
perceptions of AOC's safety
climate--perceptions, for
example, of management
commitment, discipline policies,
and hazard corrections--that
could help AOC identify
successful strategies for
application to other areas as
well as areas that need focused
attention to improve.
Source: GAO analysis of AOC data.
Capitol Power Plant Management
AOC has made progress in improving CPP management3 and efficiently
staffing the modernized power plant, but more work remains. For example,
AOC took interim steps to modify existing positions--as they have been
vacated--to reflect the additional skill sets required to successfully
operate and maintain the modernized plant. Since October 2005, AOC has
been working with a consultant to develop a new workload analysis and
staffing implementation plan and received the results of the analysis and
recommendations in November 2006. On the basis of these results, AOC is
developing a reorganization plan to reflect the recommendations, which it
expects to submit to Congress for approval in March 2007. In anticipation
of the staffing changes, AOC has been using attrition to reduce and
realign the CPP workforce and is currently keeping seven vacated positions
vacant, four of which will be filled by internal candidates and will not
impact the staffing numbers. See table 8 for more information on the
implementation status of our recommendations on CPP management.
Table 8: Current Status of Recommendations on CPP Management
GAO recommendation and Status
date of the (month/year of
recommendation GAO report) Progress and remaining action
1. By the end of fiscal Making progress Progress
year 2005, AOC should
develop an o AOC evaluates and adjusts
implementation plan for fuel sources on an ongoing
adopting its basis to use the most
consultant's November economically priced fuel.
2004 recommendations o AOC has worked with a
without decreasing contractor to develop a new
system reliability or workload analysis and staffing
violating environmental implementation plan. The
air permits that are in workload analysis, completed in
effect. The November 2006, recommends a
consultant's report reduction in staff, and AOC is
recommended that AOC developing a reorganization
plan.
o use the most o AOC also has been using
economically priced attrition to reduce and realign
fuel to operate the the CPP workforce in
steam boilers and anticipation of recommended
o reduce current CPP changes. For example, seven
staff from 88 vacated positions are currently
positions to 46 being kept vacant, four of
positions. which will be filled by
internal candidates and will
April 2005a not affect CPP's staffing
numbers.
Remaining action
o AOC needs to develop and
implement a staffing plan that
is based on the recommendations
from the recent consultant's
study.
2. AOC should not wait Implemented AOC fulfilled our recommendation
to implement prudent (February 2007) to implement prudent operational
operational and and incremental organizational
incremental changes in anticipation of a more
organizational changes permanent organization when the
in anticipation of a West Refrigeration Plant Expansion
more permanent project is complete. In January
organization when the 2007, the CPP took use and
West Refrigeration possession of the new West
Plant Expansion project Refrigeration Plant Expansion
is complete. If chiller systems to support the
carefully planned, campus cooling loads. The West
anticipated workforce Refrigeration Plant Expansion
reductions can be project is scheduled to finish in
managed in a manner June 2007, but the construction
that minimizes adverse contract will remain open until
impacts. Workforce the Boiler House Distributed
planning can result in Control System project is
CPP employees being completed in January 2008. To
placed in other AOC implement incremental
organizations and can organizational changes, AOC
account for natural indicated that it has taken steps
attrition by to modify existing positions--as
considering the they have been vacated--to reflect
retirement eligibility the additional skill sets required
of current employees. to successfully operate and
maintain the modernized plant.
April 2005a These steps are intermediate to
permanent staffing changes that
are expected to be made once AOC
implements the staffing plan
outlined in its November 2006
consultant's report. Moreover, the
completion of AOC's staffing
study, which includes a phased
implementation plan to achieve
CPP's permanent organizational
structure, supersedes the need to
make interim changes. Accordingly,
we expect AOC to take no further
action to implement this
recommendation.
3. To ensure that CPP Making progress Progress
is staffed efficiently
and that CPP personnel o AOC has worked with a
are trained to operate consultant to develop a new
the modernized power workload analysis and staffing
plant safely, we implementation plan. The
recommend that the consultant issued the results
Architect of the of the study in November 2006.
Capitol On the basis of these results,
AOC is developing a
o develop and reorganization proposal, which
implement a staffing it expects to deliver to
plan for CPP that is Congress for approval in March
based on the results 2007.
of its most recent o The consultant also evaluated
consultant's study the operator training program
and and is preparing its evaluation
o evaluate the report. AOC expects to receive
training provided to the results of the evaluation
CPP operators and by early March 2007.
use the evaluation
results in Remaining action
implementing the
staffing plan. o AOC needs to develop and
implement a staffing plan for
February 2006b CPP and incorporate the results
of the training evaluation.
3As previously reported, we also reported on CPP's 2004 master plan during
this same time period. Due to its security sensitive nature, we did not
include it in this report.
Source: GAO analysis of AOC data.
aGAO, Capitol Power Plant: Actions Needed to Improve Operating Efficiency
(Washington, D.C.: Apr. 8, 2005), issued as unnumbered correspondence.
bGAO, Architect of the Capitol: Addressing Staffing and Training Issues Is
Important for Efficient and Safe West Refrigeration Plant Operations,
[42]GAO-06-321R (Washington, D.C.: Feb. 10, 2006).
Recycling
AOC has implemented the recommendations related to developing a strategic
approach to recycling. In January 2006, AOC finalized its recycling
program mission, goals, and performance measures. The performance measures
are also in AOC's revised strategic plan and the Senate and House business
plans. To monitor performance, AOC reports on the status of its recycling
performance measures in the quarterly Safety, Health, and Environmental
Council meetings. Additionally, AOC formed a Legislative Branch recycling
group that met for the first time in September 2006. This group plans to
meet quarterly to discuss common issues and best management practices. To
clarify responsibilities and hold staff accountable for achieving
recycling goals, AOC has included recycling tasks in its position
descriptions and included recycling responsibilities for recycling
managers and supervisors in its evaluation system. For example, the
performance evaluation system includes recycling objectives in the ratings
of Senate and House recycling managers to hold them accountable for
program results. See table 9 for more information on the implementation
status of our recommendations on recycling.
Table 9: Current Status of Recommendations on Recycling
Status
GAO recommendation and date (month/year of Progress and remaining
of the recommendation GAO report) action
1. Develop a clear mission Implemented AOC drafted a mission
and goals for AOC's recycling (February 2006) statement, goals, and
program with input from key performance measures for its
congressional stakeholders as recycling program and shared
part of its proposed this draft with
environmental master plan. congressional stakeholders.
AOC may want to establish The mission for the
reasonable goals on the basis recycling program is to
of the total waste foster an environment that
stream--information it plans encourages recycling by the
to obtain as part of its legislative branch staff
long-term environmental through convenient and
management plan--that could efficient programs,
potentially be recycled. resulting in the diversion
of wastes from the solid
January 2003 waste stream. AOC
established three main goals
for its recycling program:
(1) increase overall
recycling rates by diverting
office wastes, (2) increase
overall recycling tonnage by
diverting nonoffice wastes,
and (3) improving
communication and
coordination among
interested legislative
branch agencies by
establishing a recycling
working group by the end of
fiscal year 2006.
2. To further assist AOC in Implemented AOC relied on input from
developing a more strategic (February 2006) internal and external
approach for its recycling stakeholders, including
programs and to ensure that congressional stakeholders,
congressional input is to assist in the development
obtained when it would be of the mission, goals, and
most useful, we recommend performance measures as part
that the Architect of the of its recycling program.
Capitol direct the COO to
obtain preliminary input from
congressional stakeholders on
its environmental program
plan--particularly as the
plan relates to the mission
and goals of AOC's recycling
programs--prior to the
completion of the plan.
August 2004
3. Develop a performance Implemented AOC has established a
measurement, monitoring, and (February 2007) performance measurement,
evaluation system that monitoring, and evaluation
supports accomplishing AOC's system that supports its
recycling mission and goals. recycling mission and goals.
AOC finalized its recycling
January 2003 program mission, goals, and
performance measures in
January 2006. These
performance measures are in
AOC's revised strategic plan
and the Senate and House
business plans. To monitor
performance, AOC reports on
the status of its recycling
performance measures in the
Safety, Health, and
Environmental Council
meetings. Additionally, AOC
formed a Legislative Branch
recycling group that met for
the first time in September
2006. This group plans to
meet quarterly to discuss
common issues and share best
management practices.
4. Examine the roles and Implemented AOC included recycling tasks
responsibilities of AOC's (February 2007) in its position descriptions
recycling program staff to and included recycling
ensure that they are responsibilities for
performing the right jobs recycling managers and
with the necessary authority, supervisors in its
and holding the staff evaluation system. For
accountable for achieving example, the performance
program and agency results evaluation system includes
through AOC's performance recycling objectives in the
management system. ratings of Senate and House
recycling managers to hold
January 2003 them accountable for program
results.
Source: GAO analysis of AOC data.
Appendix II: GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments
GAO Contact
Terrell G. Dorn, (202) 512-6923, or [email protected]
Staff Acknowledgments
In addition to the individual named above, key contributors to this report
were Shirley L. Abel, Mark Bird, John C. Craig, Elizabeth Curda, Amr
Desouky, Elizabeth R. Eisenstadt, Elena P. Epps, Brett S. Fallavollita,
Jeanette M. Franzel, Mary Hatcher, Randolph C. Hite, Heather Krause,
Neelaxi Lakhmani, Steven G. Lozano, Valerie Melvin, David Merrill, Susan
Michal-Smith, Sara Ann Moessbauer, Stephanie Sand, Natalie Schneider,
Bernice Steinhardt, John J. Reilly, Jr., Sarah E. Veale, Sara Vermillion,
and Merry Woo.
(545048)
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Highlights of GAO-07-407, a report to congressional requesters
February 2007
ARCHITECT OF THE CAPITOL
Committed, Sustained Leadership Needed to Continue Progress
The Architect of the Capitol (AOC) is responsible for the operation,
maintenance, renovation, and new construction of the Capitol Hill complex,
including the U.S. Capitol, the Library of Congress, and the Senate and
House Office Buildings. In 2003, at the request of Congress, GAO issued a
management review of AOC that contained recommendations designed to help
AOC become more strategic and accountable. Subsequently, Congress directed
GAO to monitor AOC's progress in implementing recommendations. This is the
fourth status report on AOC's progress and summarizes GAO's assessment of
AOC's overall progress and remaining actions in becoming more strategic
and accountable, including AOC's responses to specific recommendations GAO
made in January 2003 and subsequently. To assess AOC's progress, GAO
analyzed AOC documents; interviewed AOC officials; and relied on the
results of related GAO reviews, including reviews of the Capitol Visitor
Center (CVC).
AOC generally agreed with GAO's assessment of its progress, but noted that
2 additional recommendations--1 on financial management practices and 1 on
collecting worker safety data--should be considered implemented. GAO
acknowledges AOC's efforts in these areas, but maintains that further
steps are necessary to fully implement these recommendations.
AOC has made progress in becoming more strategic and accountable, but
critical actions are needed to sustain and build on this progress. To
date, AOC has filled key leadership positions, revised its strategic plan,
improved communication, and continued initiatives to improve internal
controls and accountability. AOC is thus establishing a foundation for
becoming more strategic and accountable. However, completing the
transition to new leadership--including the transition to a new Architect
of the Capitol (a position that is now vacant)--and other actions remain
to bring about lasting improvements in performance. For example, AOC must
integrate nine new managers into the agency while ensuring its continued
progress. In addition, the Chief Operating Officer faces the challenge of
performing the Architect of the Capitol's responsibilities and his own
during the CVC project's completion and AOC's management transition.
Furthermore, although AOC has revised its strategic plan to better focus
on its mission and goals, it has not determined whether it can better
deliver the services that support its mission and goals through
outsourcing or in-house resources. Finally, a continued focus on
communication and other areas that are key to greater internal control and
accountability--including financial, information technology, and project
management--is needed to sustain and further AOC's progress to date. For
example, full implementation of AOC's cost accounting system--a key
financial management initiative--is needed to more accurately track
facilities management cost measures. Improvements in project management
could be achieved, in part, by applying lessons learned in managing the
CVC project.
Appendix I of this report summarizes AOC's progress on recommendations
that GAO has made since January 2003 to help AOC establish a strong
strategic management and accountability framework. This year, AOC has
implemented 21 recommendations. For example, AOC implemented 6 of the
strategic management recommendations, including the development of
congressional protocols and the involvement of stakeholders in developing
the revised strategic plan. For project management, AOC implemented 7
recommendations, including the development of performance measures.
Implementing these 21 recommendations brings the total number of
implemented or closed recommendations to 43 out of 64.
AOC's Progress in Implementing GAO's Recommendations
Issue area Implemented or closed Total recommendations
recommendations
Strategic management 13 14
Human capital 7 9
management
Financial management 1 4
Information technology 3 7
management
Project management 9 13
Facilities management 0 2
Worker safety 5 8
Capitol Power Plant 1 3
management
Recycling 4 4
Total 43 64
Source: GAO analysis of AOC data.
References
Visible links
29. http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-03-231
30. http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-06-290
31. http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-04-966
32. http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-04-299
33. http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-07-227R
34. http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-03-231
35. http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-06-321R
36. http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-02-847T
37. http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-03-231
38. http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-07-227R
39. http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-04-299
40. http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-04-966
41. http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-04-456RNI
42. http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-06-321R
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