Federal Information Resources Management: New Challenges for the Nineties

Joe Ryan*

Charles R. McClure

Rolf T. Wigand

Information resources management (IRM), introduced two decades ago in 1974, emerged in the 1980s as a key organizing framework for U.S. Federal information policy and management practices. IRM in the 1990s must deal with a fundamental shift in focus from efficient internal management of paper-based information delivery systems to effective management of a externally targeted, digitally networked, interactive, exchange of information and services with citizens. This changed context will bring both new opportunities and challenges. This article identifies critical success factors that IRM must address and offers recommendations for how best to meet these challenges and opportunities based on discussions with senior IRM leaders.

American citizens are surrounded by an increasing array of information technologies that are changing the way they work, shop, communicate, do business, and spend their leisure time. Americans sense a possible future in which flexible, responsive, service, whenever and wherever it is needed is the norm. Already American consumers quickly become impatient with slow and ineffective services, and with organizations that lack a customer-centered service attitude.

In response to these changing expectations many private and public sector organizations have been reinvented; they envision information technology (IT), combined with a renewed commitment to serving their clients and customers, as fundamental to their continued existence. American citizens will expect their

* Direct correspondence to: Joe Ryan, Research Associate, Syracuse University, School of Information Sludies. 4-206 Center for Science & Technology, Syracuse, New York 13244-4100. <joryan@suvm.syr.edu>

Government Information Quarterly, Volume 11, Number 3, pages 301-314. Copyright @ 1994 by JAI Press, Inc. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved. ISSN: 0740-624X.

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government, whether at the Federal, state, county, or local level, to do the same. Citizens will expect their government to adopt a responsive customer-centered service attitude and deploy modern telecommunications and information technology in the provision

of government services. The authors interviewed information resources management (IRM) leaders as part

of a study conducted by the U.S. Congress, Office of Technology Assessment.’ Those interviewed made it clear that citizen expectations of their future government must be today’s agenda items for IRM leaders. Federal IRM leaders are beginning to ask what are the critical success factors they need to address as they move a large, paper-based, internally focused government into a digital, service-oriented future? This article addresses this challenge by asking three questions:

l What are central, recurring challenges that Federal IRM has faced and is likely to face in the foreseeable future?

l What transformations must occur if these challenges are to be effectively addressed?

l What key issues must be resolved to bring about the needed transformations?

To address these questions, an exploratory design was employed to capture the range of views and experiences that Federal IRM officials have, their patterns, and points

of agreement and concern rather than quantify the frequency of a perspective’s occurrence.2

The investigators reviewed the literature to identify the persistent, unresolved, problematic situations that IRM has faced and the lessons which could be drawn from the experience useful for the future. The preliminary analysis and questions developed were then brought to senior IRM leaders identified in the literature and through key informants. This enabled the researchers to elucidate and corroborate tentative findings and gain key informants’ insights. The research team then asked these forward-looking IRM managers to identify future key IRM considerations and their policy consequences.

IRM leaders were drawn from Federal executive and congressional agencies (N = 40), national government associations (N = 3), the private sector (N = 2) and the academic community (N = 3). In all, 48 people representing 2 I organizational units participated in either focus group meetings or individual interviews. Follow-up phone interviews, electronic mail, and correspondence throughout the study with these study participants allowed the research team to further explore and clarify their understanding. The authors synthesized the findings from these efforts into a series of IRM critical success factors which will need close attention during the 1990s.

A REVIEW OF IRM: THE FIRST 20 YEARS

IRM as a concept has its origin in a report3 by a temporary national advisory panel, the Commission on Federal Paperwork, established in 1974.4 The Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA) of 1980 defined IRM as: “the planning, budgeting, organizing, directing, training, and administrative control associated with government information resources.” IRM, since its origins,6 has worked best as a slightly “fuzzy”idea that could serve as a lightening rod to focus debate on how to best manage information both within

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Federal agencies, across government, and between government and citizen, and that had the flexibility to change in response to:

. A changing appreciation for information’s value as a resource;’ l Ongoing changes in information technologies and their impact on information

exchange; l The great diversity of agency missions, cultures, and user populations; and l The need to respond to political exigencies of the moment. IRM has, by necessity,

been focused on the immediate, tangible, and real-world benefits that IRM could deliver.

This flexibility in definition has been a strength in the rapidly evolving Federal information environment. But IRM’s intentional vagueness has led to a diffused, some would say chaotic, information policy context.

Contemporary Federal IRM policy is a large and complex set of interrelated

principles, public laws, guidelines, rules, regulations, procedures, practices, and judicial interpretations emanating from government bodies that deal with managing the variously conceived life cycles of government information resources.* Indeed, Congress passed more than 300 public laws alone between 1977 and 1990 related to information policy and technology.’ Collectively these policies form frameworks for information resources management. However to conceive of a unitary information policy system within the Federal government is inaccurate.

Structural issues, some of long standing, also shape the IRM policy environment and constrain the amount of coordinated IRM planning that can occur in the Federal government. The separation of powers clause of the Constitution constrains coordination among branches of government, thus making government-wide IRM difficult to achieve. Individual agency mandates can have a similar limiting effect within a branch of government, indeed even within an agency. Coordinated IRM planning is further complicated when an agency receives its funding from one branch of government (e.g., the Congress) and receives direction from another (e.g., an executive body), or there are conflicts within a branch of government (e.g., among congressional committees). Coordinated IRM planning within an agency can be further limited by such factors as senior management’s interest and knowledge of IRM; the agency’s size, mission, and organizational structure; and the degree of influence of secretary-level IRM officials over individual agency units.

While no agency has government-wide IRM authority, several agencies have influence. The Office of Management and Budget’s Office of Information Resources Agency (OMB-OIRA) has the widest range of IRM policy authority as sanctioned by the PRA, but it is limited to the Executive Branch. Other agencies’ injZuence lies in certain areas of IRM policy: the General Accounting Office (GAO) in information technology and management evaluation; General Services Administration (GSA) in procurement and IRM training; the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in records management and preservation; and National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in standards development and oversight.

In summing up IRM’s first 20 years there is some sense that IRM has assisted the nation by reducing the paperwork, red tape, and information-processing burdens on

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citizens, businesses, and government alike. There is widespread agreement that information resource managers have successfully made the case that information is an economic resource, and sound information management saves money. There is equal agreement and recognition that information is worthy of the same level of attention and management as land, labor, capital, and natural resources. With this view of Federal IRM’s history, the authors consulted with senior IRM leaders to identify the critical success factors which should be attended to in the foreseeable future.

CRITICAL SUCCESS FACTORS FOR IRM

Shift Focus to External Electronic Service Delivery

One purpose of the 1980 PRA was to “ensure that automatic data processing and telecommunications technologies are acquired and used by the Federal government in a manner which improves services delivery” (emphasis added).” The 1993 revision of OMB A- 130, “Management of Federal Information Resources,” has clarified agencies’ responsibilities in this area as well.” However, agencies have given inadequate attention to this aspect of IRM. Improved provision of government electronic services cannot occur without a clear and pervasive understanding government-wide of what the term service entails and how the quality of those services will be assessed.

Agencies are only beginning to give attention to how emerging IT can be used to deliver government services in a more effective and timely manner by:

. Identifying users’ information needs;

. Providing access and disseminating needed information products and services via

an effective distribution infrastructure; and . Developing feedback mechanisms to determine IRM’s effectiveness.

Existing policies have often hindered rather than helped in these efforts. The PRA’s “undue burden” clause has inhibited agency surveys of users to measure the value of information products and services. Modification of this clause to allow the equivalent of market surveys as part of a systematically conceived dissemination evaluation plan would send a constructive signal to agency officials.

Useful information service models exist to assist agencies as they respond to the Clinton administration campaign pledge “putting people first.” The provision of information is itself a valued service. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) officials recently learned this lesson with the release of the Toxic Release Inventory, a database containing known toxic locations in the United States. EPA’s provision of accurate, timely information turned critics demanding instant solutions to a multi-year, multi- billion dollar task into agency advocates. Such initiatives as the GSA’s “Service to the Citizens” may suggest strategies for how a services perspective can be promoted in the Federal government.12

Many private and public sector organizations have emerged or have been re-invented that depend on information technology, combined with savvy IRM, and a renewed commitment to serving their clients and customers, as fundamental to their continued existence.13 Citizens expect their governments to adopt a responsive, customer-centered

Federal Information Resources Management 305

service attitude and deploy modern IT and management practices in the provision of government services.

Position IRM within Agencies More Effectively

The IRM function is an evolving hybrid difficult to position within an agency.14

Significant IRM roles that have evolved include:

. A senior staff role in which strategic planners shape and understand the linkage among an agency’s mission, its sources of mandate and funding, its key business

processes, and its information resources; l A coordinator role integrating often disparate agency information units, including

automated data processing, telecommunications, public information, libraries, and records management;

. A line manager role ensuring that new IT is selected, procured, installed, and

maintained properly; and l An evaluator role with reporting requirements to external oversight agencies.

The relentless pace of IT-induced change and the associated costs and impacts have shaped the evolution of these roles. However, the ability of the individual IRM leader

to play any or all of these roles is limited by that person’s skill and IRM training, and

is influenced by the agency’s culture. Three potential reasons why the IRM unit may not be an effective leader include: poor positioning within the organization, the failure of the IRM unit to make the case, and poorly trained IRM personnel.

The legacy of the IRM administrator’s insertion into Federal agencies’organizational structures haunts the resolution of this issue. The PRA’s attempt to insert IRM into the ranks of agency senior administration has largely failed or at best had mixed results.15

Often, the IRM unit is resented, bypassed, or simply ignored. The relationship of the IRM office to other internal agency units is unclear in many agencies. IRM positions

have been viewed as places to transfer those who did not work out elsewhere in the organization, in some instances.

Constructive initiatives that move IRM to a more appropriate and prominent position within the agency management structure include:

l Reexamine OMB Circular 92-05, IRA4 Plans Bulletin. Require that explicit links be made between mission and IRM requirements and capabilities, and between

department processes and IRM requirements; . Consider a change to OMB Circular A-l 1, Preparation and Submission of Budget

Estimates, to require agencies to produce a strategic business plan reflecting business process redesign due to the adoption of new IT; and

l Require IRM training for key agency officials outside of the IRM unit so as to move tested IRM concepts out of the IRM unit and into the day-to-day practice of the agencies.

Federal agency leaders must recognize that the IRM function is a core management function. Government programs and services are inextricably linked to the management

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of information resources. The IRM function is, indeed, a hybrid-staff and line, strategic and tactical-unique in organizational structure.

Position IRM within Government More Effectively

Certain IRM policies are best coordinated on a government-wide basis. These include:

l Development of a broad vision that reflects the evolving role of IRM within government supplemented by generalized guidelines and standards for all Federal

agencies to better manage the life cycles of information and IT; . Direction for creation and coordination of multi-agency information

infrastructures, such as a modern electronic network for government services

delivery; l Provision of established forums for consensus building and conflict resolution

among government branches and agencies; and

l Specific guidance either for or within a particular agency.

However, during IRM’s first 20 years, questions of responsibility, jurisdiction, funding, and authority have remained unresolved.

Those interviewed suggested two competing points of view regarding the appropriateness of a government-wide IRM policy framework. The first perspective

is that the existing IRM framework provides an adequate basis for the development of acceptable government-wide IRM policy. Those holding this view are sensitive to the structural constraints that any government-wide IRM policy must address. A second

perspective is that the IRM policy framework is ad hoc, voluntary, consensual, slow,

inadequate, out of date, out of touch, selective, highly focused, and fragmented. Central IRM oversight agencies have issued a multitude of IRM regulations that do not reflect the diversity of agency IRM policy contexts. Managing this diversity centrally has been

difficult, and achieving agency accountability has been all but impossible. Elements that would help to articulate and enhance a government-wide IRM policy

framework include:

. Craft an IRM vision that can direct and motivate all in government to a desirable and achievable goal;

. Produce an electronic Federal IRM Policy Locator containing every Federal IRM

policy useful for all involved;16 . Strengthen and speed the processes that must occur to arrive at multi-agency or

government-wide consensus on IRM policy issues, including government-wide training, competitive demonstration project awards, and matching fund programs;

. Examine what can be done to strengthen informal, multi-agency, IRM policy organizations, such as the Solomon Islands group;” and

. Plan for a modern Federal information infrastructure for electronic service delivery by convening a multi-branch, multi-agency task force.

The logical agency to promote many of these changes is a revitalized Executive Branch OMB-OIRA.i* The PRA reauthorization could be a useful legislative vehicle. But, since

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1989, reauthorization has been stymied and current proposed legislation inadequately

address many of the issues raised in this article.

Modernize the Federal Information Infrastructure

A modern Federal information infrastructure is the basic set of hardware, software,

communications equipment, human resources, and policies required for the government

to conduct its business in a global electronic environment successfully.” A modern

information infrastructure offers the capacity to select and acquire data in any format

from any part of the world in any language at any time of day. Such a modern

infrastructure must then be able to store that information for rapid retrieval,

presentation, and projection any place in the world in multiple media and for multiple

purposes. The government of the next generation will measure its arsenals in terms

of megabytes instead of megatons.”

A systematic long-term effort will be needed to:

l Modernize the IT available to Federal agencies;

l Deploy and coordinate IT used government-wide and by individual agencies; l Develop an electronically networked and distributed information infrastructure

that links all Federal agencies, state and local governments, and key points in

the community, such as libraries and schools ; l Locate, organize, coordinate, and make available existing Federal information

resources to the public via a government-wide locator;*’ and

l Plan for how best to use the information infrastructure to provide government

services.

The need to upgrade aging Federal information technology will be subsumed by the

dawning realization that a modern Federal information infrastructure is necessary

simply to survive in a changed political environment.

Procure State-of-the-Art Information Technology in a Timely Fashion

The Federal government must be able to procure the newest appropriate information

technologies rapidly to deliver the best possible electronic services to the nation’s citizens. Indeed, efficient procurement will be essential in modernizing the Federal

information infrastructure. The need for fast procurement is constrained by the:

. Size and diversity of the Federal government’s purchases, which dwarf the largest

corporations; l Need to prevent fraud, abuse, and mismanagement; l Desire to exercise purchasing power and gain economies of scale; and l Opportunity that the government has as a large buyer to influence standards,

target historically depressed regions, stimulate small business and research and

development, and promote social goods, such as equity.

Achieving a balance among these and other competing interests has never been easy.

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IRM procurement policies need to be updated, a task begun with the National Performance Review>22 and the subject of recent proposed legislation. Many IT

purchases should no longer require special regulation; they should be treated like the

commodities they have become. The entire procurement process needs greater

flexibility and responsiveness and fewer rules, procedures, and delays. Key oversight

agencies, such as the Office of Federal Procurement Policy, should be freed to develop

prototypes, and test and introduce innovative procurement techniques. GSA’s Trail

Boss program is a step in the right direction and should be strengthened. Ideas from

the “800 panel” on Department of Defense acquisition law and earlier proposed

legislation contain useful ideas for procurement reform. A fair but efficient

procurement process will be essential for any modernization of the Federal

government’s information infrastructure.

Encourage Agencies to Cultivate Partnerships

Partnerships in the Federal IRM community are not new. The Automated

Fingerprint Image Reporting and Match (AFIRM) system, Federal IRM Policy

Committee (FIRMPOC), Federal Library and Information Coordinating Committee

(FLICC), International Working Group on Global Warming, the Special Interest

Group on CD-ROM Applications and Technology (SIGCAT), the Workgroup for

Electronic Data Interchange (WEDI), and dozens of other partnerships have made

crucial contributions to Federal information management.

Coordinated action is both needed and, with the advent of electronic networks,

possible if an appropriate policy framework exists. Some elements in a revised policy

framework include:

l Determine appropriate relationships with foreign governments and other

international organizations in the area of information management, procurement,

standards, and government services delivery;

l Move Federal services out to citizens using existing state and local government,

and nonprofit distribution nodes connected by an electronically networked

infrastructure in mutually supportive arrangements;

l Develop agency- and government-wide locators.23 Locator creation is a useful first

step in identifying an agency’s own internal information assets and in reducing

duplication;

l Develop guidelines to assist IRM managers with recurring issues associated with

agency-industry partnerships. For example, address the questions associated with

when and how to outsource components of the production and dissemination of

government information products and services.24 This should be seen as a

necessary extension to OMB Policy Letter 92-1, Inherently Governmental Functions, and subsequent revisions to OMB A-130; and

. Incorporate, in new legislation, opportunities that encourage, where possible, and

compel, where necessary, multi-agency reengineering of government services or

the creation of new services in the context of fiscal restraint.

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The most critical and often neglected partnership, however, remains that between the Federal government and the American people. The ability that electronic networks offer for interactive exchange has the potential to enhance this partnership as well.

Engage in Systematic IRM Education and Training

IRM leaders interviewed frequently mentioned the need for adequately funded,

systematic, and sustained agency and government-wide education and training. Training needs vary depending on the trainee’s organizational role. For example, IRM unit members need continuous training to refresh their knowledge of the latest IT and management practices. IRM offtcials who obtain their positions through administrative ability need to be rapidly trained in the information management and technical aspects of their jobs. Specific attention must be given to the high turnover of IRM personnel as well as the impacts of more predictable changes, such as elections. All personnel are likely to need to update their knowledge of IT continuously.

A related concern often voiced is the need to establish formal job descriptions and career paths for IRM personnel on a government-wide basis. One way to address the pressing need for trained IRM personnel is to establish a career program within government that will attract and motivate career professionals. The next decade will

demand smart government and the key will be personnel trained in the basics of information management and information services delivery.

Initiatives to improve government-wide IRM training include the need to:

l Make explicit allocations of funds to agencies for information technology, training, and management when the programs mandated by Congress implicitly require these assets;

l Adequately fund and expand existing meritorious training programs within government, such as GSA’s 1000 by 2000 and Trail Boss programs;

. Direct the Office of Personnel Management to detail an IRM job description series. Salary scales should be competitive with industry;

l Streamline the process and shorten the time it takes for a government employee to receive approval (with funding) to attend educational programs;

l Find ways to encourage remote, high-quality programs to offer their services in both Washington, D.C., and in agency field offices;

l Consciously involve the nonprofit and commercial sectors in this enterprise; and . Designate a lead agency to be responsible for IRM training, and then empower

it to carry out the task;

There is need for a massive, systematic, government-wide IRM training effort that is standardized, up to date, predictable, sequential, multiyear, securely funded, and tied to real incentives for job retention and advancement.

Create Incentives for IRM and Electronic Services Provision

Study participants invariably mentioned the lack of incentives to improve quality or to innovate. Instead, agency officials remarked on the number of disincentives: government lethargy, restrictive and time-consuming IT procurement policies, senior

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administrators’ ignorance or lack of interest, inadequate information infrastructure, inability to retain income produced by innovative information services, and too many

conflicting responsibilities. Steps that Federal information policy makers can take to identify, reward, and embed

innovation and experimentation in government include:

l Consider legislation that creates “enterprise zones” of experimentation within government agencies, free of existing regulation, patterned after private industry, and funded from existing monies in a manner similar to the Veterans Administration’s Corporate Capital Investment Fund;

l Develop parallel but different incentive structures for those who maintain high- quality existing government services and those who experiment with innovative

practices within an organization;

l Offer government-wide and agency-wide competitive innovation grants, and additional awards for effective partnerships with other agencies, governments, and

nonprofit or for-profit organizations; and

. Charge a lead information agency with systematically documenting, evaluating,

and disseminating widely throughout government the results of these agency experiments, both the successes and the failures.

There is a need for a climate that fosters risk taking and experimentation with an incentive structure tied into advanced education and training.25

Measure IRM Performance and Address the Productivity Paradox

The service sector spent $800 billion on IT over the past 10 years2’ Yet, during this same period a number of studies concluded that there was a productivity paradox: the investment in IT did not translate into higher profits or better performance. Recent

studies, however, question the accuracy of these earlier studies,” while others question the appropriateness of the measures. Experience from the first generation of IRM

suggests a need for at least five distinct types of performance measures:

. User needs: measures that identify which information products and services citizens want and their level of satisfaction with what they are offered;

. Diagnostics: measures that help IRM managers determine what is going right,

what is going wrong, and what to do next;

. Return on investment: measures that identify IT introduction and use costs compared to some tangible improvement of equivalent value;

. Winners: measures that identify which new IT offer the most likely productivity gains; and

l Impacts: measures that indicate the probable outcomes or consequences for government and citizens of introducing new information technologies.

Productivity measurement is controversial because of the need to measure differing productivity types and their value-laden nature. Yet, all study participants agreed that

measuring productivity is essential.

federal Information Resources Management 311

Oversight agencies struggle with a dual responsibility-to Congress and to the agencies that they evaluate. Are oversight agencies critics or coaches? Congressional committees often demand that oversight agencies assume the critic role typified by the one-shot invasion and summative evaluation. Frequently the role of coach is more appropriate. The evaluator is involved from the start in the design, implementation, and measurement of outcomes for each information service. Evaluation is continuous, integrated into the work flow, cooperative, and formative. Oversight agencies can be the best equipped to advise agencies on how to evaluate their own information services delivery. Yet, often oversight agencies have no opportunity to use this alternative evaluation approach. This formative approach to evaluating productivity deserves

greater attention than it has received so far. Information policymakers need to explore new measures of IT productivity. Specific

recommendations include:

. Understand the type of productivity measure needed: user needs, management diagnostics, return on investment, IT winners, or societal impacts;

. Clarify the linkage among productivity measure, mission, and business process for all concerned;

. Balance the role of critic and coach. Seek legislative mandate where appropriate;

. Explore information-based productivity measures including ubiquity, portability of IT, and the ease of use;**

. Develop straightforward performance measures, with associated clear definitions, suitable for use by agency personnel as part of their existing work flow; and

. Build the capacity within agencies to evaluate their own information products and services, on a regular basis, with explicit involvement of users and citizens.

The pace of IT-driven change is so rapid that it has become extremely difficult to evaluate its impact on government or on society at large. Effective IRM evaluation with meaningful performance measures is essential given the pervasive information revolution.

REINVENTING FEDERAL IRM

Taylor points out that the “IRM planning process asks some rather fundamental questions about (1) organizational objectives and directions; (2) investment in expensive

information resources, people, and systems; (3) accountability for information resources; (4) access to information; and (5) centralization and autonomy. r’9 IRM has always been an evolutionary concept driven by technology and re-directed by political exigency, one part strategic vision, and one part tactical policy. The difficulties that the Federal government has had in addressing the recurring challenges IRM faces suggest a lack of a coherent vision for the role information plays in government. Elements of such a vision might include the following:

. A modern information technology infrastructure acts as the focus for citizen services provision. Federal agency information resource management practices are re-oriented, using incentives, training, and support of managed innovation to

31 2 GOVERNMENT INFORMATION QUARTERLY Vol. 1 l/No. 3/l 994

adopt a responsive, interactive, customer-service attitude in the provision of quality services to citizens. This vision enhances government’s provision of electronic services, increases government’s productivity and efficiency, and

promotes the public’s general welfare and quality of life. . To accomplish this vision, the Federal government adopts a comprehensive

information resources management policy, identifies a lead Federal agency to

guide the execution of this vision, and works closely with its partners both inside and outside of government. The Federal government commits to provide quality electronically networked connections, products, and services to all its citizens.

The Federal government must undertake a concerted, major effort to build a modern information infrastructure to serve its own internal needs and, more importantly, to deliver services to its citizens.

Currently, much of the Federal bureaucracy seems to suffer from a sort of administrative arthritis, characterized by slowness and little agility in responding adequately and promptly to citizens’ needs.3” All units of government must take steps to realize the policy objective of a modernized governmental information infrastructure that is strategically deployed and managed for the delivery of services.

Members of the research community have an important role to play in the development of a Federal IRM that is externally focused, service-oriented, and digitally networked. There is a need to:

. Reassess existing Federal policy that describes the role and applications of IRM in the government;

. Determine the effect of IRM in specific administrative situations; and

. Reassess the component parts of IRM and determine if they are appropriate.

The time is ripe to seize the moment and review IRM’s founding principles and reassess them.

If IRM is to play a central role in the building of a national information infrastructure, it will need to shift its focus from internal agency efficiency to external service delivery. The critical success factors identified here represent a beginning point for the process of reinventing Federal IRM.

Acknowledgements: The authors wish to acknowledge the contributions of John Carlo Bertot, Mary McKenna, William E. Moen, and Stacy B. Veeder, who were co- authors for the original study from which this article is derived. The authors also gratefully acknowledge the support of the Office of Technology Assessment for this study. The authors are grateful for the very helpful comments of the anonymous reviewers. In addition, the authors wish to thank the Federal IRM managers who participated in this study whose thoughts have actively shaped our thinking.

NOTES AND REFERENCES

I. The research reported here is taken in part from a larger study sponsored by the Office of Technology

Assessment: Charles R. McClure, Rolf T. Wigand, John Carlo Bertot, Mary McKenna, Joe Ryan.

Federal information Resources Management 313

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

I.

8.

9.

10.

II.

12.

13.

14.

15.

16.

17.

18.

19.

William E. Moen, Stacy B. Veeder, Federal Information Policy and Managementfor Electronic Service Delivery, PB94113313 (Washington, D.C.: NTIS, December 21, 1992). This report was then

incorporated into the larger effort: Office of Technology Assessment, Making Government Work:

Electronic Delivery of Federal Services (Washington, D.C.: GPO, September 1993).

Further details on the research methodology employed can be found in McClure et al., Federal

Information Policy and Management for Electronic Service Delivery. Commission on Federal Paperwork, Information Resources Management (Washington, D.C., 1977).

88 Stat. 1789.

P.L. 96-5 11, Section 3506.

For a recent review of the literature, see Ray C. Oman and Nilda D. Godwin, “An Assessment of

Information Resources Management over a Decade: An Annotated Bibliography,” Vance

Bibliographies: Public Adminisfrarion Series, P 3115 (Monticello, IL: Vance Bibliographies, 1991).

The focus on information over the past 20 years has yielded a deeper understanding of information’s

importance, dimensionality, meaning, and impact. What was once a demand to reduce paperwork

shifted to a concern with format, with process redesign, and with assessing information’s value. Each

prior concern was not lost; instead, it was embedded in a richer understanding of what information

as a resource is. The following sources summarize the key instruments and issues that comprise Federal information

policy: Peter Hernon and Charles R. McClure, “Electronic U.S. Government Information: Policy Issues

and Directions,” Annual Review of Informarion Science and Technology, Vol. 28, edited by Martha

E. Williams (Medford, NJ: Learned Information, Inc., 1993) pp. 45-l IO; Peter Hernon and Charles

R. McClure, “United States Information Policies,” National and International Information Policies,

edited by Wendy Schipper and Ann Marie Cunningham (Philadelphia, PA: National Federation of

Abstracting and Information Services, 1992), pp. 348; Peter Hernon, Charles R. McClure, and Harold

Relyea, eds., United States Government Information Policies: Views and Perspecfives (Norwood, NJ:

Ablex, 1989).

Robert Chartrand, Information Policy and Technology Issues: Public Laws of the 95th through lOIsi Congresses (Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress, Congressional Research Service, 1991).

P.L. 96-511, Section 3501 (5).

Office of Management and Budget, OMB Circular No. A-130, “Management of Federal Information

Resources” (Washington, D.C.: OMB, 1993). Available FTP: nis.nsf.net DIRECTORY: omb Files:

omb.al30.revl omb.al30.rev3.

General Service Administration, Service 10 the Citizens (KAP-93-I) (Washington, D.C.: General

Services Administration, 1993); Francis A. McDonough and Thomas J. Buckholtz, “Providing Better

Service to Citizens with Information Technology,” Journal of Systems Management, 43 (April 1992):

3240.

David Osborne and Ted Gaebler, Reinventing Government: How the Entrepreneurial Spirit Is Transforming the Public Secror (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1992).

Robert Benjamin and John F. Rockart, “The Information Technology Function of the 1990s: A Unique

Hybrid,” Center for Information Systems Research (CISR) Working Paper No. 225 (Cambridge, MA:

Center for Information Systems Research, Sloan School of Management, Massachusetts Institute of

Technology, 1991).

Sharon L. Caudle, “Federal Information Resources Management after the Paperwork Reduction Act,”

Public Adminisnafion Review, 48 (July-August 1988): 790-799.

For a recent positive step in this direction, see General Services Administration, FAR/ FIRMR CD-

ROM (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1993).

Alvin Pesachowitz, “Interagency Conference on Public Access,” Government Information Quarterly, 9 (1992): 187-198; J. Timothy Sprehe, “Issues in Public Access: The Solomons Conferences,”

Government Publications Review, 20 (1993): 251-272.

J. Timothy Sprehe, “Clinton Admin. Could Refocus OIRA’s Role,” Federal Computer Week, 6 (November 30, 1992): 18.

For strategic planning issues connected with information infrastructure, see Joe Ryan, “Strategic Information Infrastructures: Planning and Design,” in Integrating Technologies/ Converging Professions: The I993 ASIS Annual Proceedings, edited by Susan Bonzi (Medford, NJ: Learned

Information, 1993), pp. 3-10.

314 GOVERNMENT INFORMATION QUARTERLY Vol. 1 l/No. 311994

20.

21.

22.

23.

24.

25.

26.

27.

28.

29.

30.

For a related view. see Alvin and Heidi Toffler, War and Anti- War: Survival ur the Dawn ofthe 2/sr

Century (Boston: Little, Brown, 1993).

Charles R. McClure, Joe Ryan, and William E. Moen, Identifying and Describing Federal Informution

Inventory/ Locator Systems: Design,for Networked-Based Locators, 2 ~01s. (Bethesda, MD: National

Audio Visual Center, 1992) [Also available from ERIC ED 349 031, Eliot J. Christian, Government

Information Locator Service (GILS). Available: FTP: ftp.cni.org PATH: pubidocsj gils FILE:

gilsIOll.txt (ASCII); gilslOl7.Word.hqx (Binhexed MS Word for MAC); gilslOll.ps (Postscript) Gopher: gopher.cni.orgl.

Vice President Albert Gore, From Red Tape 10 Resulrs: The Nationul Performarwe Review

(Washington, D.C.: GPO, September 7. 1993) [Available e-mail: npr@ace.esusda.gov MESSAGE: none

necessary].

Charles R. McClure et al., Idenrifying and Describing Federal Itzfiwmution Inventory/ Loutor Syslems.

Design for Networked-Based Locafors.

See Office of Management and Budget, Currem Itzformation Techno1og.p Resource Reyuiremenls q/

lhe Federal Government: Fiscal Year 1993 (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1992) pp. 111-3946.

Osborne and Gaebler, Reinventing Governmenl. They repeatedly illustrate that traditional work

behaviors will continue until the rewards and incentives for change are in place.

Patrick McGovern. “Plug in for Productivity.” The New York Times, CXLII (June 27 1993): FI I.

Ibid.

Robert G. Eccles, “The Performance Measurement Manifesto,” Harvard Business Review, 69 (January,

February 1991): 13 I-137. For an interesting recent study, see National Research Council, Informution

Techno1og.v in fhe Service Socier, (Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press. 1993).

Robert S. Taylor. “Information Values in Decision Contexts,” Irzjbrmotion Management Revinr, I (1985): 47-55.

This was a major concern of Vice President Albert Gore, From Red Tape to Results: The Narionul

Performance Revieti,.