Handouts to accompany plenary presentation at 2010 Summer Evaluation Institute.
Session Description: Professor Newcomer will describe the context and challenges the Obama Administration’s approach to performance management confronts. She will describe the legacy of performance measurement assets, logistical challenges and skepticism the Obama Administration inherited. Then she will lay out the initial actions taken by the new Administration, and commitments articulated by Obama’s Chief Performance Officer and OMB staff. And finally, she will outline some challenges facing the Obama Administration as the new OMB and agency leaders try to move performance improvement efforts forward.
Kathryn Newcomer is a the Director of the Trachtenberg School of Public Policy and Public Administration at the George Washington University where she is also the Co-Director of the Midge Smith Center for Evaluation Effectiveness, home of The Evaluators’ Institute (TEI), She teaches and routinely conducts research and training for federal and local government agencies and nonprofit organizations on performance measurement and program evaluation. Dr. Newcomer has published numerous journal articles as well as five books, including The Handbook of Practical Program Evaluation (with Joe Wholey and Harry Hatry and the 3rd Edition forthcoming in 2010), Getting Results: A Guide for Federal Leaders and Managers (2005), and Transformational Leadership: Leading Change in Public and Nonprofit Agencies, (2008). She is a Fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration, and currently serves on the Comptroller General’s Educators’ Advisory Panel. Dr. Newcomer has received two Fulbright awards, the Elmer Staats Award for Achievements in Government Accountability, as well as two awards for outstanding teaching.