Jonathan Breul, executive director of the IBM Center for the Business of Government, offers some advice on getting ready for the transition from one presidential administration to another.
Have plenty of ideas ready for new officials. The new team will want to move quickly and smartly.
Think ahead about pre-positioning contracts. The newcomers might want contracts available to ramp up their agenda.
Get set for the budget process. There will be a big scramble beginning Jan. 20 to prepare the new president’s 2010 budget.
Meet staffing needs. It’s not uncommon for a new team to come aboard and institute a hiring freeze.
Overhead recently at a government agency: “Can you believe those career folks are starting to work on the transition?”
That’s exactly what career executives — particularly deputy chief executive officers — should be doing with an election looming in about 20 weeks. The career CXOs will be running the show at their agencies while they await the appointment and confirmation of new political executives.
“This time next year, it’s going to be the deputy CXOs who are running the government,” said Jonathan Breul, executive director at the IBM Center for the Business of Government and former senior adviser to the deputy director of management at the Office of Management and Budget. “It’s…the career officials who are going to be acting for some period of time. This isn’t a short-term arrangement, and it could last for quite a while.”
At the Energy Department, Deputy Chief Human Capital Officer Rita Franklin, a career civil servant, began tackling the transition six months ago. “It’s the right thing to do because we have to be prepared for the next person that will come in,” she said. “In coming months, about a quarter of my time will be spent on transition, and as it gets closer to election time and thereafter, probably half to three-quarters of my time will be spent on transition-related activities.”
Once DOE’s politically appointed CHCO departs, Franklin will temporarily assume the top role — as will most other deputy chief executives governmentwide. “My position description is that I act in the absence of,” she said. During that time, Franklin said, she will continue to follow the department’s current human-capital priorities until the new CHCO arrives.
At the General Services Administration, career officials started preparing six months after the last presidential election, said David Bibb, GSA’s acting administrator. “We have everything ready to go.” Bibb is working on briefing papers for the next GSA administrator. He plans to address long-standing issues, such as the proliferation of acquisition contracts that have led to what he described as an overlapping, confusing excess of options.
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