Shared Services Requirements: Kicking the Tires

Buying a car is a process that many of us have gone through at one point or another (more than once for a lot of us). Thinking back on that process raises the question of why some of the simple techniques we use in our personal lives aren’t being better applied in the workplace.

If we can apply four lessons from buying a car to the workplace, we can be as happy with our new systems as we are with our new cars.

1) Focus on what’s unique

2) Leave the engine to the engineers

3) Keep your priorities straight

4) Take it for a test drive

The process of buying a car can teach us a lot about how we should (and shouldn’t) approach requirements gathering for shared services migrations. Use the resources at your disposal to start with the baseline and focus on what’s unique, stay away from trying to design the system, make sure you stay realistic about your priorities, and of course take it for a test drive. This will help make sure that you don’t end up with a high-end sports car when all you can afford and all you really need is the economy model.

About the Authors

Teia Clarke, Deloitte Consulting Senior Manager in Federal Practice Shared Services

Karen Ganley, Deloitte Consulting Specialist Leader in Oracle and Technology Implementation

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Why agencies break the law on improper payments

Despite an attempted crackdown by the Obama administration, agencies are increasingly likely to make payment mistakes. The error rate rose from 3.53 percent in fiscal 2013 to 4.02 percent in fiscal 2014. In other words, the government misspent about $10 billion more last year than the year earlier.

That we knew, thanks to a Government Accountability Office report issued a few months back. But recent inspector general reports round out the picture by showing where agencies go wrong.

Of the 24 CFO Act agencies — those required to have audited financial statements —about half failed to comply with the law on improper payments, according to a preliminary analysis of the IG reports by the accounting firm Grant Thornton. The low scorers include the agencies that misspent the most money: the departments of Health and Human Services, Treasury, Agriculture and the Social Security Administration.

The overall picture seems, at first glance, worse than in past years, when inspectors general evaluated agencies on a multilevel scale that ranged from "compliant" to "noncompliant." While agencies have made strides in some of their programs, complying with the improper payments law is now pass-fail, thanks to guidance the White House issued in October.

"They're trying to say, ‘No more wiggle room. You're either compliant or not compliant,'" said Grant Thornton Principal Robert Shea.

-Emily Kopp, FederalNewsRadio.com
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Improving Financial Systems through Shared Services, OFIT Industry Day May 21st

Solicitation Number: RFI-FIT-14-0055

Agency: Department of the Treasury
Office: Bureau of the Public Debt (BPD)
Location: Bureau of the Fiscal Service

MB Memorandum M-13-08 directed all executive agencies to use, with limited exceptions, a shared service solution for future modernizations of core accounting or mixed systems. In implementing this policy, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is following a guiding principle of "Federal First" whereby executive agencies must consider one of the Federal Shared Services Providers (FSSP) designated by the Department of the Treasury (Treasury) as eligible to provide financial management shared services to other executive agencies.

On May 2, 2014, OMB and the U.S. Department of the Treasury designated four agencies as FSSPs. They are Department of Agriculture's National Finance Center; the Department of the Interior's, Interior Business Center, the Department of Transportation's Enterprise Services Center, and Treasury's Administrative Resource Center.

A copy of OMB M-13-08, "Improving Financial Systems through Shared Services," is located at: http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/omb/memoranda/2013/m-13-08.pdf .

The Division of Procurement Services, on behalf of the Financial Innovation and Transformation (FIT), is conducting market research in the form of this RFI and an Industry Day event scheduled on May 21, 2014. 

The Government will hold an Industry Day event on May 21, 2014, starting at 8:15 a.m. ET, with sign-in starting at 7:45 a.m. ET at GSA Central Auditorium located at 1800 F Street, NW, Washington, DC 20006. There will be a general session followed by question/answer session. The general session will include background information on the implementation of OMB M-13-08, FIT's role in the implementation, current plan and associated challenges. Following the general session, each FSSP will provide background on their organization, current platform and customers, challenges, current contracting vehicles and potential needs/desires to improve financial management services offerings. 

Treasury begins shared services quest to educate, integrate

The Treasury Department's Office of Financial Innovation and Transformation is starting to put the bigger pieces of the shared services puzzle in place.

It started by approving four shared service providers — one new one and three current providers — on May 2. Now OFIT is on an education and data quest.

The office issued two requests for information to industry in the past few weeks, including one to begin telling industry about the role contractors will play in this governmentwide initiative.

One RFI , issued May 7, announced an industry day on May 21 where all four shared service providers — the departments of Agriculture, Interior, Transportation and Treasury — will present current capabilities and those they would like to have in the future.

OFIT also wants to gather market research on private sector solutions and capabilities that could be of assistance to OFIT (in its oversight role), the FSSPs (in their service provider role) and customers or prospective customers) in 11 different areas, including optimizing shared services, assisting in customer migrations and identifying alternative contract approaches such as share-in- savings or public-private partnerships.

Then on May 22, OFIT will host an agency day so potential customer agencies can learn about the shared services offerings and ask questions about the initiative.

The second RFI is focused on data management.

The April 18 RFI asks vendors for insights into "the development and implementation of a shared data transfer capability (e.g., enterprise bus) to facilitate the interaction and communication between mutually interacting software applications. Software applications may include financial systems, procurement systems, e-invoicing systems, inventory systems, or other mixed systems. These software applications may or may not be owned and operated by the federal government."

Responses to the RFI are due May 16.

The RFIs are more pieces to this financial management shared services puzzle.

Treasury, which is leading this administration effort, is trying to get data and information out to the agencies so they really get what's expected of them and what they can expect.

At the conference, audience members sought answers about how the initiative works, and the RFIs and several other document or data releases over the next two weeks are part of those answers.

Angerman says the OFIT will post those documents on its website.

-Jason Miller, FederalNewsRadio.com
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USDA joins the ranks of the financial shared services providers

Agencies will continue to have four approved federal shared services providers to buy financial management services from. The only difference is the Agriculture Department replaces the General Services Administration.

The Office of Management and Budget and the Treasury Department today announced they recertified the departments of Interior, Treasury and Transportation and added USDA to be the support pylons of its shared services initiative.

By adding USDA, OMB and Treasury partly solve concerns over a lack of competition among providers, because they all offered Oracle as their back-end software. USDA offers SAP's federal financials.

USDA in 2013 continued deploying its Financial Management Modernization Initiative (FMMI), a new financial system that replaces USDA's legacy financial system, according to OMB's January 2014report to Congress on the benefits of E-Government initiatives. "FMMI is based upon a commercial, off-the-shelf resource planning product. FMMI is an advanced, Web-based, financial management system that provides general accounting, funds management, and financial-reporting capabilities that has been deployed to 28 of USDA's 29 administrative organizations."

GSA's decision to get out of the financial management services is no real surprise. The agency said it was getting out of the human resources services last summer, and several government and industry sources said financial management wasn't far behind.

But by GSA not receiving OMB and Treasury's approval, it means one less software package will be available for agencies to choose from (it offered CGI's Momentum), and it's unclear what will happen to the people running the Federal Integrated Solutions Center's External Services Branch or its 44 internal and external financial management customers.

OMB and Treasury's approval of the four providers should kick off a series of decisions that will underlie the financial management share services effort.

-Jason Miller, FederalNewsRadio.com
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Largest USDA overpayments go toward farm subsidies, report says

The Department of Agriculture doled out more than $20 million in excess financial assistance last year, with the largest overpayments coming in the form of farm subsidies for crop insurance.

In a report released this week, the USDA inspector general said the agency spent nearly $15 million on undue payouts through the Federal Crop Insurance Corporation while issuing no major overpayments for nutrition assistance, including the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program — formerly known as food stamps.

Overpayments are defined as payouts that rise at least 50 percent higher than the correct amount while totaling at least $5,000 per individual or $25,000 per organization, according to the analysis.

The watchdog analysis, released Wednesday, focused on the USDA’s compliance with reporting requirements under an executive order President Obama issued in 2009 to reduce high-dollar overpayments.

The Department of Agriculture reported 239 overpayments worth a combined $20.3 million during the 2012 fiscal year, compared to 143 payouts totaling $11.7 million during the previous cycle, according to the review.

Excess payments through the Federal Crop Insurance Corporation averaged excesses of $209,000 per payout. The next highest amount came from a wildland firefighting program that sent out overpayments of $58,000 apiece on average.

The inspector general said the USDA could decrease its overpayments through better control over bookkeeping and stricter adherence to reporting guidelines, including the deadlines for producing quarterly numbers.

The Agriculture Department said in its response that “agencies misinterpreted or deviated from the requirement of the Office of Management and Budget and the [Office of the Chief Financial Officer].” The agency said its CFO would issue a memo directing each department to certify that its reporting processes comply with the established standards.

-Josh Hicks, WashingtonPost.com

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Werfel: Gov't avoids $47B in overpayments

The federal government avoided making $47 billion in overpayments over the last three years. In addition, the governmentwide error rate dropped from a high 5.4 percent in Fiscal Year 2009 to 4.3 percent in FY2012.

Adding in the number of improper payments avoided during the same three-year period by the Department of Defense in commercial contracts, the overpayment savings rise to $70 billion and the governmentwide error rate sinks to 3.7 percent. Danny Werfel, the controller of the Office of Management and Budget, announced these figures Wednesday in a blog post on the agency's blog, OMBlog.

Werfel wrote that error rates dropped in major programs across the government, including Medicare Fee-for- Service, Medicaid, the Earned Income Tax Credit and SNAP (Food Stamps). He added the Department of Labor is also working with states to reduce Unemployment Insurance improper payments.

- Michael O'Connell, FederalNewsRadio.com
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OMB touts progress on reducing federal property footprint

The White House on Thursday announced new progress in the Obama administration’s effort to save money by consolidating and selling off unneeded federal real estate.


Through the first quarter of fiscal 2012, agencies saved $5.6 billion in property costs and were “on track” to exceed President Obama’s goal of saving $8 billion by year’s end, Controller Danny Werfel said in a blog post.

Congress is mulling bills to reform the property sale process. The Office of Management and Budget has proposed legislation to create an outside board of property experts who would bundle properties for sale after congressional approval, much like the Defense Department’s Base Closure and Realignment Commission. A bill with some similar provisions introduced by Rep. Jeff Denham, R-Calif., cleared the House in February but is stalled in the Senate.


-Charles S. Clark, GovExec.com
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Agencies cut improper payments by $18 billion

Agencies saved nearly $18 billion in fiscal 2011 by reducing improper payments, the White House announced Tuesday. The administration also unveiled new steps to prevent the government from paying money to the wrong people.


Agencies saved $17.6 billion last year, by reducing payment errors in Medicare, Medicaid, Pell Grants and a food assistance program.

President Barack Obama initiated the crackdown on improper payments two years ago, when he gave agencies the goal of reducing payment errors by $50 billion before 2013. The effort has since become part of the administration's Campaign to Cut Waste, which seeks to apply lessons learned by the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board to all federal spending.

As part of the crackdown, agencies reduced the 2011 governmentwide payment error rate to 4.7 percent, the administration said. In 2010, it was 5.3 percent.


The Medicare and Medicaid programs shouldered the bulk of savings, avoiding $16 billion in payment errors, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius told reporters.

USDA also prevented $800 million in improper payments under its Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly the food stamps program, according to the administration.

In announcing the reduction of payment errors, the White House also revealed new steps to improve agency suspension and debarment programs.


-Ruben Gomez, FederalNewsRadio.com
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FSIS Posts Financial Management Positions

Branch Chief in the Systems Branch, Beltsville, MD


Public announcement number W-OM-FMD-2011-2004; current/former government employees announcement W-OM-FMD-2011-0006.

A brief summary of the position is below and the full announcement can be accessed on USAJOBS at the attached link (copy and paste the link or locate the job with the vacancy number at http://www.usajobs.gov/).

The Financial Accounting and Systems Branch of the Financial Management Division provides the overall oversight and security access of the Agency within the parameters of the Department's Financial Management Modernization Initiative (FMMI) and related administrative feeder subsystems. The Branch maintains master data, monitors and reports system availability, provides assistance with understanding and retrieving information and monitors and controls system access. They work across FSIS, the Department and the National Finance Center.

For more information please visit the following link:

http://jobview.usajobs.gov/GetJob.aspx?JobID=93879561&JobTitle=Branch+Chief%2C+Financial+Accounting+and+Systems+Management+Branch&q=accountant&where=md&brd=3876&vw=b&FedEmp=N&FedPub=Y&x=72&y=13&pg=1&rad=20&rad_units=miles&re=0&jbf574=AG*&AVSDM=2010-11-24+15%3A54%3A00
Branch Chief in the Financial Review and Analysis Branch in Beltsville, MD

Public announcement number W-OM-FMD-2011-2007; current/former government employees announcement W-OM-FMD-2011-0008.

A brief summary of the position is below and the full announcement can be accessed at http://www.usajobs.gov/.

The Financial Review and Analysis Branch negotiates indirect cost rates with recipients (i.e., State Agencies); conducts on-site financial and compliance reviews of recipients' policies, procedures reporting and grant expenditures; performs grant close-out reviews; researches/establishes cost policy for FSIS-USDA programs; and serves as the main liaison between recipients and FSIS-USDA concerning cost issues.

For more information please visit the following link:

http://jobview.usajobs.gov/GetJob.aspx?JobID=94432714&JobTitle=Auditor%2c+Branch+Chief%2c+Financial+Review+%26+Analysis+Branch&q=w-om-fmd-2011-0008&where=&brd=3876&vw=b&FedEmp=N&FedPub=Y&x=0&y=0&AVSDM=2010-12-01+00%3a00%3a00

Senior agency leaders focus on measuring success of their programs

In keeping with what the Obama administration sees as a high priority, officials at the Labor, Agriculture and Veterans Affairs departments are making program and performance evaluation a key focus in their strategic planning. Agencies already have been working hard narrow down their top objectives -- like the Agriculture Department's push to ensure all children in America have access to safe and nutritious meals -- and now they are tackling the even more difficult task of determining how to measure success.

Well into the process of submitting high-priority performance goals to the Office of Management and Budget, senior officials say they are identifying their program objectives and designing ways to evaluate progress toward those outcomes.

Labor will create a new position -- chief evaluation officer -- and a corresponding office within the policy office. The chief evaluation officer will develop a strategic approach that ties together the diverse goals and priorities of the department's many agencies and offices.

At Agriculture, Deputy Secretary Kathleen Merrigan's staff aims to establish metrics that can accurately measure success and to make sure each metric involves multiple agencies and mission areas.

Veterans Affairs Deputy Secretary W. Scott Gould said the elevator test applies to budgetary questions as well as metrics.

"There are three basic questions when you go see an appropriator -- what are you buying, how much does it cost and what do I get for it," he said. "If you can't answer that question in 30 seconds, it's on to the next line item."

Gould, Merrigan and Harris all anticipate the budget environment will be increasingly Spartan in the coming years, making program evaluation even more important.

-Elizabeth Newell, GovExec.com

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Today's GAO Publications

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) released the following publications:

Inspectors General: Independent Oversight of Financial Regulatory Agencies, by Gary L. Kepplinger, general counsel, before the Subcommittee on Government Management, Organization, and Procurement, House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
GAO-09-524T, March 25.
http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-09-524T

U.S. Department of Agriculture: Improved Management Controls Can Enhance Effectiveness of Key Conservation Programs, by Lisa Shames, director, natural resources and environment, before the Subcommittee on Conservation, Credit, Energy, and Research, House Committee on Agriculture.
GAO-09-528T, March 25.
http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-09-528T
Highlights - http://www.gao.gov/highlights/d09528thigh.pdf

U.S. Postal Service: Escalating Financial Problems Require Major Cost Reductions to Limit Losses, by Phillip Herr, director, physical infrastructure issues, before the Subcommittee on Federal Workforce, Postal Service, and the District of Columbia, House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
GAO-09-475T, March 25.
http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-09-475T
Highlights - http://www.gao.gov/highlights/d09475thigh.pdf

Securities and Exchange Commission: Oversight of U.S. Equities Market Clearing Agencies.
GAO-09-318R, February 26.
http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-09-318R

Recent GAO Publications

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently released the following reports, correspondence and testimonies:

Business Systems Modernization: Internal Revenue Service's Fiscal Year 2009 Expenditure Plan.
GAO-09-281, March 11.
http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-09-281
Highlights - http://www.gao.gov/highlights/d09281high.pdf

Troubled Asset Relief Program: Status of Efforts to Address Transparency and Accountability Issues, by Richard J. Hillman, managing director, financial markets and community investment, before the Subcommittee on Domestic Policy, House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
GAO-09-474T, March 11.
http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-09-474T

Forest Service: Emerging Issues Highlight the Need to Address Persistent Management Challenges, by Robin M. Nazzaro, director, natural resources and environment, before the Subcommittee on Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies, House Committee on Appropriations.
GAO-09-443T, March 11.
http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-09-443T

VA Health Care: Challenges in Budget Formulation and Execution, by Randall B. Williamson, director, health care, before the Subcommittee on Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies, House Committee on Appropriations.
GAO-09-459T, March 12.
http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-09-459T
Highlights - http://www.gao.gov/highlights/d09459thigh.pdf

Medicare: Improvements Needed to Address Improper Payments in Home Health.
GAO-09-185, February 27.
http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d09185.pdf

Counterdrug Technology Assessment Center: Clarifying Rationale for the Research and Development Funding Decisions Would Increase Accountability.
GAO-09-339R, March 12.
http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d09339r.pdf

"Challenges Facing the New Administration and the 111th Congress," by Gene L. Dodaro, acting comptroller general of the United States, before the JFMIP 2009 Federal Financial Management Conference, in Washington, D.C.
GAO-09-510CG, March 12, 2009.
http://www.gao.gov/cghome/d09510cg.pdf


Principles of Federal Appropriations Law: Annual Update of the Third Edition
GAO-09-340SP
http://www.gao.gov/special.pubs/appforum2009/d09340sp.pdf
Highlights - http://www.gao.gov/highlights/d09443thigh.pdf


Appropriations Decisions:

B-317878,United States Postal Service Office of Inspector General-
Implementation of Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act Section 603,
Part 2, March 3, 2009
http://www.gao.gov/decisions/appro/317878.pdf

Today's GAO Publications

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) today released the following reports:

Confirmation of Political Appointees: Eliciting Nominees' Views on Management Challenges within Agencies and across Government.
GAO-09-194, November 17.
http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-09-194

Federal Farm Programs: USDA Needs to Strengthen Controls to Prevent Payments to Individuals Who Exceed Income Eligibility Limits.
GAO-09-67, October 24.
http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-09-67
Highlights - http://www.gao.gov/highlights/d0967high.pdf


Wildland Fire Management: Interagency Budget Tool Needs Further Development to Fully Meet Key Objectives.
GAO-09-68, November 24.
http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-09-68
Highlights - http://www.gao.gov/highlights/d0968high.pdf

IG community honors auditors and investigators

Nearly 100 federal employees and agency teams tasked with fighting government fraud and waste received kudos from two top councils on integrity and efficiency on Thursday.

"Despite the transformation that requires all of us to be able to work in a dynamic environment, we have remained focused on our core mission," said Daniel Levinson, inspector general of the Health and Human Services Department and chairman of the President's Council on Integrity and Efficiency awards program. The 11th annual ceremony, held in Washington, coincided with the 30th anniversary of the 1978 Inspector General Act, which established the duties and responsibilities of the watchdog organizations.

The awards were handed out by the President's Council, which includes IGs appointed by the president, and the Executive Council on Integrity and Efficiency, which includes IGs who are appointed by agency heads.

Winners included the asset forfeiture team at the Agriculture Department that handled National Football League quarterback Michael Vick's dog-fighting operation, and the team from the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction Office that investigated the physical soundness of the Mosul Dam.

The Sentner Award for Dedication and Courage, the IG community's highest honor, went posthumously to Paul Converse, a special auditor with the Iraq Reconstruction IG office who was killed in Iraq last March.

Marlane Evans, deputy inspector general for audit at Agriculture won the Alexander Hamilton Award, while the department's Link Team won the Gaston L. Gianni, Jr. Better Government Award for its investigation of electronic benefits transfer fraud. The Transportation Department team that investigated lapses in the Federal Aviation Administration's inspections program at Southwest Airlines won the Glenn/Roth Award for Exemplary Service. Education Department Inspector General John Higgins Jr., won the June Gibbs Brown Career Achievement Award. James Noeth, deputy inspector general for audit at the National Science Foundation, and Housing and Urban Development Department special agent Edwin Bonano both won awards for individual accomplishment.

-Alyssa Rosenberg, GovExec.com
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FederalNewsRadio - Ask the CFO - Charles Christopherson (USDA)

U.S. Department of Agriculture

Charles Christopherson - Chief Financial Officer

The Agriculture Department's financial management is on the mend in many ways.
USDA received a qualified opinion from its auditors, meaning there were questions about how one of its bureaus manages its money. The bureau and the entire department are on track to have a clean audit opinion for fiscal 2008.

The department is also making strides in implementing a new financial management system.
Both of these goals are part of Charles Christopherson's plans before he leaves USDA in January.
The Chief Financial Officer has about five months left in his term and his list of priorities are trying to set Agriculture on solid footing for years to come.

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Agencies choose vendors for financial systems

Agencies are increasingly choosing contractors as shared service providers for their modernized financial management systems over federal agencies that provide the same services. The first three large agencies to move to a shared service provider under the Financial Management Line of Business have selected contractors.

In the latest example, the Labor Department awarded a $50.4 million contract to Global Computer Enterprises on June 26 to develop and host a core financial management system to replace its mainframe accounting system The vendor will implement Oracle Federal Financial software for the department.

Agencies must use a public or private shared-services provider when they upgrade their financial management systems under the Office of Management and Budget’s Financial Management Line of Business consolidation initiative.

Meanwhile, two other agencies have chosen contractors to upgrade their financial systems over the federal agencies that act as shared service providers. The Environmental Protection Agency upheld its choice of CGI Federal in April to host its financial management software, after IBM protested the original award in February 2007. The Agriculture Department selected Accenture in September to modernize its financial systems.

The four agencies that provide financial management shared services are the Treasury Department’s Bureau of Public Debt, the Interior Department’s National Business Center, the Transportation Department and the General Services Administration.

Labor said it followed OMB's guidance for a competitive framework for the financial management effort and migration planning from GSA’s Financial Systems Integration Office.

-Mary Mosquera, FCW.com

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The Lean Six Sigma approach to transition

More and more agencies have been turning to business process improvement methodologies in the last few years. The goal is to further develop the way they meet their mission from a strategic and tactical point of view.

Now, some agencies are using one such methodology, Lean Six Sigma, to prepare them for the upcoming presidential transition.

The Agriculture Department is using Lean Six Sigma to help their career employees drive change in the government before, during and after the transition.

"They have to understand what the best practices are as they go forward," says Charles Christopherson, USDA's chief information and chief financial officer.

Along with Agriculture, the Defense, Treasury and the Veterans Affairs departments are among the agencies using Lean Six Sigma to improve their performance.

Christopherson says Lean Six Sigma is helping focus on their customer's needs.
But Lean Six Sigma also helps focus on functional areas that go across an agency.

-Jason Miller, FederalNewsRadio.com

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USDA IT budget boosts financial management modernization funds

President Bush requested $2.4 billion for information technology for the Agriculture Department in fiscal 2009, slightly higher than the $2.3 billion for this year, in his budget proposal unveiled today. Overall IT development and modernization is slightly lower for 2009 at $472.9 million from this year. But maintaining IT operations rises to $1.9 billion in 2009 from this year.

Financial management gets a significant boost from $51.3 million to $79 million, including the department’s financial modernization initiative and the Human Resources Line of Business.

-Mary Mosquera, FCW.com
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FederalNewsRadio - Ask the CFO - Karen Ratzow (USDA APHIS)

Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS)

Karen Ratzow - Acting Chief of Budget and Program Analysis

Even if you have never heard of APHIS, chances are you are aware of the work the agency does. On the job 24/7, APHIS is charged with protecting the health of the country's agriculture, constantly on guard against pests and diseases. Additionally, APHIS is responsible for monitoring genetically engineered organisms and administering the Animal Welfare Act. Ratzow says while it has been tough for APHIS to compete for resources, the agency has been working internally to better align the budget to help take on the most pressing threats. She says one factor contributing to the agency's recent success in this area has been support from senior APHIS officials. She also says working groups at the mid-level manager level have been especially effective in keeping all APHIS programs on track.

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