The Manager's Edge Companion Guide

Managing in the information-age bureaucracy.

IT Management Guides

Lucky for neophytes, federal agencies have produced the following guides for managing information technology, measuring its performance and merging it with business process improvements:

• GAO's "Executive Guide to Improving Mission Performance Through Strategic Information Management and Technology" has set the tone for every IT audit since its publication. It draws on private industry's experience to come up with 11 best IT practices. Get this guide and use it if you hope to survive scrutiny by congressional auditors. GAO/AIMD-94-115, May 1994.
• "Evaluating Information Technology Investments" contains the OMB Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs' step-by-step process for creating an organization that can take full advantage of IT investments.
• "Performance-Based Management: Eight Steps to Developing and Using Information Technology Performance Measures Effectively," is the General Services Administration's Office of Policy, Planning and Evaluation's contribution. The guide uses federal agency best practices to explain how to set and use performances for IT investments. It's available on the Performance Pathways page of GSA's IT Policy On Ramp.
• "Information Management Performance Measures: Developing Performance Measures and Management Controls for Migration Systems, Data Standards and Process Improvement" ($15) is another guide to devising IT performance measures. It was published by the National Academy of Public Administration and is based on a study conducted for the Defense Department. To order, call (301) 617-7801.
  

Reports, Periodicals and Books

Here you'll find reports outlining the government's IT predicament, periodicals providing up-to-date IT overviews, and IT books geared specifically for managers and executives.

• "Computer Chaos: Billions Wasted Buying Federal Computer Systems," a 1994 report by Sen. William Cohen, R-Maine, to the Senate Governmental Affairs oversight of government management subcommittee, spells out in chilling detail the sorry state of federal IT management.
• "Information Technology Investment: A Governmentwide Overview" is the General Accounting Office's snapshot of overall federal IT spending and agencies' problem projects. GAO/AIMD-95-208 July 1995.
  Available through the Web
• Government Executive: The magazine is described by many techno-savvy federal officials as a key source of timely information about emerging technology and case studies about how agencies are using IT. Government Executive publishes an IT section in most issues, a number of special IT supplements every year, as well as an annual "who's who" in government technology, "The Federal Technology Source." To subscribe, call (202) 739-8500.
• Business Week: An excellent source of easily understood information about how private industry is using IT, the magazine also publishes a number of special focus articles and supplements on IT each year. To subscribe, call: (800) 635-1200.
• Techno Vision: The Executives' Survival Guide to Understanding and Managing Technology, 1994, 198 pages, $19.95, McGraw Hill, N.Y. Author Charles Wang, CEO of software provider Computer Associates International Inc., is the guy behind those technology boot camps for executives called "The CEO in a Wired World." His book explores the disconnect between technologists and generalist executives and includes a handy, though slightly dated, guide to business technologies.
• The Politics of Information Management, 1995, 554 pages, $49, The Information Economics Press, New Canaan, Conn. Paul Strassmann, former principal deputy assistant secretary of Defense for command, control, communications and intelligence, draws on his long business career and experience running DoD's corporate information system to explain why information management equals power. It's a curative for those who gloss over the "information" in "information technology." From Strassmann, Inc.

On Line

This handful of World Wide Web sites offers a cornucopia of IT background material, publications and contacts.

• GSA's IT Policy On Ramp contains a vast array of material, all of it of potential interest and use to the IT-curious manager. It contains a "hot topics" section, updated weekly, pages that look more deeply into specific subjects, such as reengineering and performance measurement. The "Performance Pathways" page contains pithy digests of GPRA, ITMRA and FASA.
• A Business Researcher's Interests is a gateway to the Web sites of a huge number of articles, magazines, journals and experts on IT, covering such topics as reengineering, outsourcing, virtual corporations, Intranets and knowledge management. Yogesh Malhotra, an engineer and management consultant, created the site and regularly updates it. It's sponsored by the Association for Information Systems a professional group for information systems academics.
• Association for Federal Information Resources Management (AFFIRM) offers the newsletter, IT white papers and membership information of AFFIRM, a nonprofit organization of federal, academic and industry information resources management professionals.
• National Performance Review. You'll want to keep up with Vice President Gore's group since many governmentwide IT initiatives are created or honed by the NPR. The site houses Gore's reinvention plans along with a good collection of agency case studies, especially on customer service improvements.