FY 1999 Performance Report
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Quality of Performance Data
Like all agencies, we are continuing to focus on the quality and reliability of the measures used to set and assess progress toward our goals. We emphasize formal, quantifiable methods for evaluating our effectiveness in accomplishing our objectives. We chose measures based on: 1) cost-effectiveness; 2) availability; 3) reliability and validity; and 4) meaningfulness to stakeholders. Our evaluation program emphasizes balanced, multiple measures that include effectiveness, timeliness, cost and customer satisfaction. Some examples of program measures include the balanced scorecard used to assess oversight reviews, usage statistics for information sites such as USAJOBS, increases in number of agencies providing family-friendly flexibilities, customer satisfaction from job seekers and annuitants, timeliness of new policy issuances, and financial savings from Governmentwide programs.
In addition to the program specific measurement information, we conduct two nationwide surveys periodically that enable us to track our impact over time. The OPM Customer Satisfaction Survey is given to two important groups of customers: all agency Human Resources (HR) directors; and a Governmentwide random sample of HR specialists. The survey includes questions about our policy leadership, technical assistance, information sharing, and service and product ratings. The first survey was given in 1998 and provided a baseline from which our progress can be tracked.
In 1999, we updated the survey to include questions about our newest initiatives and products and made a considerable effort to improve the response rate from 1998. For FY 1999, we did achieve a higher confidence level in the data from the HR specialists, by increasing our sample size. This increased sample size provided us with confidence level for reporting results of plus or minus two percentage points, at 95 percent confidence. Unfortunately, even though more than 50 percent of the HR Directors responded to our survey, the small overall population meant that we could not rely on the results with confidence. We therefore had to report that no data were available for a number of key indicators. We were disappointed that the specific actions we took in FY 1999 to increase response rates on both surveys did not result in such increases. We are reassessing our survey program for FY 2000, considering such options as changing the time period for survey administration, administering the survey only every two years to avoid survey “fatigue,” moving to an electronic survey method, shortening the questionnaire for the HR Directors, and using a structured questionnaire over the telephone to a smaller sample of respondents.
The Merit System Principles Questionnaire (MSPQ) is distributed to a nationwide random sample of Federal employees in the last quarter of the year, with results timed to be used in oversight reviews during the subsequent year. This questionnaire includes questions on the perception of merit principles and human resources management (HRM) effectiveness, including effective use of employees. OPM program offices use the results as surrogate measures of certain objectives and as indicators of needed improvements in policy. However, because the MSPQ was not designed for measuring performance, results must be supported by related objective data from other sources to provide a complete picture of performance results. The FY 2000 survey (given in late 1999) was significantly shortened and the questions were reorganized and refocused on the respondents’ immediate work unit and experience. As a results of these changes, we could not compare the results of this survey to prior year data. Therefore, several key indicators in this report are listed as having no data. The data from the new survey will be reported as the baseline in next year’s performance report, and will be used to track performance over the following four years. Although this was a significant loss of data for the FY 1999 report, the changes in the survey will result in improved measurement in the future.