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“"" Over the past couple of years the agency has been undergoing a transformation that includes a reorganization of our offices to better align with our mission and goals, but isn’ t limited to that. Rather, it is an effort to change the culture of the agency, to encourage more forward thinking, and to grapple with understanding how to execute our mission in a rapidly changing environment. So the goals of the transformation are really the goals of the innovation as well." ” -stated Pamela Wright, CINO of NARA, during an interview with GovLoop’s Spring Research Fellow, Kate Long.
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Recently, Kate Long, GovLoop’s Spring 2013 Research Fellow, had the pleasure of speaking with the Chief Innovation Officer (CINO) of the National Archives, Pamela Wright. As her title might imply, she can be considered one of the movers and shakers of agency innovation, as she sits at the center of a transformation within National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). The title of Chief Innovation Officer is a relatively new one in agencies. Wright is the first at NARA, donning the title this past December (2012), but it’s unlikely that she will be the last. The invention of this title shows that organizations are looking to give themselves a makeover and to overcome the public misperception that federal agencies are not innovative. However, NARA is one of the first agencies to develop a whole office dedicated to innovation.
Goals of Innovation at the National Archives 1. Work as one NARA At NARA, many agencies are disjointed, stovepiped in departments, offices, or business units, which halts progress and stifles innovation. At times, agencies conduct repetitive research because of the lack of communication between offices. NARA seeks to remedy this by developing internal structures to support communication. The Office of Innovation aims to be at the center of this communication while simultaneously pushing for increased innovation, “transferring knowledge across the units, within the agency” and ensuring that “the project of innovation will be projects that cross organizational boundaries,” says Wright.
NARA serves a variety of purposes, but the primary mission is to preserve the most important records of the federal government, and provide access to unclassified records to the public. Its holdings include documents and materials that Often agencies look to other agencies and organare of historical value, provide legal izations, especially abroad, in order to observe evidence, and record events in America’s near best practices. Wright says that she “want[s] NARA and distant past. to be out in front, to be a leader in the world of Wright states, “Over the past couple of years the archives and records management. We want to agency has been undergoing a transformation work with other institutions to advance archithat includes a reorganization of our offices to val theory and create innovative practices that better align with our mission and goals, but isn’t anticipate changes in information management limited to that. Rather it is an effort to change to and technology.” A way she is trying to achieve the culture of the agency, to encourage more forthis is by encouraging innovation, which encourward thinking, and to grapple with understanding ages forward thinking and, ultimately, improves how to execute our mission in a rapidly changing NARA’s ability to reach the goals of their mission. environment. So the goals of the transformation are really the goals of the innovation as well.”
2. Out in Front
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NARA’s efforts to transform the culture to better align with their mission follows trends throughout the federal government, including efforts by the White House to increase citizen engagement and transparency. The goals specific to NARA, however, show a clear understanding of what an agency needs to be in order to succeed. During the interview, Wright highlighted six innovation goals at National Archives, which are described in the next section.
3. NARA as an Agency of Leaders
Leadership is often cited as one of the most important parts of a successful program or agency, and at NARA, the goal is to become not just a leading agency, but also an agency full of leaders. Wright mentioned that all of the successful pilots her office has launched could not have existed without supportive leadership. Further,
she reminded us that leaders do not have to be managers; leaders can be any employee with a great idea. “The Office of Innovation has an opportunity to allow staff from anywhere across the agency to submit projects that they might want to do for innovation that would help them in their work where they are and we can support them with resources or staff to work on projects that they would initiate,” says Wright. The support can encourage the consideration of more “big ideas” that could help NARA become a trailblazer in the world of archives or in agency productivity.
4. A Great Place to Work One of the most common descriptions of “innovative workplaces” is that they are a great place to work. Encouragement for innovation sparks creativity and collaboration, and gives a feeling of value to those in the process. Wright says that the Office of Innovation wants “to create an environment where staff understand that they are the agency’s most vital resource and that their ideas get heard and they have avenues to explore those ideas.” A supported staff is a motivated staff, working diligently to push the agency forward with innovative ideas and solutions.
5. An Open NARA Today, transparency activities are essential across the federal government. This means transparency between agencies and the public (sharing data, explaining decisions) but it also means transparency within the organization. “That’s again working across organizational boundaries within NARA,” says Wright, “and working more openly also with the public and the agencies. We are opening up and seeking external viewpoints and solutions. We are offering stakeholders opportunities to participate with us.” Open communication is vital for efficiency and productivity.
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6. A Customer-Focused Organization “We’ve always been customer-focused,” says Wright. “In fact, the mission of the agency is to preserve and provide access to the permanent records of the federal government. Providing access to our records for the public has always been one of our goals,” to meet demands of customers, making records available through web searches is not enough anymore. Agencies, especially ones like NARA with huge records holdings, need to reach out more publicly and develop more modern ways to connect to constituents.
Innovated Projects The efforts lead by Pamela Wright and the Office of Innovation have been making progress in leaps and bounds. Two of her current projects highlight her efforts to support innovation in and around the agency: The Internal Collaboration Network and the Citizen Archivist Dashboard.
The Internal Collaboration Network The Internal Collaboration Network is a Jive software-based program that NARA piloted last year. Wright described the Internal Collaboration Network as a "social tool that allows staff from across the building and around the country throughout any of our organization structures to ask questions to find out what their colleagues are doing, to solve problems, to develop new ways to work with each other.” The Internal Collaboration Network includes project management software and document sharing capabilities in order to make communication and sharing across the agency (which has offices nationwide) easier and more efficient. This does not replace in-person meetings and collaboration, but it streamlines many processes when travel budgets and time restraints are tight. In a nutshell, it is the “marriage of new technology and tools with business needs to make us more efficient and change the way we do our work and the way we think of ourselves,” says Wright.
Citizen Archivist Dashboard The second innovation project is the Citizen Archivist Dashboard. Pamela Wright and her colleagues at NARA wanted to engage the public while meeting the goals of the agencies. To do this, they wanted to provide access to records and allow the public to help tag, transcribe, upload, describe and even write articles about the documents. To streamline the project, Wright says
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that they “decided to put all of these projects into a dashboard that made it more accessible. That made it easier for the public to work with this. So we provided a portal to folks who just wanted to come in and do something fun with us, and all of the work related directly to our mission to provide better access.” The Citizen Archivist Dashboard was an immediate success, allowing for thousands of hand-written pages to be transcribed. This initiative has also connected citizens from all sorts of backgrounds to connect with national records on any scale they choose, making the program an extremely successful citizen engagement tool.
One last bit of advice from Pamela Wright The above goals highlight what innovative agencies should do in order to keep moving forward. However, in tough fiscal climates with great uncertainty it is often hard to convince agency leaders to take a chance on an unfamiliar program. To remedy this, Wright suggests implementing pilot programs: “For anyone who is still in a culture that’s afraid of using new media tools and new social tools, my advice is to try a pilot...when we were at an impasse, we offered to simply pilot a project before going all in on a long-term effort, and we promised to take it down if anything bad happened. You can control a pilot, which gives a sense of security to those who fear trying new projects. Once people saw the pilots succeeding, they started to warm up to more long-term projects that use new media tools.” This method of introducing a program, social media or otherwise, takes the worry of permanence and irreversibility out of the equation and allows agencies to move forward without fear of negative repercussions. It’s one of the best ways to support innovation.
About Govloop GovLoop’s mission is to connect government to improve government. We aim to inspire public sector professionals by acting as the knowledge network for government. The GovLoop community has over 65,000 members working to foster collaboration, solve problems and share resources across government. The GovLoop community has been widely recognized across multiple sectors. GovLoop members come from across the public sector. Our membership includes federal, state, and local public servants, industry experts and professionals grounded in academic research. Today, GovLoop is the leading site for addressing public sector issues. GovLoop works with top industry partners to provide resources and tools to the government community. GovLoop has developed a variety of guides, infographics, online training and educational events, all to help public sector professionals become more efficient Civil Servants.
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Govloop Authors Kate Long Kate is the Spring 2013 Research Fellow at Govloop. She graduated with BA in English and History from SUNY New Paltz in 2012 and is currently pursuing her Masters degree in Library and Information Science at the University of Maryland, College Park. She is originally from Long Island, NY.
Carrie Moeger Carrie is the Spring 2013 Design Fellow at Govloop. She is currently studying Multimedia Design at the University of Wisconsin-Stout with a minor in Sociology. She is originally from River Falls, WI.
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