Why Government Needs Innovators in a Budget Crunch

When the funding runs low, aren’t people supposed to hunker down and go with the tried and true? Don’t job seekers narrow their expectations? Well, TMP Government sees the opposite happening: Fewer resources can further innovation. As HR leaders and hiring managers struggle to make sense of pay and hiring freezes, present and prospective employees can be intrigued by the kind of challenges they won’t find anywhere else.

Author Steve Denning in a recent provocative article in Forbes has discussed the appeal of Challenge.gov, a site where government proposes problems and the public responds with solutions. This “crowdsourcing” has brought some wild ideas into serious government consideration: Stopping a car from fleeing a checkpoint with a remote-controlled vehicle that slips under the fugitive and nets the car with an air bag. An iPhone app that cautions you about stepping into a restaurant with health violations. Piecing together documents shredded into 10,000 pieces with computer algorithms and human assembly. No other single organization would be likely to pose such dilemmas and then serve as a clearing house for ideas.

TMP sees this focus on innovative challenges as a key part of any Federal Employer Value Proposition, especially during turbulent times. Here are four ways it can be done.

• 1.
  "When you don’t have resources, you become resourceful." So says Dr. K. R. Sridhar, co-founder and CEO of Bloom Energy, the Silicon Valley fuel cell company that began as a spin-off from NASA's Mars program and now seeks to make clean energy for everyone on earth. Tom Friedman quotes Dr. Sridhar in a recent column in the New York Times. With Taiwan as an example, Friedman notes that a workforce gets smarter and more capable because fewer resources demand greater creativity. Since Taiwan has virtually no natural resources, Friedman points out that "this barren rock in a typhoon-laden sea" has created the fourth-largest financial reserves in the world through developing people skills. He backs up his thoughts with a study from the OECD that shows that the knowledge and skills of the high school population in different countries rise where the GDP is less dependent on natural resources. Those countries tend to honor and support education, which is increasingly the "global currency" of success.
  LESSON: When training budgets get trimmed, employees need to find ways to get smarter with fewer resources. If mentoring isn’t available, consider self-directed ways they can enhance their careers. An example is MyCareer@VA (www.mycareeratva.va.gov), which is in itself an innovative approach to career building for the 300,000-plus employees of the Department for Veterans Affairs. The website, designed by TMP as a subcontractor to prime Federal Management Partners, makes use of advanced data visualization and recently received several Web marketing and human capital awards.
• 2.
  Restricted funds can encourage more innovative technology. In the March issue of National Defense, Lt. Col. Mark Ward, a USAF acquisitions officer deployed in Kabul, discusses the correlation between restricted funds and more innovative technology. He lays out advantages of "austere innovation" not only for military organizations, but also for the industry. His conclusion seems especially relevant to most organizations: defense and civil government, defense contractors, technology firms, even consumer companies. Ward writes, "We find that operating in a fiscally austere environment tends to result in affordable, simple products that are available when needed and effective when used. As an added bonus, the work force gets smarter and more capable. Everybody wins.”
  LESSON: When you become limited in your hires and promotions, you can still attract innovative thinkers to address challenges. For instance, the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) confronted a Base Realignment and Closures Act (BRAC) situation. In these relocations, usually only 15 to 20 percent of families are willing to move, and they tend to be the most experienced. In our discovery phase, TMP realized that the challenge of working in missile defense could be seen as comparable to such engineering feats as the Panama Canal, the Manhattan Project and the Apollo Project. Job seekers flocked to the website, which presented the challenge in a vivid way.
• 3.
  Take advantage of disruptive innovation, which brings more performance for less cost. A new study by Deloitte, Public sector, disrupted, highlights remotely piloted or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) as an example of disruptive innovation, a breakthrough that ultimately results in saving money (and lives) to get the job done. The study notes that too often government has been content with sustainable innovation, which may lead to greater performance while entailing more cost…not an ideal combination for today’s budgetary environment. Deloitte cites how a UAV can save hundreds of thousands of dollars over traditional aircraft for a similar function, such as surveillance.
  LESSON: Encourage and publicize thinking that leads to disruptive innovation. For example, TMP’s award-winning career website for the Air Force Flight Test Center at legendary “Right Stuff” Edwards Air Force Base features videos with employees expressing their contributions to testing solutions like UAVs.
• 4.
  Don’t wait for a thaw. Create an oasis of innovation now! In his Forbes article, Denning encourages government leaders: “ Don’t wait for the political bickering to end or the elephants at the top to get their act together. That may take forever. Instead, decide who are your primary stakeholders and make sense of your unit. Turn it into an oasis of innovation, by consistently delivering more value to your primary stakeholders sooner.”
  
  LESSON: Lead with value-based innovation in your recruitment communications. The chances are that typical economic benefits can be matched or maybe beat by other government and private sector employers. But the problems your agency solves for your stakeholders are uniquely yours. For instance, in developing a careers website for the Department of Energy, TMP emphasizes, “Only Here…Will You Define the Future of Energy.” The copy then backs up this promise with innovations that bring value to agency stakeholders: Groundbreaking international initiatives like the Global Nuclear Partnership. Solar power demonstration projects. Cutting-edge projects that convert captured carbon dioxide emissions from industrial sources into fuel, plastics and fertilizers.

Finally, if innovation is about adding value, so is government hiring. Federal agencies come under fire when it appears that they exist to perpetuate themselves and in doing so entail waste. Many of the most valued innovations we take for granted today, however, came forth out of the so-called bureaucracy. In fact, where would we be had not some researchers back in 1969 sought an alternative to switch-based telephone networks for communicating in a war zone? That year the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) launched the program called “the Internet.”

For more information on how TMP Government can help your agency attract and retain innovators, contact John Bersentes at john.bersentes@TMPGovernment.com or call him at 703-269-0092.

Follow the author, Ellis Pines, on Twitter (@EllisPines) and on his blog at http://www.meshworking.com/home/author/ellisppines

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