Lurita Doan, the former Administrator of the General Services Administration (GSA) who was forced by the White House to resign in April, will now be filling a regular weekly slot on Federal News Radio. Her show, called "Leadership Matters," first aired this morning and will present her unfiltered views on government leadership.
Despite impressive achievements, Doan was a polarizing figure during her 22-month tenure at GSA and was investigated on charges of violating the Hatch act and interference in contract negotiations. However, it seems to have been a personal feud over whistleblower complaints with her agency's inspector general that lead the White House to force her resignation.
Former GSA colleagues have commented that Doan was very critical of the media's portrayal of her and are not surprised that she is now a member of that very group. They say she is well suited to radio because of her contrarian personality and predict that her show will be a success.
Doan's inaugural appearance focused on fiscal discipline in the era of a record $490 billion federal deficit. She encouraged the government to follow the advice of management guru, Peter Drucker. She recommended allowing programs that no longer provide value to the citizens to "sunset" and transfer that funding to meaningful ones; but used her own personal experience to caution that this is difficult for many reasons including the "blame game."
She went on to state that the entrepreneurial instincts of government employees, who are the ones who know better than anyone that there are many sources of wasteful spending within the government, should be encouraged, and Congress should give individual agencies more flexibility in budgeting. We couldn't agree more.
A major first step in the right direction would be to reward those divisions and agencies that do not spend their annual budgets instead of punishing them by lowering their budgets for the following year, as is the current practice. Divisions or agencies that demonstrate greater frugality by doing more with less should accrue points that function like goodwill. The greater the points, the greater leeway they should be granted for funding their requests in the future. And a portion of the money saved could be used for bonuses to reward those who keep the taxpayer in mind and find innovative ways to save. Wouldn't that be a governmental novelty!
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