Foreign Relations of the United States, 1969–1976, Volume XXXVIII, Part 2, Organization and Management of Foreign Policy; Public Diplomacy, 1973–1976

115. Executive Summary of a Paper Prepared in the Department of State¹

Washington, undated.

LINKING RESOURCE MANAGEMENT TO DECISION-MAKING: A STRUCTURAL APPROACH

Executive Summary

As a practical matter the Secretary and the Deputy Secretary are normally unable to devote as much of their time and energy as they might wish to the management of the Department. The amount of attention afforded by them to the management task accordingly may well depend on the extent to which the resource allocation process is linked to the decision-making process.

The deliberations of the Management Reform Task Forces prompted several actions which were to provide for a closer relationship between these processes. Management Reform Bulletin No. 24 of July 1971 describes these actions which involved limited structural changes.² In fact, the integration of the principal management functions—personnel and budget—was to be achieved without organizational change.

To institutionalize the linkage between resource management and decision-making, the structure of the Department has to be modified. This step is also required to assure the continued and orderly growth of the PARA system.³

Additionally, this modification must meet certain minimal conditions for the Deputy Under Secretary for Management—the Seventh Floor principal charged with exercising the Deputy Secretary’s responsibilities for the allocation of resources—to be able to perform his core tasks.

—M must divest himself of direct supervision of activities not central to his core responsibilities.

—The main resources of the Department—personnel, budget, and management support systems (including PARA)—must be organizationally located under M and eventually integrated.

—M must have a capability for determining resource management information requirements and for developing and operating systems to satisfy these requirements.

—M must continue to provide day-to-day guidance to S/IG to ensure the interrelationship of policy and program evaluation with the PARA process.

—Management activities such as substantive and administrative reporting; regulations, directives, and delegations of authority; manpower utilization, analysis, and control; records management; etc. have to be placed in an office under M.

In a large measure the foregoing conditions echo the intent of the changes announced in MRB No. 24:

“To give concrete support to the managerial role of the Deputy Secretary, the management functions of personnel, budget, evaluation, and methods development now delegated directly to the Deputy Under Secretary for Administration [redesignated “Management”] will be delegated to him through the Deputy Secretary.”⁴

The required organizational changes should be implemented incrementally to permit structure and process (i.e., PARA) to develop in tandem and to minimize the impact of the disruptive energy that usually attends such realignments.

Charts 1 and 2 depict the immediate/mid-term and long-term organizational patterns proposed to institutionalize the linkage between resource management and decision-making. These charts are at Tab A.⁵

An Implementation Plan and Schedule is at Tab B.

A more detailed description of the entire proposal is at Tab C.

Management Reform Bulletin No. 24 of July 1971 is at Tab D.

1. Source: National Archives, RG 59, General Administrative Correspondence Files of the Deputy Under Secretary for Management, 1968–75: Lot 78 D 295, Reorganization 1968–73. No classification marking. The main body of the paper, dated May 1973, is attached at Tab C but not printed. Drafted by Gerald J. Goldman (M/MS) on an unspecified date in March 1973. The linkage of management and decisionmaking had previously been studied by Task Force XIII, one of 13 task forces created by Deputy Under Secretary of State for Administration William Macomber in January 1970 to study Department of State managerial problems (see Foreign Relations, 1969–1976, vol. II, Organization and Management of U.S. Foreign Policy, 1969–1972, Document 312). Task Force XIII’s recommendations and actions taken to implement them were printed in Management Reform Bulletin No. 24 on July 6, 1971. For more on the Department’s management reform progress following the task forces’ reports, see ibid., Document 336. The preface of the paper, summarized in the Executive Summary, sought further reforms in order to meet Nixon’s goal of achieving “management excellence in the Executive Branch” during his second administration.
2. Attached at Tab D but not printed. For the text, see the Department of State Bulletin, July 26, 1971, pp. 103–109.
3. Introduced in 1971, the Policy Analysis and Resource Allocation system (PARA) was designed, among other things, to ensure that U.S. foreign policy interests and objectives were “explicitly defined,” to improve long-range planning by identifying issues at an early stage, to stimulate “rigorous policy review and self-appraisal,” and to “ensure that the resources of the Department—and of other foreign affairs agencies—are related in the most effective way possible to policy objectives and programs.” For more on the development of PARA, see Foreign Relations, 1969–1976, vol. II, Organization and Management of U.S. Foreign Policy, 1969–1972, Document 343.
4. Brackets in the original.
5. Tabs A and B are attached but not printed.