ASMC hosts the Department of Defense financial management workforce roundtable.

Dr. Wayne Schroeder

On Thursday, February 7, 2002, the American Society of Military Comptrollers (ASMO) hosted a Workforce Development Roundtable. This event kicked off a process to enable the Department of Defense (DoD) to ensure that the financial management workforce has the skills and abilities needed to adapt to the challenges it will face during the first years of the 21st century.

The roundtable was created to provide the DoD Financial Management Workforce Development Workgroup (a subgroup of the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) Comptroller's Financial Management Modernization Program) with the best possible thoughts and ideas from experts and financial management and personnel colleagues in the Department, other government agencies, and the private sector. Approximately 100 persons participated in the roundtable. The work group recommendations are due to the Under Secretary of Defense (Comptroller) in March of this year.

The introductory speaker was Dr. Wayne Schroeder, Deputy Under Secretary of Defense (Resource Planning/Management), who reiterated Dr. Dov S. Zakheim's strong commitment to "people" development and his tasking to strengthen the DoD financial management workforce. He commended ASMC for its leadership role in the professional development of financial management personnel and in hosting this conference.

Mr. Michael Montelongo, Assistant Secretary of the Air Force (Financial

Management and Comptroller), gave the keynote address. He stressed that the DoD financial management workforce was professional, competent, and dedicated. He emphasized that our future focus needs to move from transaction processing to strategic planning and decision support, similar to the changing roles of financial managers in the public sector. He also stressed the need for training in change management for financial managers at all levels, saying that you can buy all kinds of fine systems, but if you do not manage change well, you will surely fail. Despite all the changes, he said there will always be one constant. Our values (duty, honor, country, and selfless service) will not change. He concluded with the analogy of a carpenter building a house, saying that the participants were beginning to build the future of the financial management workforce and exhorted us to "build well!"

At midday ASMC welcomed Mr. David Walker, Comptroller General of the United States, as the luncheon speaker. This was his second appearance at an ASMC venue. He delivered the John R. Quetsch Memorial Lecture at last year's PDI in Dallas, Texas--the same day that his daughter was making him a proud grandparent!

He was pleased to be back and commended our effort, stating that people were indeed the most important asset in any organization. He discussed at length many of the things he is personally doing at the General Accounting Office (GAO) to build human capital. He spends about one-third of his time working on the human capital aspect of managing the GAO.

He talked at length about empowering people, giving them meaningful work and the training they need and rewarding them based on results and performance. He stated that many of the successful initiatives could be done without legislative change. Many of these are outlined on the GAO Web site at www.gao.gov.

Does it work? "Yes!"He said emphatically Initial term personnel turnover rates are down considerably at GAO, and last year the agency created approximately $65 billion in savings and efficiencies. He said that an agency's success is measured not only by a clean audit opinion on its financial statement alone but also by results and performance. People, he said, "come in to government to maximize their self worth, not their net worth." Investing in people, getting the right people in the right jobs, and rewarding them appropriately are essential to success.

Breakout Panels Addressed Tough Issues

Four separate breakout panels of approximately 30 persons each were convened during the morning and again in the afternoon. They addressed issues relating to establishing performance metrics, standardizing technical competencies, reinvigorating financial management recruitment and retention, and motivating people to pursue advanced degrees and professional certifications.

The panels were designed to be highly interactive. Two invited subject-matter experts addressed each panel, giving very brief presentations to stimulate thoughts and discussion among attendees. A facilitator led each group and presented some of the groups' ideas at the wrap-up session at the end of the day.

The speakers included Dr. Jerome Smith, DoD Chancellor for Education and Professional Development; Dr. Frederick L. Copeland, Partner, Learning Resource Group; Ms. Doris Chew, Assistant Executive Director, Joint Financial Management Improvement Program; and Mr. Jeffrey Steinhoff, Managing Director, Financial Management and Assurance wit the GAO. Mr. Steinhoff, as past National President of the Association for Government Accountants, was instrumental in creating the first professional certification program for government personnel, the Certified Government Financial Manager (CGFM) certification.

The wrap-up sessions reflected that the participants were creatively grappling with some hard issues. These included metrics selection and identification, linking metrics to missions and outputs, rewarding those who seek advanced education and certification, recruiting in the new paradigm of continued job change throughout a career, and integrating systems and people successfully. A number of follow-on meetings and briefings have already been set so that the working group can continue to progress in meeting its challenging task. We all await their recommendations.

Special thanks are due to ASMC members Ms. Donna Brown, Dr. Carol Codori, Ms. Geri Manning, and LCDR Dan Christovitch, who acted as panel facilitators, and to the firm of Booz-Allen/Hamilton, the corporate sponsor for the event. For a detailed report on this event, including agenda, biographies of all speakers, and useful Web sites, visit the ASMC Web site (www.asmconline.org) and click on Professional Development.