Office of the Chief Financial Officer Major Accomplishments
GSA Budget Development
Major improvements were made to the GSA Performance Management Process (PMP) in FY 2007, significantly improving its utility in formulating the FY 2009 GSA budget submission. Most notably, the improved process required that all proposed FY 2009 budget initiatives include quantifiable estimates of the associated return on investment and/or increase in performance. Using the improved PMP process, the GSA Administrator was provided with comprehensive, data driven financial and performance analysis, allowing her to make informed budget decisions. As a result, GSA delivered an FY 2009 budget submission to OMB that was both within OMB’s guidance and fully consistent with the Administrator’s policy and fiscal goals.
In its role as the Controller for GSA’s General Management and Administration (GM&A) functions, the OCFO worked hard to support the Administrator’s goal of reducing the cost of services provided to GSA’s customers. Providing common support functions such as human resources, financial management, and information management centrally to all GSA organizations significantly reduces their total cost to the Agency. Through aggressive application of the Performance Management Process (PMP) and extensive, cooperative interaction with the GM&A service providers, the OCFO was able to reduce GM&A costs in the FY 2007 budget by nine percent, a saving of over $15 million from FY 2006.
Organization and Process Improvements
In FY 2007, the OCFO continued the development and implementation of the Federal Integrated Solutions Center (FISC) as a means to facilitate GSA’s role as a financial management shared service provider. The FISC provides integrated shared services that enhance effectiveness, improve efficiency, and reduce risk for Federal government agencies, enabling them to focus on their core missions. The OCFO’s FY 2007 focus was on standing up FISC services and establishing partnerships with small to mid-sized agencies to deliver these services. GSA’s long-term goal is for the FISC to become the leading provider of expert, integrated process, technology, and management solutions to Federal government agencies.
Financial transaction and system operations are at the core of the services provided by the GSA financial management community. The OCFO delivers these services both internally to GSA and externally to other governmental agencies and commissions. Pursuant to GSA’s goal to be a government-wide leader in these business offerings, GSA is working to achieve efficiencies by streamlining financial transaction processing. During FY 2007, the OCFO completed an initiative to map out all of the processes required to perform accounts receivable, accounts payable, asset management, cash and disbursement operations, and financial reporting services. This initiative identified a number of potential process improvements for study and improvement during FY 2008.
Another key financial initiative was the creation of the OCFO Executive Scorecard. To ensure that GSA is managing its customer’s money in full compliance with all statutory requirements, the OCFO began producing aging reports on unfilled customer orders, accounts receivable, accounts payable, obligations, and Charge Card logging. These reports were consolidated into a monthly OCFO Executive Scorecard which helps focus GSA financial staff and senior management on older and possibly invalid data residing in its systems. The scorecard provides managers with an unambiguous snapshot of current organization performance and indicates where management attention should be focused to prevent future problems. The OCFO Executive Scorecard has successfully focused GSA financial management resources on identifying errant data and purging it from GSA financial systems, helping to ensure the financial integrity of GSA and its customers.
In the area of financial management systems, GSA is working to implement a world class shared services financial system enterprise that meets customer needs and positions GSA to provide efficient and effective IT services, today and for the long term. Throughout FY 2007, the OCFO worked to unify GSA financial management systems operations through Financial Management Enterprise Architecture (FMEA), replace GSA’s remaining legacy financial system modules, simplify financial management information access, and offer a high-quality delivery of services that meet GSA customer requirements. As part of its continuing effort to modernize GSA’s financial applications, GSA implemented cost allocation, vendor self-service, and E-Gov Travel modules, with implementation of E-authentication planned for the near future. In addition, final planning and acquisitions are underway for two major functional areas—billing and accounts receivable, and asset management. Much of the required development and planning work was completed in FY 2007, positioning GSA to begin implementation in FY 2008. The OCFO also works diligently to ensure that GSA was in full compliance with all Federal financial management systems requirements. A significant step was implementation of a major version upgrade to GSA’s financial management commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) application to help maintain Financial System Integration Office (FSIO) compliance.
Internal Controls and Audits
GSA made a major effort in FY 2007 to further implement the latest A-123 policy management and internal control requirements throughout GSA’s nationwide programs. To achieve these new mandatory government-wide requirements, the OCFO expanded the process of conducting risk assessments for all GSA programs, incorporating risk-based testing into internal control reviews, and tracking implementation of internal control review recommendations. In addition, the OCFO established a fully functional internal control database, providing all GSA employees with a central location to electronically complete assurance statements, risk assessments, and internal control reviews. The OCFO also significantly improved its automated system for tracking audits and required follow-up actions. As a result, GSA was able to meet all of its audit deadlines on time in FY 2007.