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Strategic Goals for the NIOSH Construction Program - Requesting Stakeholder Input on DRAFT Goals and Performance Measures

Strategic and Intermediate Goals and Performance Measures - 10/20/08 Revision
 PDF only 884 KB (131 pages)

The NIOSH Construction Program is in the process of developing "strategic goals" to guide our construction research and partnership efforts over the next decade. NIOSH is interested in your review and comments on the draft goals. This background piece explains:

1. The purpose of "strategic goals";
2. The NIOSH "program portfolio" approach; and
3. How you can assist the development of construction research strategic goals.

1) STRATEGIC GOALS

NIOSH previously used "priority" topic areas (e.g. traumatic injury, hearing loss) to guide research efforts. Goals take this approach a step further by identifying specific outcomes that we want to target, performance measures for evaluating progress in meeting the outcome goals, and intermediate goals to describe the necessary steps that need to be performed to accomplish the goal. The construction goals effort began with a NIOSH briefing to OSHA's Advisory Committee on Construction Safety and Health (ACCSH) in February of 2005. Since then, NIOSH subject matter teams have developed 8 strategic goal candidates.

Setting goals is challenging because:

• It forces us to focus on a subgroup of issues where we think NIOSH can make an impact - a long list would spread our resources too thin to accomplish the goals. Not every worthwhile topic can be included.
  
  
• It is difficult to develop performance measures. Injury statistics are available but there are limitations and exposure and health outcome measures are typically not available.
  
  
• It is ambitious for NIOSH to set goals to affect outcomes such as reductions in a national fatality rate. NIOSH is a research agency so we don't often directly influence outcomes - we must partner well and influence other groups to show results.

2) NIOSH PROGRAM PORTFOLIO APPROACH

NIOSH has been organizing research, guidance, information, and service efforts into specific "programs" that can be readily communicated and strategically governed and evaluated. There are eight NORA Sector Programs representing industrial sectors, and fifteen Cross-sector Programs organized around adverse health outcomes, statutory programs and global efforts. In addition to these program areas, NIOSH has organized seven Coordinated Emphasis Areas to support the Sector and Cross-Sector Programs. The complete list of programs can be found on the NIOSH Program Portfolio page at http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/programs .

The NORA Sector Programs intersect with Cross-Sector Programs in a matrix-like fashion. For example, a Construction Program goal of reducing fall injuries would likely be a shared goal with the Traumatic Injury Cross-Sector Program and if appropriate would be adopted by both programs. This approach provides an added advantage and will allow multiple Programs to work towards accomplishment of intersecting goals.

Each of the 30 programs in the NIOSH Program Portfolio has a Manager and Coordinator. Each of the 8 NORA Sector Programs will have a "Research Council" to engage external stakeholders in the process of developing sector program goals and methods to measure the short-term, intermediate and long term outcomes arising from those goals. Each cross-sector program will have a "Steering Committee" which will also develop program goals and monitor outcome measures.

These planning efforts will position NIOSH to align with the most current governmental approaches for evaluating program effectiveness, i.e., the "Program Assessment Rating Tool" or PART. PART is a mechanism to hold governmental agencies accountable for accomplishing results. As part of our comprehensive approach to performance measurement, NIOSH has engaged the National Academies to independently evaluate our sector and cross-programs for relevance and impact. See http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/nas/ for additional information.

3) CONSTRUCTION GOALS:

Accompanying this background piece is a PDF file of the current Construction strategic goals. These goals represent the latest revision and refinement of the goals for the Construction Sector. NIOSH will use these goals to target intramural and extramural construction research efforts.

NIOSH welcomes continued review and comment on the goals. The Construction Strategic Goals are always a "work in progress," subject to refinement and change. We will use the NIOSH E-news to report on future revisions and to report on research progress toward the attainment of the goals.
We encourage you to consider partnering with us on goals-related issues of interest to you and your organization.