Citiwire.net

For Release Sunday, January 10, 2010
© 2009 Washington Post Writers Group

NEW YORK — Why can’t humans–intelligence officials, for example–communicate better? And what’s a possible cure?

The close call on an airliner Christmas Day has resurrected and underscored a problem already targeted in the 9/11 investigations: highly trained officers failing to share critical intelligence clues across agency lines.

Why are we repeating the same errors? How do we “fix” the system?

A week after the near-disaster of the Detroit-bound jet, an intriguing remedy–at least a possible answer–cropped up. And not in official Washington, but rather in Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s third-term inaugural address in New York City.

Bloomberg recalled a successful effort he’d introduced in private business–temporarily reassigning senior managers to new areas, “an eye-opening exercise that improved teamwork, generated new ideas, and launched the company to greater heights.”

So, said the mayor, within a few days he’d start reassigning every one of New York’s first deputy commissioners to become a deputy for three weeks at another agency– “one they regularly work with,” working directly with that agency’s commissioner– “side by side, 24/7.”

Bloomberg didn’t mention our national intelligence breakdowns, but he did identify a highly relevant goal– “to break down the bureaucratic barriers that too often impede innovation, compromise customer service, and cost taxpayers money.”

One has to wonder–Wouldn’t we (and national security) benefit if State, CIA, NSA, FBI–the whole alphabet of federal intelligence-based agencies–broke down their barriers in similar fashion?

Each of his deputy commissioners, Bloomberg said, will be obliged to “report directly back to me with recommendations for ways their own agencies–and the agencies they’ve been assigned to–can work more closely together to improve their performance.”

Bloomberg continued: “This is not a game of musical chairs. This is a management challenge, and a unique opportunity for collaboration and innovation.” And, he added: “As I tell everyone I hire, don’t screw it up.”

The nation would do well to keep its eyes on Bloomberg’s experiment–and not just in the interest of a formula that might get intelligence departments communicating quickly and effectively, in our pressing national interest.

The serious issue of failing to talk early and share information, often and creatively across the “silos” of department and agency lines isn’t new. It’s deeply ingrained. And you can find it at any level of government–federal, state or local–wasting enormous public wealth and benefit in the process..

I’d argue it starts at the neighborhood, city and regional level. Ask what makes an area successful? Is it adequate police or fire protection, social services, schools, libraries, or quality maintenance of our shared space on streets and public places? Or “unseen” services ranging from clean water to sanitation services? The answer, clearly, is “all of the above.”

Yet in fact, there are many local agencies that fail to talk with one another in more that a perfunctory way–especially across municipal lines. Each exists in its separate “silo.” There are few bureaucratic (or political) rewards for coordination or risk-taking partnerships. So money is wasted and the quality of life is lower than smart, coordinated teamwork might deliver.

Tick up to the state level and the silos are just as pronounced. Human services, transportation, environmental protection, law enforcement–each normally operates in its own orbit, fairly oblivious of the others.

The federal government? It’s become, the Brookings Institution’s Bruce Katz said last year, “an ossified network of specialized and balkanized agencies at a time when most challenges require integrated solutions that ‘join up’ related areas of domestic policy.”

The Obama administration is at least trying to implement some coherence by getting its housing, transportation, energy and environmental protection agencies to coordinate field operations.

Several states–among them Virginia, Iowa and Utah–are emulating corporate ideas of an “enterprise-wide perspective” including common training of executives, shared procurement and information technology services that can drive down costs. Two Massachusetts governors–Michael Dukakis and Mitt Romney–both made classic efforts to set clear state growth policies and then get their relevant departments working in unison to achieve coordinated results. Many far-sighted mayors try the same.

But it’s always tough sledding because department heads and entrenched bureaucrats alike typically think (even unconsciously)– “This is my turf. Knowledge, ultimate authority, is in my head. Asking me to share is either a threat or an insult.” Perhaps it goes back to America’s cultural norms: “It’s about me, the rugged individual.”

But there may be hope. Martin O’Malley, with his “CitiStat” operation as Baltimore’s mayor and now “StateStat” as governor of Maryland, has pushed tough, data-driven accountability of department heads and other key officials “facing the music” together in joint sessions. Several other cities have emulated the model.

And now we have Bloomberg’s experiment of cabinet officials not only observing, but critiquing and reporting back to him on the performance of each others’ departments. A dose of parallel discipline in intelligence circles might make us all safer.

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