Ramping Up Homeland Security

ramers of the Homeland Security Department face the ultimate test.

During my five decades of military and civilian service, the most difficult challenges were creating new organizations and reforming old ones. I was involved in two significant organizational feats of the past half century-the post-World War II restructuring of the armed forces and the creation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. I learned that intransigent bureaucracies stymie reform and render nascent organizations impotent. Rapidly changing environments demand flexible and agile organizations to meet operational needs. If the proposed Homeland Security Department is denied the flexibility required to counter the threat of terrorism, it will fail.

Placing more than 170,000 people un-der a single agency head and merging 22 agencies with 17 sets of procedures and seven pay scales into a new department is a Herculean task. We cannot afford the luxury of spending decades getting the department up and running properly, as we did with the military reorganization and NATO.

To make matters worse, merging civilian agencies is more difficult than merging military ones. Civilian agencies lack the central organizing principle that binds the military services. Those agencies have different missions, policies and procedures. If we fail to harmonize these disparate systems, the result will be a collection of 22 different plans, budgets, policies and methods of operation, often working at cross-purposes.

President Bush's strategy for the Homeland Security Department includes "21st century approaches to personnel and procurement policies" and "broad reorganization authority to enhance operational effectiveness as needed." Without sufficient managerial, personnel, and fiscal flexibility, the new department will be handicapped.

Current civil service rules protect whistleblowers and grant civilian employees the right to bargain collectively. But the president has discretionary powers over personnel and budgetary matters for organizations involved with national security, such as Defense, the National Security Agency, and the Central Intelligence Agency. The Homeland Security Department should be no different. Agencies that have successfully adopted new, more flexible personnel policies shouldn't be forced to abandon them under the new department.

Over the years, civil service regulations have changed little, and reform is being fiercely contested by at least 17 unions. I can attest to the great frustration of waiting four months to bring new employees on board or to shift them to new positions because of civil service rules. Even when I was not trying to fire someone, but put him in a more appropriate spot, I was required to build a day-by-day record and forced to prove my case. The unions' work to prevent injustices and discrimination is commendable. However, in times of heightened security threats, especially during times of war, people must be willing to make adjustments to enable organizations to accomplish their missions.

Competition in the private sector is the driving force behind greater productivity and improved efficiency. Since government bureaucracies do not have competitors, they have not kept pace with the organizational advances in the private sector. Even highly competitive and efficient companies often experience an 18- to 24-month dip in productivity and profits after mergers. How could the new Homeland Security Department, the result of a massive merger with a bloated bureaucracy and antiquated personnel management policies, hope to avoid a similar decline in efficiency? We cannot afford to follow either the government or commercial example. The security of the United States is at stake.

Efficiencies of scale at the Homeland Security Department would mean that redundant management positions (planning, policy, budgeting and administration, for example) would either disappear or be merged or moved from the agencies to designated undersecretaries. Eliminating stovepipes would strengthen the focus on common mission areas. But if every job in the new department were protected by current civil service rules, such moves could not be made. The department would be hamstrung from the start.

Also, Congress should not be allowed to micromanage funding for the new department. Legislative guidelines are necessary, but they should be broad enough to permit managers a great deal of latitude. And Congress should limit the number of committees that would oversee the new department.

The administration should find creative ways to put together the Homeland Security Department rapidly. Detailing military personnel to the new department may be the solution to getting it functioning in a hurry. Rather than following the elaborate procedures necessary to hire necessary talent, many departments simply request people on detail, especially in the higher echelons of management. When I became President Reagan's special representative for arms control, only one member of my staff was a civil service employee; six were drafted from the military, and one came from the U.S. Information Agency.

Staffing the offices of the Homeland Security secretary, deputy and six undersecretaries initially with military personnel would kill two birds with one stone. First, it would provide highly trained and skilled managers who are used to working on joint programs. Second, it would provide employees who are not beholden to any of the 22 agencies being folded into the department. As civil servants are trained and gain experience in the new organization, they could be promoted to higher ranks, replacing the military detailees.

Another innovation would be the creation of a Senior Security Service to parallel the Senior Executive Service. The SES, formed in 1980, has established innovative methods to train and groom managers for promotion and resembles the system of promoting people to general and flag rank in the military.

It has been suggested that creation of the Homeland Security Department should be the primary vehicle for a much-needed overhaul of the entire civil service system. Such an overhaul may be necessary, but the task shouldn't be placed on the back of the new Homeland Security secretary. Many reforms would be highly controversial and hotly contested. A wholesale overhaul should be done deliberately through carefully crafted legislation. Only the changes necessary for the rapid establishment and operation of the Homeland Security Department should be made now.

Establishing an effective Homeland Security Department in the shortest possible time requires ingenuity. There is much more to forming an organization than forming its units, staffing them rapidly and providing incentives for its leaders.

First and foremost, the department needs a set of shared values. It needs to devise management processes and performance measurements. It requires a flexible personnel structure. The requisite skills should be clearly defined and people hired quickly. The organization's attitudes and behavior must lead to a common culture. A well thought out, overarching strategy is essential. Above all, the department needs strong leadership.

The matters of personnel and budgetary flexibility that have stalled the creation of the new department are not trivial. But these devilish details often cause new organizations to founder. Most new organizations need annual reviews to allow them to evolve. As part of these reviews, personnel and budgetary procedures can be perfected. To assure employee concerns are taken into account, the legislation creating the Homeland Security Department could contain a sunset clause requiring a thorough review after five years.

Conquering terrorism requires a fight on two fronts. The war will be a long one. the 1986 Goldwater-Nichols Act forced the military services to act jointly, allowing the war on terrorism abroad to succeed. However, lacking a similar civilian organization, the war on the domestic front has barely begun.

Only prompt action will help prevent terrorist attacks and assure prompt recovery if they occur. Otherwise, the secretary will march into the fight with hands tied, and American citizens will lose.