More Thoughts on Panetta

In an interview with former Indiana Rep. Tim Roemer, Marc Ambinder gets confirmation of his observation yesterday that dealing with the workforce and morale at CIA will be one of Leon Panetta's biggest challenges as director. Roemer says:

Secondly, one of the key issues is managing the young work force at the CIA, balancing our electronic and satellite capabilities with a human intelligence network that can penetrate some of these groups around the world....The challenge there -- we've got one of the youngest workforces since 9/11 in any of the government agencies... and it's very diversified, and getting more diversified....that's a strength.

Some commentators have noticed that CIA veterans might resent Panetta for overseeing Clinton-era budget cuts at the agency. Others have batted back and forth whether Panetta's lack of intelligence experience matters But if the intelligence workforce is really the most important thing Panetta has to address, it's more important to consider what he's like as a manager, and how he handles major transitions. Because Panetta's taken on a troubled agency with an elite staff before.

This 1994 National Journal profile (If it's under a pay barrier let me know, and I'll try to get it out) of Panetta at the Office of Management and Budget provides an interesting look at how he took on some similar challenges. Obviously, the parallels between OMB and the CIA aren't exact, but the experience does suggest a couple of things about Panetta's management style.

1. He's eager to learn about things he doesn't know very much about. Panetta was a budget expert when he took over at OMB, but he didn't know very much about evaluating performance or about OMB's management division. Nicholas Masters, then a lobbyist who had worked with Panetta on the Budget Committee, is frank in saying Panetta was pretty clueless about management, but that he worked hard to make up for that lack of knowledge.

2. He's willing to shift positions if his first proposal doesn't work. Panetta originally supported separating OMB into two separate offices, one that handled management, and one that handled budget. The budget office was probably overstaffed: of 550 total OMB analysts, 160 at most were working on management. But, as the profile shows, he changed his mind:

Instead of "never the twain shall meet," OMB 2000 fuses management and budget into a single function. As the report, which was signed by Panetta and Rivlin, states, "Having led this institution for over a year ... we are convinced that management is integral to budget and vice versa."

"I thought that you would never be able to integrate the two," Panetta explained. He attributes his change of view in large part to the National Performance Review. "The fact that we were stressing management, and that we were going to cut the equivalent of 272,000 full-time employees (throughout the federal government) gave us the momentum." The issue became one of how to run a smaller and less costly agency. "How do you solve that problem? You scream and bitch a lot, but you have to make it work. That's why we had to bring those two elements into one office."

Obviously, it's been a while since Panetta made the link between budgeting and performance. But unless his beliefs on the matter have changed substantially, understanding that connection means Panetta has already grappled with a challenge that many agencies are only beginning to address. And because he took on performance at OMB, he understands both how that agency's management challenges, and how OMB tries to measure the success or failure of management elsewhere. Does that mean Panetta can fix CIA on day one? Of course not. Does it mean he's a management guru? Probably not either. (No matter what anthems to great managers 30 Rock delivers, no one is a perfect visionary.) But it does mean Panetta's got a sense of what it's like to work in a troubled, unbalanced agency that is trying to realign itself.