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State Department: Actions Needed to Improve Embassy Management

NSIAD-96-1 Published: Mar 12, 1996. Publicly Released: Mar 12, 1996.
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Highlights

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Department of State's efforts to improve the management of its embassies, focusing on whether State has responded to previous recommendations concerning embassy management.

Recommendations

Recommendations for Executive Action

Agency Affected Recommendation Status
Department of State The Secretary of State should expand operational improvements to a minimum of 50 other embassies on a test basis to help improve operations. If the test demonstrates the applicability of these improvements in a variety of posts, the practices should be further expanded until the maximum benefits are achieved.
Closed – Implemented
Rather than test management improvements at 50 posts, State has chosen to address deficiencies across the board, relying on the improvement of senior embassy management using the Mission Program Plan (MPP) as a guiding tool. Since GAO endorsed MPP as a way to institutionalize management improvement efforts, and State has made utilization of this tool a high priority, GAO has closed this recommendation.

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Topics

Cost controlEmbassiesEmployment of foreign nationalsFederal property managementFinancial management systemsEmployee trainingInternal controlsManagement information systemsPersonal propertyManagement reengineering