10.1: Employee Engagement/Culture Initiative

Develop an infrastructure to stimulate and support employee execution of open government activities at all levels of the Department.

Other Information:

Treasury can continue to develop an infrastructure to stimulate and support employee execution of open government activities at all levels of the Department. Detailed milestones need to be determined as to how the infrastructure will be developed. An employee engagement infrastructure will empower agency employees to execute actions that promote transparency, seek opportunities to increase citizen engagement, and collaborate with others across the government and outside the government. This infrastructure may include: •Incentives such as internal distinctions; •A central location for information that enables employees easily to find relevant open government information, such as policies, standards, tools, training, handbooks, and other similar guidelines. •Agency-provided training or commitment to enroll employees in training provided by others, such as Web Manager University and New Media Talks provided by GSA on open government-related subjects. Topics may include FACA, FOIA, Sunshine in Government Act, Federal Records Act, and other relevant laws or regulations. •Demonstrated commitment to open government by executives, including a communication plan for the open government message to be consistently communicated from top leadership. •Launch, to the extent practicable, the OMB guidance on the use of prizes to promote Open Government. It is important to recognize that this is a long-term endeavor and requires commitment by the Department to be successful. It also involves informing and educating employees across the Department about the open government initiative and the Department's activities supporting the initiative. Sustainable change that incorporates open government principles into all aspects of the culture at Treasury requires the support of senior level managers and leaders across the Department. Treasury's bureaus have various mission goals and operating needs that require the use of a variety of communication methods to ensure all employees stay informed and engaged in open government activities. It is important to find champions of change within each bureau to continue to assess the specific needs of each part of the organization regarding communications and engagement. As discussed under "Alignment with the Treasury Strategic Plan and Core Mission Areas", Treasury is finishing the development of a training module entitled "Transparency and Open Government Awareness" which will be available to all employees to give them an overview of the open government principles reflected in the President’s memoranda on transparency and open government and FOIA, and how these concepts affect their daily work activities. We will also roll out this Open Government Plan to all employees in a series of bureau meetings, brown bag sessions, workshops, and other activities. On-going communications will be needed to ensure the open government principles continue to be a part of each employee's every day activities, and will utilize a variety of methods to reach all employees, including memorandum, brochures, global e-mails, training sessions, to name a few. More robust use of technology will also assist with getting and keeping employees across Treasury engaged in these efforts, such as the on-line discussion tool on the Treasury portal, webcasts, and others.

Stakeholder(s):

• Employees

Indicator(s):

Indicator:1

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