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Strategic Objective

Invest in SBA’s employees

Strategic Objective

Invest in the Agency’s employee recruitment, hiring, training, work-life programs and performance management so employees are engaged to more effectively serve small businesses.

Lead Office: Office of Human Resource Solutions

Themes:

Management

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Overview
Progress Update

Overview

The SBA makes training and leadership development a priority. The Office of Human Resources Solutions develops strategic human capital solutions to workforce issues and strives to create a work environment that attracts and retains the talented and high-performing workforce the Agency needs in order to accomplish its mission. Attracting high quality employees is just the start of the process; establishing work-life balance and delivering training and leadership opportunities helps staff thrive in the workplace and effectively serve small businesses.

Progress Update

The SBA Office of Human Resources Solutions (OHRS) engaged in consultation with hiring managers to clarify their mission requirements and target recruiting efforts. The applicant pools were better aligned with SBA’s needs, which resulted in an average time to hire of 97 days, which is three days below the Agency’s target of 100 days. Furthermore, strengthened collaboration with hiring managers concerning special hiring authorities resulted in a larger pool of highly qualified candidates. The SBA also deepened its understanding of employee perspectives by conducting themed snapshot surveys (e.g., recommending SBA as a Great Place to Work), as a continuation of OPM’s FEVS. The Agency’s current efforts are focused on supporting strategies to increase the Employee Engagement Index score to 67 percent by the end of FY 2017 to meet the President’s employee engagement goal.

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Strategic Goals

Strategic Goal:

Building an SBA that meets the needs of today’s and tomorrow’s small businesses

Statement:

Building an SBA that meets the needs of today’s and tomorrow’s small businesses

Strategic Objectives

Strengthen, streamline and simplify program operations

Statement:

Streamline, simplify, and strengthen SBA’s core programs and operations to ensure that they are high performing, effective and relevant to the needs of the small business community.

Description:

Entrepreneurs, small business owners and lenders have limited time and resources. The SBA works to continuously strengthen, streamline and simplify its programs to meet their needs. The SBA improved processes for managing fraud, waste and abuse, and; made strategic investments in its physical and IT infrastructure. These ongoing efforts have contributed to improved delivery of services and more efficient processes. The SBA also continues to move from paper-based processes to electronic platforms and to reduce overhead through its efforts to promote effective and efficient operations which include reducing travel expenses, consolidating real estate, improving fleet management and reducing redundancies in IT functions.

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Invest in SBA’s employees

Statement:

Invest in the Agency’s employee recruitment, hiring, training, work-life programs and performance management so employees are engaged to more effectively serve small businesses.

Description:

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Mitigate risk to taxpayers and improve oversight across SBA programs.

Statement:

Mitigate risk to taxpayers and improve oversight across SBA programs.

Description:

Taxpayers, including entrepreneurs and small business owners, expect that their tax dollars are being used wisely. SBA programs give taxpayers a strong “bang for the buck,” and the Agency will continue to find ways to mitigate risk while ensuring that small businesses have access to and fully benefit from its programs. With an outstanding loan portfolio of over $100 billion, oversight of small businesses’ eligibility in tens of billions of government contract set-asides, a network of hundreds of grantee partners delivering counseling and training to over a million clients a year, and direct fiscal responsibility for the annual budget, the SBA has an extraordinary responsibility to taxpayers to mitigate risk and conduct oversight of its programs.

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FY 14-15 Priority Goal: Maximize Small Business participation in government contracting

Statement:

Maximize small business participation in federal government contracting to meet the statutory goals and reduce participation by ineligible firms.

Description:

Congress has mandated that small businesses receive 23% of federal government prime contracting dollars, including 5% of prime and subcontracts to Small Disadvantage Businesses; 5% of prime and subcontracts to Women-Owned Small Businesses; 3% of prime and subcontracts to HUBZone Small Businesses; and 3% of prime and subcontracts to Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Businesses

Meeting and exceeding the federal government’s small business procurement goals continues to be an Administration priority. Federal contracting with small businesses is a win-win. Small businesses get the revenue they need to grow their businesses and create jobs, and the federal government gets the opportunity to work with some of America’s most innovative and nimble small businesses, often times with a direct line to the CEO.

In FY 2012, the federal government made real progress toward the 23 percent goal, with 22.25 percent or $89.9 billion in federal contracting dollars going to small businesses compared to 21.65 percent in FY 2011, with significant impact in key areas:

For the first time, more agencies than ever before met or surpassed all of their prime contracting goals.
Also, for the first time, the federal government exceeded the goal for service disabled veterans.
The federal government had the highest percentage of contracts going to Small Disadvantage Businesses to date.

As a result of a government wide focus on increasing small business contracting opportunities, during President Obama’s first term (FY2009 - FY2012) the federal government awarded $376.2 billion in federal contracting dollars to small businesses. This is a $48.1 billion increase over the four preceding years even as we have seen reduced spending overall.

Also, since President Obama took office, the SBA has supported more than $132.61 billion in Federal government contracting dollars to small disadvantaged businesses. This represents a 36.6 percent increase when compared to the prior Administration. Under the Bush Administration’s first term, $97.10 billion in federal government contracting dollars were awarded to small disadvantaged businesses.

Although we have seen marked success over the last few years, we know more must be done. Many challenges exist for small businesses seeking to enter the federal procurement marketplace.

The unpredictable and changing budget climate is a challenge for small businesses, and SBA is working hard to create an environment where small businesses can be successful in the federal procurement marketplace.
The instability and ambiguity caused by Continuing Resolutions make it difficult to agency acquisition staff to plan effectively for small business utilization.
Entering the federal supply chain can often be a lengthy and arduous process for many small businesses.

SBA’s GCBD unit must implement effective and efficient strategies to monitor the agencies’ progress to goal, support small businesses interested in working with the government and encourage agencies to improve data quality when reporting their contracting activities. SBA will increase its efforts to collaborate with and hold federal agencies accountable to achieving their goals.

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