U.S. government CIOs have been hogtied by bureaucracy, unable to effectively do their jobs because they do not consistently have responsibility for what they are legally mandated to do or are critical for effective information technology (IT) management. Additionally, while law mandates that CIOs report directly to the head of their respective agency, only about half do, further hindering their effectiveness, according to a Government Accountability Office report issued yesterday.

“CIOs have not always been empowered to be successful,” concluded the report. “Despite the broad authority given to CIOs in federal law, these officials face limitations that hinder their ability to effectively exercise this authority, which has contributed to many of the long-standing IT management challenges we have found in our work.”

With the weakened state of the economy and the battle over the federal budget, missing any opportunity to operate government in a smarter, more efficient way is unacceptable.” – Joe Lieberman

Federal CIOs typically have responsibility for only seven of the 13 areas they’re required to oversee, GAO found. The CIOs cited two specific pain points: insufficient control over IT investments and limited influence over the IT workforce, such as hiring and firing decisions and “the performance of component-level CIOs,” stated the report. Essentially, not much has changed since 2004, the last time GAO reported on this issue, noted the report.

GAO went on to state that the average time in job for a CIO has remained at about two years. Furthermore, while CIOs reported implementation of improved IT management practices, they had not sufficiently documented these changes and reasons for doing so in a way that could be shared with the agency. Not sharing this information “increases the likelihood of new CIOs making the same mistakes as those they are replacing,” said the report.

Plus, many CIOs have multiple roles within an agency, such as serving as human capital officer in addition to CIO, further hindering their ability to be effective.

In a press release, Senators Joe Lieberman, Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee chairman, and Susan Collins, ranking member, urged agencies to grant CIOs more responsibility and comply with the law to improve IT management. The committee is responsible for IT oversight.

“With the weakened state of the economy and the battle over the federal budget, missing any opportunity to operate government in a smarter, more efficient way is unacceptable,” said Lieberman.

“We cannot continue to have schedule slips, poor mission-related results, and millions of dollars in cost overruns,” added Collins. “I am concerned that the vision of the Clinger-Cohen reforms has, in some cases, been subverted by bureaucratic maneuvering and turf battles.”

GAO recommended that the Office of Management and Budget establish accountability measures, better define the scope of CIOs’ authority and establish internal processes for documenting “lessons learned”.