The White House announced today that Jeffrey Zients will serve as the acting director of the Office of Management and Budget.

Zients is currently deputy director for management and chief performance officer at OMB. He replaces Jack Lew who last week was named as chief of staff to the president after William Daley announced he will be leaving the position later this month.

Obama praised Zients in a White House release saying, “Since day one, Jeff has demonstrated superb judgment and has provided sound advice on a whole host of issues.”

The role as acting director is not new to Zients. He served as OMB’s acting director from July-November 2010. As deputy director, however, Zients became the nation’s first federal chief performance officer.

He was instrumental in a variety of initiatives to reduce waste, including the administration’s efforts to consolidate government data centers and reform IT spending.

Zients has twenty years of business experience as a CEO, management consultant and entrepreneur with a deep understanding of business strategy, operations and process improvement, and financial management. His expertise extends across a broad range of industries and geographies.

Mr. Zients served as CEO and Chairman of The Advisory Board Company and Chairman of the Corporate Executive Board, firms that are leading providers of performance benchmarking and management best practices for senior executives at over 5,000 businesses, according to a White Hosue press release.

Mr. Zients also co-founded The Urban Alliance Foundation, a non-profit organization that partners with corporations to provide economically disadvantaged youth with year-round paid internships, adult mentors and job training. Zients graduated summa cum laude from Duke University with a degree in Political Science. He and his wife Mary live in Washington, D.C. and have four children.