U.S. Army Infrastructure

Policy efficiency is tied to an effective use of the public monies. To determine if a program or policy is effective is important that public administration be able to evaluate these programs or policies. In an essay format answer, you are to discuss the following: First, what are the roles of the OMB and the GAO? Second, what identify and discuss the three types of government audits used by the U.S. Government. Third, what is meant by program evaluation and how public administrators employ it? This answer is worth 30 points. The Government came up with an idea of being able to organize it’s auditing system better by having something called The U.S. General Accounting office. Within the U.S. General Accounting Office, there was a system that was designed to be implemented which was called the Government Accountability Office. It was directed by a comptroller general of the United States who is then appointed by the president with a consent from the Senate to be able to do a term of 15 years. The GAO was designed to audit the financial records so that it would be able to see where the funds were actually going and how they were properly spent.

The responsibilities of it were to conduct financial good performance for all of the Government Agencies. The act was for the comptroller to make the general recommendations to make the economy greater and more efficient with its public expenditures. All of the departments and establishments are required to turn over all acts of paperwork such as books, documents, papers and/or even records, that the comptrollers or any of the assistants would request. Within one year on average, the Government Accountability Office completes around 1,000 reports for the members of Congress. The information provided by the Government Accountability Office often is delivered in written reports which would include specific recommendations. Usually, the issues that are given are handed over to the conventional financial management and the reports would be checked out but Congress would be unaware of them. Although the Government Accountability Office checks out the policy and performance investigations, with financial management will still be a major key concern. There is the revenue side though that Government Accountability office would go and identify the many cases where the government agencies would not pull in the money owed.

The Government Accountability Office staff consists of lawyers, engineers, and other employees. It is the largest auditing agency in the United States. The Government Accountability Office is vast both in size and its reputation. The reputation for it has become an institutional integrity and has made it a model for the other major levels of government. Each of the substantial levels of government has its own auditors. They all range from the state government auditors to the local accounting firms that are all retained by a small school board. Most of the governors share the executive authority with the other elected independently elected officers. They are the secretary of state, the treasurer, the comptroller, and the attorney general, or as we’ve talked about mainly, the auditor. Then there are the different types of audits. The first type of audit is the Compliance Audit. This audit is the most traditional form of such an auditing activity. Within the compliance audit, it is looking for an extent in which the financial managers of an organization which gives financial input and has to manage with the compliance of the law and the accepted standards of the conventions for the accounting information. In recent times, the auditor would do an annual visit to remove any parts of the organization and would check the entries of the financial journals and the ledgers to make sure of the arithmetic balances are correct and that there are no mistakes.

Then at the end of the process, the auditor would then go and certify and make sure that the financial records are correct. The next auditing process is the Performance Audit. This is the process where they would go and check into assessing the ideas of making sure that the law and regulations are at a wider role of its highest efficiency and cost-effectiveness. The efficiency and effectiveness of the audits are the two main steps in the performance audit chain. With practice though, they’re to be full-bodied into a single performance and comprehensive chain within an organization. Such extension on the administration has implemented its objectives set by political leaders to be reviewed. They would want to know that they’re being responsive and the organization is effective and playing the instruments well of that state. Next is the Internal Audit. The internal audit consists of line managers that are reluctant to wait for an external examination that would find problems within their other organizations. The groups need to have reported high in the organization where the chief executive officer or where an audit committee is at the highest level. They would need adequate and clear authority to support it as well as the resources and all of the other right parts of the organization. If there are cash handlers, they’d need to have a significant compliance audit role.

On the other end though they would have independent virtual troubleshooters who would provide any early warnings to the top management emerging issues. The internal auditors are always going to be the ones in line to be within the danger zone of losing their major independence to the line management. Ensuring that the degree of independence is needed for the effectiveness and its maintained, there are three key factors that come into play. Those three key factors are the location on the outside of the line management, a high reporting line within the audit results, and the reasonable latitude that selects the assignments. Those who are imagining the government to audit should be placed within the hands of the private accounting firms within the minority. Finally, there is the program evaluation which is considered to be an extensive systematic evaluation of any activity or group that is undertaken by the government so that a determination could be made by both short and long range. Its distinguished from the management evaluation which is called the organization evaluation because it's limited to the program’s internal administrative procedures. These procedures are employed by the policy analysis and program evaluation analysis methods. Program evaluation is a method where a systematic examining process of any of the activities or groups of activities are undergoing a viewing by the government to be able to decide on the effects both short and long range. It is signified that it is distinguished from the management evaluations which is also called the organization evaluation where it is limited to a program’s internal administrative procedures. Question 4: In this question, you are to discuss the practicality of what you have studied in this course.

In an essay answer, identify three themes or concepts related to Public Administration that you will be able to utilize upon graduation as you move forward with your career plans. This answer is worth 20 points. Utilizing theories from Public Administration will help guide and interpret what kind of leader that I’ll be when I graduate and then go on and move into the Officer world within the United States Army Infrastructure. There may be more themes or concepts that I’ll be utilizing but the major three that come do come to mind that I think would help me out the most are within the hierarchy of ethics. Within the Hierarchy of ethics, there are four different types of levels to go by. The first one to go by is the personal morality of ethics. It is the basic sense of doing what is right and what is wrong. To utilize this method within the military infrastructure, there may be sometimes when doing what you feel is right is wrong, but it may actually get you to where you need to be. As a leader though, you need to utilize these two ideas of what is right and wrong when talking to the lower levels of soldiers such as your squad leaders and team leaders so that they can have an idea of a standardized idea of what to tell their soldiers that are below them. Using these two types of ideas with them will help make it beneficial to not only just showing them that but also being able to give them a sense so that if they do manage to make a mistake and happen to maybe even be in a situation where they feel it is right but could be wrong to do because of other moral principles, then they’d have to go with their gut feeling and push through with the mission that they’re given to complete.

I was always juggling through these two whenever I was working the road as a Military Police Officer because there were many times where I was in a situation when someone happened to do what is wrong and I was supposed to go by the book but just by my experiences and decisions at the time of being there, I made my own choice and moved on about my business. The next concept within the levels of ethics would be the way that professional ethics are performed. Professional ethics are rules and norms that are obligated within a professional way. It is also considered to be a set of guidelines that are considered professional codes. There are the Army values and there is an acronym to go by that the soldiers are blessed with when they graduate basic training and that acronym is LORDSHIP. These two are considered a guideline for ethics within the U.S. Army that the soldiers are supposed to live by day in and day out whether or not they’re on duty. It is a series of ethics that shows a representation of how professional you are as a person. Then there is the third level within the ethics structure signified as organizational. With each and every organization there is an environment or culture that is both formal and informal with a set of rules that consists of ethical conduct.

It consists of public laws, rules, regulations, executive orders that are all taken into effect within the U.S. Army infrastructure. First off, the public laws work both for on and off of the installation except for the fact that those who are the police on the base will be there to help assist and aid with anything that has happened that went wrong with either traffic violations, or even a domestic. While in a combat situation, you have a set of rules that are called, “rules of engagement”, that are signified as a set of rules that you are to go with just in case something was to happen while out on a mission. The regulations portion of it is there tell help to have a standardized method of how you should be while in uniform such as how you should dress and present yourself on a day to day basis. Finally, the executive order portion of it is that if something such as a mission were to be passed down and your unit was to get activated for it, there is no choice for you but to go ahead and make that mission happen whether you like it or not. As a leader, there will always be times when the job isn’t fun for a little bit but that’s when your leadership skills will come in to play to ensure that your soldiers are at their highest level of morale. Then there are the social ethics which is consisted of a way that the members of the organization should act that would protect both the individual and the further progress of the group as a whole unit.

Social ethics is how you would want to basically present yourself as an individual and want to represent the group that you’re in. While out with friends or even family, you wouldn’t want to give out the most important confidential information as to how your unit is run or you wouldn’t want to talk any type of bad mouthing about it but you would want to be able to represent it in a way where people could see it as a good place to be. Also, even as an individual, you’d want to represent yourself as a good person because you never know who’s paying attention to what you’re doing. The world may seem like a small place but within the military infrastructure, you’ll never know who is actually paying the most attention to everything that you’re going to be doing. That’s why you always act professional and never let your guard down. You maintain your boundaries and be the best person that you could be.

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