President's Management Agenda

The President's Management Agenda, released in March 2018, presents “a long term vision for modernizing the federal government in key areas that will improve the ability of agencies to deliver mission outcomes, provide excellent service, and effectively steward taxpayer dollars on behalf of the American people.” As part of its focus on mission, service, and stewardship, the Agenda outlines the importance of creating a data strategy and infrastructure for the future.

The Agenda defines four high-level components to shape the long-term development of a Federal Data Strategy. These components include:

(1) Enterprise Data Governance: Manage government data as a strategic asset.

(2) Access, Use, and Augmentation: Improve data dissemination and standardization.  Maximize publicly available non-sensitive data. Maximize sensitive data for public use while maintaining security and privacy.

(3) Decision-Making and Accountability: Provide high quality data. Facilitate external research. Foster public accountability and transparency.

(4) Commercialization, Innovation, and Public Use: Engage the private sector by making data publicly available.  This will encourage innovation and will allow for greater use of government data beyond the capabilities of what the government could achieve by themselves.

The President’s Management Agenda also established a Cross-Agency Priority (CAP) Goal, Leveraging Data as a Strategic Asset, to drive sustainable progress in developing and implementing plans for the Federal Data Strategy. This CAP Goal, which is being led by the Small Business Administration, the U.S. Department of Commerce, the Office of Science and Technology Policy, and the Office of Management and Budget, aims to: “Leverage data as a strategic asset to grow the economy, increase the effectiveness of the Federal Government, facilitate oversight, and promote transparency.” For more information, see the CAP Goal Action Plan.