Sec. 5. Elevating customer experience and employee engagement within the Federal Government
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/bill/117/s/1934/is/section-5A research copy — for the controlling text, always check the official state or federal source. Not legal advice.
Chapter 3 of title 5, United States Code, is amended by adding at the end the following: In this subchapter: The term agency — has the meaning give the term in section 306(f); and includes the United States Postal Service. The term customer experience — means the ways in which the Federal Government and agencies consider Federal customers at the center of the decision making process, including by— understanding needs from the perspective of a Federal customer; considering the entire journey of a Federal customer, instead of simply the point of service; soliciting and considering voluntary customer feedback; and measuring performance; and includes a consideration of the factors within any interaction between a Federal customer and an agency, or between agencies, including, with respect to the interaction— ease; effectiveness; emotional effect; perception or trust;
Federal employee interaction; and any other factor that impacts the overall trust, satisfaction, and confidence of the customer in a program, an agency, or the Federal Government as a whole. The term Director means the Director of the Office of Management and Budget. The term employee engagement means— the heightened sense of commitment of a Federal employee or contractor to the agency for which the Federal employee works or the contractor performs services and the Federal customers served by the Federal employee or contractor that results in a more efficient, effective, creative, or courteous outcome; and the extent to which a Federal employee or contractor— finds personal meaning and pride in the work of the Federal employee or contractor; and with respect to the agency served by the Federal employee or contractor, feels— a sense of belonging in the culture of work of the agency; valued by the agency and the public; and that the agency regularly considers and is responsive to feedback and human-centered design insights from the Federal employee or contractor.
The term Federal customer — means— a member of the public of the United States; and an entity that is directly impacted by the Federal Government, including— member of the public of the United States, a business, an organization, or an agency of a State or unit of local government, Tribal, or territorial that interacts with an agency or Federal program— directly; through a Federal contractor; or through a federally funded program; an applicant for a Federal job, a Federal employee, a contractor, or a volunteer of the Federal Government that interacts with an agency or an internal process of an agency, including— hiring; on-boarding; human resources; information technology services; and efforts to improve agency performance, including by suggesting process improvements or reporting fraud, waste, or abuse; an agency that relies on another agency for information or services; and the recipient of a Federal award, including a contract, grant, or loan.
The term Federal employee has the meaning given the term employee in section 2105 of title 5, United States Code. The term high-impact service provider means an agency or a component of an agency designated as a high-impact service provider in guidance issued by the Director under section 323(b)(4). The term human-centered design means an approach towards designing interactive systems, processes, products, services, or information that aims to make those systems, processes, products, services, or information more usable and useful by— focusing on the users of the systems, processes, or information and the needs and requirements of those users; and applying knowledge of human factors and learning from human feedback and interactions with similar systems, processes, or information.
The term voluntary customer feedback means the submission of information, an opinion, appreciation, or a concern by a Federal customer following an interaction with an agency that is— solicited by the agency and identified as voluntary in the solicitation; and voluntarily made by the Federal customer relating to the particular service of, or interaction with, the agency. The head of each agency, in order to effectively pursue the mission of the agency, shall develop a high-quality customer experience by— allocating sufficient resources to and prioritizing— customer experience capabilities; and initiatives that may cut across budget accounts or program activities; requesting and drawing on new expertise and tools relating to customer experience; adapting Government-wide and global good practices relating to customer experience; ensuring that the process of each agency for soliciting voluntary customer feedback is as streamlined as possible and requires limited internal review if the collection is within the scope of the guidance provided by the Director; making use of customer experience resources of the Federal Government; and using human-centered design practices.
The head of each agency shall— develop and use tools to— experiment with different approaches to improve customer experience; and collect qualitative and quantitative data on customer experience as Federal customers engage with the agency in a routine, flexible manner, including through human-centered design practices; ensure the tools developed under paragraph
(1)ensure the privacy of Federal customers; use the data collected under paragraph (1)(B) to continually improve customer experience and agency performance; and share the data collected under paragraph (1)(B) with research entities to allow for external analysis. The head of each agency shall, as appropriate, solicit voluntary customer feedback from Federal customers. The Director shall assist the heads of agencies in carrying out paragraph
(1)by— ensuring that the process for agencies to submit voluntary customer feedback surveys for approval is as clear and streamlined as possible; and assisting the heads of agencies in collaborating with other agencies and State, local, Tribal, and territorial governments to understand and respond to the needs of Federal customers— from the perspectives of those customers; and not solely from the perspective of the mandates of the agency. An example of a situation in which the Director shall assist heads of agencies under subparagraph (A)(ii)(II) is when an opportunity for cross-agency collaboration exists that meets the demonstrated interest of the public of the United States. With respect to any voluntary customer feedback solicited by the head of an agency, the head of the agency— may not use the voluntary customer feedback as a basis to provide a Federal customer with inferior service; and shall consider privacy concerns and, as appropriate, anonymize the voluntary customer feedback to— allow for candid feedback; and protect privacy. The head of each agency shall seek to— increase public understanding of the mandate of the agency, including the statutes under which the agency operates and from which the agency derives the mission of the agency; provide the public with historical and broader context of programs, policies, context, and achievements of the agency, including human level stories of the impact of the agency; employ shared design solutions, effective human-centered design practices, modern design tools, interactive platforms, and innovative participation methods to engage the public in the policy process of the agency; and tailor the content and format of communications of the agency based on regional or demographic considerations and human-centered design practices. The head of each agency shall develop and use tools to understand the progress of the agency towards achieving the requirements under paragraph (1), including— testing; feedback; focus groups; public participation; and human-centered design practices and co-design processes. Not less frequently than annually, the head of each agency shall consult with the agencies or offices described in section 323(c)(1) to ensure that the customer experience and communications approaches of the agency— are engaging and interactive; incorporate good practices from the private sector and human-centered design; and employ cutting edge digital tools, including application programming interfaces and social media and digital experiences. Not less frequently than annually, the head of each agency shall consult with the National Archives and Records Administration, the Library of Congress, or the historians of other relevant entities to obtain advice and multimedia content relating to the historical performance of the agency that can be used to provide context on the origins and roles of the agency throughout history, including human level stories of the impact of the agency. Not later than 180 days after the date of enactment of the Trust in Public Service Act , the Director shall issue the guidance described in subsection
(b)for— agencies; and components of agencies, as appropriate. The Director may issue the guidance required under paragraph
(1)in a format chosen by the Director, which may include Circular A–11 of the Office of Management and Budget. The guidance described in this subsection is as follows: Guidance consistent with this subchapter to assist agencies in achieving high-quality customer experience and continually improving service delivery across the Federal Government. Guidance that requires an agency or component of an agency to include principles of customer experience in— standard operating procedures of the agency or component of the agency; rules (as defined in section 551 of title 5, United States Code) issued by the agency or component of the agency; and similar documents of the agency or component of the agency. Guidance that— requires an agency to communicate the impact of programs of the agency to the public, including through communication that— is human-centered, including multimedia and good design; uses stories of human impact; allows for the public to contribute personal accounts; is participatory in nature; and is tailored to regional or demographic considerations; and reminds agencies that, although provisions of annual appropriations Acts typically bar agencies from engaging in impermissible publicity or propaganda, including self-aggrandizement, covert propaganda, and purely partisan communications, those provisions do not restrict agencies from engaging in legitimate activities to inform the public about agency programs through a communication described in subparagraph (A). Guidance in which the Director designates certain agencies or components of agencies as high-impact service providers based on the following considerations: Whether an agency or component has a large base of Federal customers served by the agency or component. Whether an agency or component has a high impact on Federal customers served by the agency or component. Whether, with respect to an agency or component, the public exchanges time, money, or information with the agency or component to receive a good, service, or authorization. Whether agencies or components have high-profile Federal customer-facing services, regulatory functions, or informational roles, including operating websites or communication portals of the Federal Government, such as usa.gov. Other agencies or components, based on factors that give the agency or component an ability to positively or negatively influence the public perception of the Federal Government. Guidance that, with respect to high-impact service providers— establishes service standards, as appropriate; emphasizes resources, expectations, and good practices, including the use of human-centered design; and requires high-impact service providers to publicly commit to, and report on, Federal customer experience standards, as appropriate. Guidance that, with respect to agencies or components of agencies that are not high-impact service providers— highlights that those agencies and components have an obligation to find creative means to inform the public about the ways in which those agencies or components serve the public; and emphasizes expectations, resources, and good practices, including the use of human-centered design, for those agencies and components, including maximizing the contribution of the agency or component to overall trust in the Federal Government. Guidance that, with respect to voluntary customer feedback— provides agencies with best practices, templates, and standards for collecting qualitative and quantitative data relating to Government-wide customer experience and voluntary customer feedback; enables cross-agency benchmarking and the improvement of customer experience; and includes— guidelines and support for user data collected from websites and forms relating to customer experience, including visits, task completion rates, time taken, drop out points, and other relevant areas; and guidance on voluntary customer feedback data collection relating to user comprehension and satisfaction, including guidance for how agencies should communicate the purpose of a data collection request and how the agency uses voluntary customer feedback to influence the policy and programs of the agency. Guidance that identifies any privacy risks to Federal customers and how those risks and mitigation measures for those risks should be communicated to the public. Guidance that clearly explains the process by which agencies and components of agencies shall solicit voluntary customer feedback and other learning and feedback tools, such as focus groups and usability testing, which shall— balance— quality control and risk management relating to the solicitation of voluntary customer feedback; and reducing unnecessary delay or burdens on agencies and components of agencies that inhibit or slow the solicitation of voluntary customer feedback; and outline a streamlined process for agencies and components of agencies that demonstrate the capability to design and conduct high-quality Federal customer surveys or other capabilities that— may include— blanket approvals; and waivers; and does not require re-approval for minimal changes. Guidance that requires Government-wide employee engagement, including— the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey of the Office of Personnel Management; as appropriate, the collection of additional, real-time voluntary qualitative and quantitative feedback from Federal employees; and the development of an explicit employee engagement measure by the Director of the Office of Personnel Management that aligns with existing public sector employee engagement measures. Guidance that includes best practices on the appropriate use of metrics by agencies that— promotes true improvement and learning and the right incentives for Federal employees and the leadership of agencies; and in order to avoid metrics that create perverse incentives, clarifies that certain customer experience or employee engagement measures should not be used for adverse personnel actions or promotion. In developing the guidance issued under subsection (a), the Director shall collaborate with— the Administrator of General Services with respect to customer experience good practices, including the use of human-centered design, data collection and use, usability testing, evaluation science, behavioral science, human-centered design, the use of agency websites and digital communication tools, and personnel support; the Director of the Office of Personnel Management with respect to— employee engagement; hiring authorities for recruiting subject matter experts; and developing a customer experience-oriented workforce; the Administrator of the United States Digital Service with respect to personnel, human-centered design, digital experience good practices, and innovation; the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs and the Office of the Federal Chief Information Officer of the Office of Management and Budget with respect to— providing technical assistance in Government-wide data collection; and balancing— the quality control of agency data collection requests; and reducing unnecessary delay or burdens on agencies, particularly with voluntary customer feedback and focus groups; the Office of Science and Technology Policy with respect to good practices in behavioral sciences and human-centered design; the National Archives and Records Administration and the Library of Congress with respect to historical context, multimedia, and stories of agency achievement throughout history; and any other entity determined appropriate by the Director. In collaborating with the entities described in paragraph (1), the Director shall ensure that those entities have sufficient resources to carry out the collaboration. Not later than 1 year after the date on which guidance is issued under subsection (a), and annually thereafter, the Director shall update the guidance. . The table of sections for chapter 3, United States Code, is amended by adding at the end the following: SUBCHAPTER III—Federal customer experience 321. Definitions. 322. Agency requirements. 323. OMB Customer experience guidance. .