The GPRA and NEI Planning Process

In August 1993, the 103d Congress passed the Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA), and President Clinton subsequently signed it into law (Public Law 103-62). Among the overarching purposes of the law were provisions to make Federal agencies accountable for achieving program results through the establishment of program goals and objectives against which progress could be measured. The Act called for each Federal agency to develop a strategic plan that would serve as the basis for a process of goal setting and performance measurement throughout the Federal Government. Although the GPRA does not require strategic plans from organizations below the agency level (cabinet-level departments and independent agencies), Senate Report 103-58 suggested that agencies may choose to develop strategic plans for major component organizations with those plans being incorporated into the final agency wide document. In addition to articulating the agency-mission in the strategic plan and identifying the general goals and objectives to be attained in performance or accomplishment of the mission, agencies are required to describe the strategies through which they will meet those goals and objectives.

The National Eye Institute (NEI) and its advisory body the National Advisory Eye Council (NAEC) view the passage of the GPRA as an endorsement of the long-range planning process that was implemented shortly after Congress created the Institute in 1968. The Council believes that this process, while imperfect, is in full accord with the spirit and intent of the GPRA.

The NEI embarked on its first formalized planning effort during internal discussions in 1973, which culminated in the NAEC's publication of the first long-range national plan for vision research in 1975. The issue of accountability, as later stressed in the GPRA, has been a central tenet of the rationale for conducting a formal planning process at the NEI that has remained for more than 20 years of Institute planning activities. That first plan recognized that an essential part of the planning process should be to identify specific program goals, objectives, and priorities, based on the evaluation of the past accomplishments and future research needs and opportunities.

Strategic Plan Requirements

Although the GPRA does not formally specify a format for strategic plans developed in accordance with the Act, the following requirements were identified: a comprehensive mission statement covering each organization's major functions and operations; general goals and objectives of each organization (including outcome-related goals and objectives that allow assessment of each organization's success in achieving those goals and objectives); a description of how the goals and objectives are to be achieved (including the operational processes, skills, technology, and resources required); identification of any external factors that could significantly affect the achievement of the goals and objectives; and a description of program evaluations that will be used to establish or revise the goals and objectives.

Vision Research—A National Plan: 1999-2003

As a means of addressing these requirements, the mission of the NEI, the goals and objectives for each of the programs, and the strategies for achieving those goals and objectives are contained in the preceding sections of this plan. The GPRA also requires assessment of each organization's success in meeting its goals and objectives, as well as a description of evaluations that will be used in revising the goals and objectives. The NAEC and the NEI have long considered evaluation of the programs as an essential component of the strategic planning process, but it was also recognized that evaluation of scientific progress was a formidable challenge. There are no readily available, reliable measurements that can be used in planning or evaluating scientific endeavors, and caution must be exercised in not focusing on inappropriate (or easier to measure) surrogates that have little to do with the new knowledge gained, which is the most important outcome of scientific inquiry.

Progress in medical research often results from incremental increases in knowledge or understanding of a disease or disease process that accumulates over a long time before a complete understanding is achieved. While a goal or objective may be aimed at gaining a complete understanding, the amount of progress that can be made with available technologies cannot be accurately predicted when dealing with a process of unknown complexity that is not yet fully understood. This makes setting exact milestones for charting progress or measuring the amount of knowledge or understanding gained a difficult if not impossible task. For these reasons, the NEI and the NAEC decided long ago that evaluation of a program (in accomplishing its stated goals and objectives) by panels of experts was the most appropriate method of evaluation in the NEI's strategic planning process.

As part of this process, experts in the various scientific disciplines encompassed by vision research are assembled to evaluate and make recommendations on NEI research programs. They are asked to review where progress has been made by identifying the most important research accomplishments that have been achieved since publication of the last plan. Not only is this assessment key to evaluating the progress that has been made in achieving the goals and objectives in the previous plan, it is also a vital first step in identifying the future needs and opportunities in each program. By asking experts in the field to evaluate the progress that has been made in realizing the goals and objectives in the previous plan, they must also consider whether there are still gaps in knowledge or understanding. They can also judge whether the opportunity exists to make additional progress with currently available technology or resources, or if new technologies or other resources must first become available for additional progress to be made.

Other evaluations of performance at the individual project and program level are also conducted. The peer review process is one of the most rigorous prospective evaluative procedures within the Federal sector. This process depends on expert reviewers to evaluate the past performance and future potential of research proposals. Additionally, in accordance with the provisions of the GPRA, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) will prepare an annual performance plan and an annual performance report for all research and research support activities conducted at the NIH. Both the performance plans and annual performance reports will be prepared in the aggregate; i.e., a centralized plan and report will be prepared for all components of the NIH. The details of the NIH annual performance plan will be released with the Fiscal Year 1999 budget.

The NIH will assess the performance of its programs based on performance goals and corresponding performance indicators that have been established to encompass the entire NIH research endeavor. These goals and indicators relate to expected program outcomes (the expected results of NIH programs) and program means (the administrative and management activities that support the conduct of scientific research). The goals and objectives in this plan are essential components in preparing the aggregated NIH annual performance plan and in making this assessment process meaningful in evaluating the vision research program of the NEI.

Update Process and Schedule

In preparing this plan, advice and input were solicited on research accomplishments and future directions from scientific and philanthropic organizations that have an interest in the research supported by the NEI. In addition, the opportunity to offer views and recommendations on the NEI programs was provided through the NEI homepage on the World Wide Web (http://www.nei.nih.gov/). This information was provided to the program planning panels for their consideration in preparing their reports.

In updating and revising the goals and objectives in this plan, a similar approach will be used in gathering information for the panels to consider. Additionally, NEI contributions to the annual performance reports will be provided to the panels so that they can review the success of NEI programs in meeting the NIH-wide performance goals. The NEI and the NAEC will continue expert panel evaluations of the vision research program as part of the strategic planning process and as a means of assessing the progress within the research programs. It is the intent of the NEI and the NAEC to begin the update and revision process for this 5-year strategic plan 3 years from the time the current plan is published so that the next strategic plan will be in place for the years 2004 to 2009.