5.
THEGOVLOOPGUIDE
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
“As part of the effort to safeguard Federal funds, agencies should focus on expenses related to conference sponsorship, conference hosting, or attendance of Federal employees at conferences sponsored or hosted by non-Federal entities. Federal agencies and employees must exercise discretion and judgment in ensuring that conference expenses are appropriate, necessary, and managed in a manner that minimizes expense to taxpayers.” – Jeffrey Zientz, Office of Management and Budget Memorandum on “Promoting Efficient Spending to Support Agency Operations”
In-person training and events dollars are getting harder to come by in government. The two primary factors for recent cutbacks are sequestration and increased scrutiny on travel and conference spending. However, the move away from in-person learning was already underway long before the present circumstances pushed teetering training budgets over the edge. Sending staff to off-site conferences and training has always been an expensive investment. The costs quickly add up when accounting for registration fees, travel and lodging for classroom-based training. Venue rental, food, beverage and other amenities further increase an agency’s costs for face-to-face conferences. With the current state of training budgets, in-person events can spiral into an amount perceived as exorbitant in the court of public opinion - even
when an agency strives to keep costs in check. Of course, there is also the opportunity cost of time out of office, away from the pressing challenges of accomplishing an agency’s mission. At the same time, employees do not grow professionally through experience alone. Policies and operating environments are not stagnant. They shift with evolving circumstances, and public sector personnel need to remain up to speed on the changing laws, regulations, products and systems that undergird their work. Sometimes employees just need to break away from the day-to-day in order to focus on specific knowledge acquisition. In other words, the training delivered via conferences and classroom-based training might be a bit too much for the current fiscal mood,