Total quality management and the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) on Federal RetirementsThe Government Accounting Office (GAO), Office of Personnel Management (OPM) in May of 2019 published the Federal Retirement: OPM Actions Needed to Improve Application Processing Times. OPM has a goal of processing most retirement application in 60 days, but for several years has not met that standard. The GAO OPM for that reason, studied the process for federal retirement processing to determine root causes of delays, and to determine what strategies should be employed to remedy the situation. The results of that study are available at the following website: https://www.gao.gov/assets/700/699120.pdf (Links to an external site.)While the document provides root cause analysis and recommends six opportunities for improvements, it offers no quality management plan. You have been contracted to develop a quality management plan, and you will report to the Comptroller General of the United States, the director of the Government Accountability Office. The GAO is a legislative branch agency established by Congress in 1921 to ensure the fiscal and managerial accountability of the federal government. If your quality management plan is acceptable, the Comptroller General of the United States will support your company for project managing the implementation of funded improvements. This could be a long and lucrative contract for your company.Note: While the document at the core of this assignment is an actual document published by The Government Accounting Office, the quality management scenario described is fictional and only for the educational purpose of showing mastery of the course objectives set forth for this course.In Module 3, you were asked as a first step, to familiarize yourself with the Federal Retirement: OPM Actions Needed to Improve Application Processing Times document, hereafter called the GAO report. After your review of the guidelines, you were asked to provide your input to the following:Is the current Federal Retirement: OPM Actions Needed to Improve Application Processing Times document one that promotes high quality? If yes, how? If no, why not and what should change to promote quality? Support your position with specific references to the GAO report or current scholarly documentation.What do you interpret to be meant by "quality" from the perspective of the GAO OPM, retirees, Congressional leaders, and the public both now and in the future? What support do you have for your position with current (published in the past five years) scholarly documentation?What are the drivers for change, and the barriers to change from the perspective of the GAO OPM, retirees, Congressional leaders, and the public? Are there competing drivers for change that may impact quality from the public's perspective? Support your position with specific references to the GAO report or current scholarly documentation.In Module 8, you are asked to build upon your work from Module 3 and show additional mastery through other course modules.Provide the following quality management plan in your final portfolio:Provide an opening paragraph which describes the importance of the using this case to show your mastery of course objectives, and mapping of what is contained in your paper to prove that mastery.Delineate your next section with a header, and in less than one page, describe the current situation with federal retirement processing, the recommendations from the GAO study, and the role of the GAO OPM in promoting quality.Delineate your next section using headers and sub-headers with your work from Module 3. Include any updates that you wish to make as a result of learning more about quality management, and input from your instructor in Module 3 for the following: Is the current Federal Retirement: OPM Actions Needed to Improve Application Processing Times document one that promotes high quality? If yes, how? If no, why not and what should change to promote quality? Support your position with specific references to the GAO report or current scholarly documentation.What do you interpret to be meant by "quality" from the perspective of the GAO OPM, retirees, Congressional leaders, and the public both now and in the future? What support do you have for your position with specific references to scholarly (peer-reviewed) resources?What are the drivers for change, and the barriers to change from the perspective of the GAO OPM, retirees, Congressional leaders, and the public? Are there competing drivers for change that may impact quality from the public's perspective? Support your position with specific references to the GAO report or current scholarly documentation.Delineate your next section with a header to discuss the operational issues that must be managed and controlled to support quality including partnering and strategic alliances if any are pertinent. How will those issues be managed and controlled in your plan? As usual, what support do you have for your position with specific references to the GAO report or current scholarly documentation?Delineate your next section with a header to discuss the human resource issues that must be managed and controlled to support quality including employee empowerment, teamwork, education and training. How will those issues be managed and controlled in your plan? As usual, what support do you have for your position with specific references to the GAO report or current scholarly documentation?Delineate your next section with a header to discuss customer satisfaction and how it will be measured. How will and when will measurement happen in your plan? As usual, what support do you have for your position with specific references to the GAO report or current scholarly documentation?Delineate your next section with a header to discuss how problems will be solved, conflicts resolved, and how decisions will be made especially any interagency issues, or legislative issues that may arise. As usual, what support do you have for your position with specific references to the GAO report or current scholarly documentation?Delineate your next section with a header to discuss what quality tools should be used, when and how, including communications tools, process control tools, benchmarking, or other tools as you find appropriate. What support do you have for your position with specific references to the GAO report or current scholarly documentation?Finally, conclude with the final section making a recommendation to the Comptroller General of the United States for your plans, and why your company is in the best position to lead the quality management effort going forward through implementation.Submission:Write a paper addressing the case of federal employee retirement processing regarding the GAO OPM report and quality management. Your paper should be 8-10 pages in length, not including the required title and references pages and any appendix if required. For more information see "How do I do an Appendix in APA style?" (Links to an external site.)Support the paper with a minimum of six current (published in the most recent five years) scholarly sources from the CSU Global Library. This is in addition to any course textbooks, lecture material you decide to use, or the case itself. Of course, you may always exceed the minimum number of sources.Format the paper according to the CSU Global Writing Center (Links to an external site.).Be clear, concise, and focused.Tip: Cases may be addressed in 6 steps:Read the assignment and questions provided to get an idea of the important course concepts to be covered. There is plenty of material in a case that may be immaterial to the course learning objectives. (For example, a case may have significant information on staff acknowledgements, but the assignment questions relate to quality management. In that case, do not spend time on those acknowledgements unless relevant to quality management. Use your time searching the case, researching and reporting on quality management.)Read and take notes on the entire case. Read every figure and table to thoroughly understand them.Determine who are the key players; what are the key issues; what is the problem to be solved?Do the research and analyze any data. Use the CSU Global library to research the key issues and problems. Find current academic information on those topics.Make your decisions relative to the important course concepts, and document the defense of your position by melding the scholarly research and examples from the case. Remember, no opinions; only facts.Finalize your portfolio by checking all assignment questions are fully answered, rubric items are met, and the document follows CSU Global Guide to Writing and APA requirements.

Communication ClimateCommunication is the grease which makes relationships in organizations run smoothly, and by extension, directly affects the effectiveness of the organization itself. Communication climate refers to the mood or tone of interpersonal communications and determines in great part how people feel about each other and how they carry out their work activities. Thus, communication climate has a great deal of influence over the organizational climate or general atmosphere of the work environment. Read the following blog about what it is like to work in a defensive climate:Dukes, A.J. (2012). Defensive v Supportive Climates in the Workplace. Retrieved from http://scom320class.blogspot.com/2012/07/defensive-v-supportive-climates-in.htmlAs you can see from this blog entry, defensive climates create a situation where employees do not raise work concerns or communicate their needs. They are careful about what they say and guard their opinions. Frequently they exhibit low motivation.Supportive climates, on the other hand, encourage employee participation and engagement, an open exchange of information, and constructive conflict. Employees who work in supportive environments often exhibit greater organizational commitment, an attitude cited as highly desirable in Module 1. The Communication Climate Inventory was developed as a means of measuring the degree of supportiveness and defensiveness in an organization. For this SLP, take the inventory and score your organization’s communication climate using the scale below. Take the Communication Climate Inventory.Defensive ScoreSupportive ScoreSLP AssignmentCompose a 3-page paper describing the climate in US Air force. Do not use the actual name of the organization – you can make up a pseudonym. Include the following in your description:Is the climate supportive or defensive? Does this align with the results of your Communication Climate Inventory? Attach your Inventory results as an appendix. (Note: This appendix requirement will likely increase your paper’s Turnitin similarity score; your professor is aware of this.)How does the communication climate affect motivation and organizational/team commitment?How could you improve the communication climate in your organization, department, or team?What communication skills would you like to learn or improve on in order to create a supportive communication climate?Be sure to support your analysis with concepts and principles introduced in the background readings on communication as well as conflict and teams (if appropriate). You may also incorporate outside research to supplement the background material. Cite all sources properly.