About Us

Who We Are

The National Academy of Public Administration (the Academy) is an independent, non-profit, and non-partisan organization established in 1967 to assist government leaders in building more effective, efficient, accountable, and transparent organizations. Chartered by Congress to provide non-partisan expert advice, the Academy’s unique feature is its over 700 Fellows–including former cabinet officers, Members of Congress, governors, mayors, and state legislators, as well as prominent scholars, business executives, and public administrators.

The Academy helps the Federal government address its critical management challenges through in-depth studies and analyses, advisory services and technical assistance, Congressional testimony, forums and conferences, and online stakeholder engagement.

Under contracts with government agencies, some of which are directed by Congress, as well as grants from private foundations, the National Academy of Public Administration provides insights on key public management issues, as well as advisory services to government agencies.

Our diverse practice areas include:

• Organizational Assessment and Design
• Strategy Development and Implementation
• Program Evaluation and Performance Measurement
• Business Process Transformation
• Change Management
• Stakeholder Outreach and Collaboration

In addition to client-driven work, as an elected membership organization the National Academy provides opportunities for its Fellows to exchange and develop ideas on a variety of government management and policy issues. The Academy holds an annual meeting of its Fellowship and supports five Standing Panels that provide input to the Academy’s agenda of studies and serve as collegial forums for Fellows to exchange ideas and interact with experts outside the Academy, including senior government officials. Typically these issues cannot be resolved by a single government agency, a single level of government or even by the government alone, but instead require interdepartmental, intergovernmental and networked solutions.

Examples of our activities include:

• Establishing benchmarks for environmental programs that extend across federal, state and local sectors;
• Helping federal judiciary agencies create new budget processes;
• Developing a peer review system for human resource programs at a statewide university;
• Improving coordination and priority-setting for emergency response across jurisdictions;
• Hosting an online Dialogue to solicit stakeholder ideas and comments for an agency’s strategic planning process;
• Creating a management transformation plan for major federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies; or
• Helping policymakers better understand the complex intergovernmental transportation system.
• Evaluating and recommending approach, priorities, criteria for awarding research contracts and methods for gathering information about needs/requirements from customers in Homeland Security Science and Technology;
• Assessing modernization action plans and risk mitigation steps for a branch of the Armed Services

Learn more about the National Academy’s Current Studies, Programs and Publications & Reports.