The
Vice President's Hammer Award
for Reinvention
|
Leading Change | |
The
Vice President's Hammer Award |
Cut-off dates for Submission Announced!
What is a Hammer Award?
Hammer Award Criteria
Nomination Instructions and Format
Other Information Resources
The Hammer Award is the Vice President's special recognition for teams of that have made significant contributions in support of National Partnership for Reinventing Government (NPR) principles -- putting customers first, cutting red tape, empowering employees and getting back to basics. The Hammer Award is a key method of recognizing outstanding reengineering accomplishments within the U.S. Army.
This award is the answer to yesterday's government and its $400 hammer. Fittingly, the award consists of a $6.00 hammer, a ribbon, and a note from the Vice President, all in an aluminum frame.
- The Hammer Award recognizes teams; not individuals.
- The team must include a federal component; state, local, and private/non-government entities can receive the award only in partnership with a federal agency.
- Nominations must reflect real accomplishments (a plan does not qualify for an award).
- Nominations must show real innovation in at least one of the following areas of reinvention:
- Putting customers first
- Empowering employees
- Cutting red tape
- Cutting back to basics (stop doing things not in core mission)
- Achieving results Americans care about
- Nominations are strengthened if they show the following:
- Bottom line savings or cost avoidance
- Strong partnership (interagency, intergovernmental, private, nonprofit, or others)
- Nominations must be written in plain language.
Awards nominations that do not meet the above criteria will be returned to the submitting organization.
For more information see the NPR Awards Criteria webpage
Nomination Instructions and Format
In September of 1998, the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) published revised procedures for the submission and review of DoD Hammer Award nomination packages. These procedures include a new nomination format and streamline the review process at the DoD level. OSD has mandated the use of this new format for nominations submitted after 22 March 1999. Any Department of the Army team which wishes to have their reinvention accomplishment considered for this award should forward their nomination package to the following address:
- Office of the Chief of Staff, Army
- ATTN: DACS-DM-SMI (MAJ Richardson)
- Suite 1001
- 1725 Jefferson Davis Highway
- Arlington, Virginia 22202
Nominations may also be faxed to 703-602-2758 (DSN 332-2758) or scanned and submitted via the e-mail link at the bottom of this page. Confirmation of receipt will be made via e-mail to the submitter.
The DA NPR Team will review the nominations and forward those that meet the criteria above to DoD. This Office will monitor the status of the nominations from receipt to award approval. Field activities will continue to provide a copy of their nomination to their headquarters. It is important that NPR POCs within Army are kept abreast of nominations submitted from activities within their organizations. Transmittal letters should indicate copies of the nominations have been forwarded to the NPR POC.
The Vice President and the NPR are eager to continue to celebrate accomplishments of teams demonstrating success in implementing NPR goals. Submission of nominations for award are encouraged any time throughout the year.
Reinvention Point of Contacts at your MACOM, ARNG, USAR, or Field Operating Agency Headquarters can provide you with any command specific guidance.
Additional general information can be found on the following Websites:
Office of the Secretary of Defense, Quality Management Office
Download the Acrobat Reader
NOTE: This page accesses documents in Portable Document Format (PDF) if your system can not read these files, you can download the Adobe Acrobat Reader, which is available at no charge from Adobe.
Please send comments and/or nominations to: vivian.collins@hqda.army.mil
Last revision: 18 Aug 2008