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Business-as-usual operations constitute around £600bn of government expenditure – making it crucial this spending delivers value for money. Government, like other business sectors, is using operations management principles such as lean, systems thinking and continuous improvement for managing and improving performance. This includes informing business change and determining whether processes are needed and are delivering intended outcomes efficiently. Strategic, policy and investment decisions, use of information, technology, and organisational capability all have a major impact on whether services are efficient and meet customers' needs.

By analysing performance across government, the NAO has identified the aspects of operations and process management with the greatest impact. These include having a customer focus, taking a whole system perspective, using information to inform business decisions, and building an effective management and leadership environment.

Key NAO publications:

• Managing business operations - what government needs to get right (Sep 2015)
• Maturity of process management in central government (Dec 2010)