ORIENTATION:
RESULTS ORIENTED
MANAGEMENT AND
ACCOUNTABILITY (ROMA)
Missouri Association for Community Action
What is ROMA?
(Results Oriented Management and Accountability)

ROMA was created in 1994 by an ongoing task
force of Federal, state, and local community action
officials – the Monitoring and Assessment Task Force
(MATF)
Government Performance and Results
Act (GPRA)



Created in 1993
“The purpose of this act is to improve federal
program effectiveness and public accountability by
promoting a new focus on results, service quality
and customer satisfaction.”
The Monitoring and Assessment Task Force, created
in 1994, created six goals in their National
Strategic Plan
Goals

Families:
 Low-income
people become more self sufficient
 Low-income people, especially vulnerable populations,
achieve their potential by strengthening family and
other support systems
Goals

Community
 The
condition in which low-income people live are
improved
 Low-income people own a stake in their community
Goals

Agency
 Partnerships
among supporters and providers of
services to low-income people are achieved
 Agencies increase their capacity to achieve results
What does ROMA do?


ROMA provides a framework
for continuous growth and
improvement among more
than 1000 local community
action agencies and a basis
for state leadership and
assistance toward those ends
Improve federal program effectiveness and public
accountability by promoting a new focus on results,
service quality and customer satisfaction
Results-oriented Management




Assesses poverty needs and conditions within the
community
Defines a clear agency anti-poverty mission for
community action and a strategy to address those
needs, both immediate and longer term, in the context
of existing resources and opportunities in the community
Identifies specific improvements, or results, to be
achieved among low-income people and the community
Organizes and implements programs, services and
activities, such as advocacy, within the agency and
among “partnering” organizations, to achieve
anticipated results
Results-oriented Accountability


Develops and implement strategies to measure and
record improvements in the condition of low income
people and the communities in which they live that
result from community action intervention
Uses information about outcomes, or results, among
agency tripartite boards and staff to determine the
overall effectiveness, inform annual and long-range
planning, support agency advocacy, funding and
community partnership activities.
Benefits

Board members
 ROMA
is a strategy that assists board members in their
statutory obligations to fully participate in planning
and evaluating community action services
Benefits

Staff
 Focus
on outcomes rather than on a particular program
 Improve services by clearly being able to see what is
working well and what is not
 Helps organize, direct and
implement resources and
activities to achieve positive
outcomes
Benefits

Families
 Empowers
families by allowing them to make educated
choices about services that will help them achieve their
goals
 Better to measure one’s own progress or achievement
toward their goals