How to Prompt New Cross-Agency and Cross-Sector Collaboration to Advance Learning Agendas
The 2018 Foundations for Evidence-Based Policymaking Act (Evidence Act) promotes a culture of evidence within federal agencies. A central part of that culture entails new collaboration between decision-makers and those with diverse forms of expertise inside and outside of the federal government. The challenge, however, is that new cross-agency and cross-sector collaborative relationships don’t always arise on their own. To overcome these challenges, federal evaluation staff can use “unmet desire surveys,” an outreach tool that prompts agency staff to reflect on how the success of their programs relates to what is happening in other agencies and outside government and how engaging with these other programs and organizations would help their work be more effective. It also prompts them to consider the situation from the perspective of potential collaborators—why should they want to engage?
The unmet desire survey is an important data-gathering mechanism that provides actionable information to create new connections between agency staff and people—such as those in other federal agencies, along with researchers, community stakeholders, and others outside the federal government—who have the information they desire. Then, armed with that information, evaluation staff can use the new Evidence Project Portal on Evaluation.gov (to connect with outside researchers) and/or other mechanisms (to connect with other potential collaborators) to conduct matchmaking that will foster new collaborative relationships. Using existing authorities and resources, agencies can pilot unmet desire surveys as a concrete mechanism for advancing federal learning agendas in a way that builds buy-in by directly meeting the needs of agency staff.
Challenge and Opportunity
A core mission of the Evidence Act is to foster a culture of evidence-based decision-making within federal agencies. Since the problems agencies tackle are often complex and multidimensional, new collaborative relationships between decision-makers in the federal government and those in other agencies and in organizations outside the federal government are essential to realizing the Evidence Act’s vision. Along these lines, Office of Management and Budget (OMB) implementation guidance stresses that learning agendas are “an opportunity to align efforts and promote interagency collaboration in areas of joint focus or shared populations or goals” (OMB M-19-23), and that more generally a culture of evidence “cannot happen solely at the top or in isolated analytical offices, but rather must be embedded throughout each agency…and adopted by the hardworking civil servants who serve on behalf of the American people” (OMB M-21-27).
New cross-agency and cross-sector collaborative relationships rarely arise on their own. They are voluntary, and between people who often start off as strangers to one another. Limited resources, lack of explicit permission, poor prior experiences, differing incentives, and stereotypes are all challenges to persuading strangers to engage with each other. In addition, agency staff may not previously have spent much time thinking about how new collaborative relationships could help answer questions posed by their learning agenda, or even that accessible mechanisms exist to form new relationships. This presents an opportunity for new outreach by evaluation staff, to expand a sense of what kinds of collaborative relationships would be both valuable and possible.
For instance, the Department of the Interior (DOI)’s 2024 Learning Agenda asks: What are the primary challenges to training a diverse, highly skilled workforce capable of delivering the department’s mission? The DOI itself has vital historical and other contextual information for answering this question. Yet officials from other departments likely have faced (or currently face) a similar challenge, and are in a position to share what they’ve tried so far, what has worked well, and what has fallen short. In addition, researchers who study human resource development could share insights from literature, as well as possibly partner on a new study to help answer this question in the DOI context.
Each department and agency is different, with its own learning agenda, decision-making processes, capacity constraints, and personnel needs. And so what is needed are new forms of informal collaboration (knowledge exchange) and/or formal collaboration (projects with shared ownership, decision-making authority, and accountability) that foster back-and-forth interaction. The challenge, however, is that agency staff may not consider such possibilities without being prompted to do so or may be uncertain how to communicate the opportunity to potential collaborators in a way that resonates with their goals.
This memo proposes a flexible tool that evaluation staff (e.g., evaluation officers at federal agencies) can use to generate buy-in among agency staff and leadership while also promoting collaboration as emphasized in OMB guidance and in the Evidence Act. The tool, which has already proven valuable in the federal government (see FAQs) , local government, and in the nonprofit sector, is called an “unmet desire survey.” The survey measures unmet desires for collaboration by prompting staff to consider the following types of questions:
- Which learning agenda question(s) are you focused on? Is there information about other programs within the government and/or information that outside researchers and other stakeholders have that would help answer it? What kinds of people would be helpful to connect with?
- Are you looking for informal collaboration (oriented toward knowledge exchange) or formal collaboration (oriented toward projects with shared ownership, decision-making authority, and accountability)?
- What hesitations (perhaps due to prior experiences, lack of explicit permission, stereotypes, and so on) do you have about interacting with other stakeholders? What hesitations do you think they might have about interacting with you?
- Why should they want to connect with you?
- Why do you think these connections don’t already exist?
These questions elicit critical insights about why agency staff value new connection and are highly flexible. For instance, in the first question posed above, evaluation staff can choose to ask about new information that would be helpful for any program or only about information relevant to programs that are top priorities for their agency. In other words, unmet desire surveys need not add one more thing to the plate; rather, they can be used to accelerate collaboration directly tied to current learning priorities.
Unmet desire surveys also legitimize informal collaborative relationships. Too often, calls for new collaboration in the policy sphere immediately segue into overly structured meetings that fail to uncover promising areas for joint learning and problem-solving. Meetings across government agencies are often scripted presentations about each organization’s activities, providing little insight on ways they could collaborate to achieve better results. Policy discussions with outside research experts tend to focus on formal evaluations and long-term research projects that don’t surface opportunities to accelerate learning in the near term. In contrast, unmet desire surveys explicitly legitimize the idea that diverse thinkers may want to connect only for informal knowledge exchange rather than formal events or partnerships. Indeed, even single conversations can greatly impact decision-makers, and, of course, so can more intensive relationships.
Whether the goal is informal or formal collaboration, the problem that needs to be solved is both factual and relational. In other words, the issue isn’t simply that strangers do not know each other—it’s also that strangers do not always know how to talk to one another. People care about how others relate to them and whether they can successfully relate to others. Uncertainty about relationality prevents people from interacting with others they do not know. This is why unmet desire surveys also include questions that directly measure hesitations about interacting with people from other agencies and organizations, and encourage agency staff to think about interactions from others’ perspectives.
The fact that the barriers to new collaborative relationships are both factual as well as relational underscores why people may not initiate them on their own. That’s why measuring unmet desire is only half the battle—it’s also important to ensure that evaluation staff have a plan in place to conduct matchmaking using the data gathered from the survey. One way is to create a new posting on the Evidence Project Portal (especially if the goal is to engage with outside researchers). A second way is to field the survey as part of a convening, which already has as one of its goals the development of new collaborative relationships. A third option is to directly broker connections. Regardless of which option is pursued, note that large amounts of extra capacity are likely unnecessary, at least at first. The key point is simply to ensure that matchmaking is a valued part of the process.
In sum, by deliberately inquiring about connections with others who have diverse forms of relevant expertise—and then making those connections anew—evaluation staff can generate greater enthusiasm and ownership among people who may not consider evaluation and evidence-building as part of their core responsibilities.
Plan of Action
Using existing authorities and resources, evaluation staff (such as evaluation officers at federal agencies) can take three steps to position unmet desire surveys as a standard component of the government’s evidence toolbox.
Step 1. Design and implement pilot unmet desire surveys.
Evaluation staff are well positioned to conduct outreach to assess unmet desire for new collaborative relationships within their agencies. While individual staff can work independently to design unmet desire surveys, it may be more fruitful to work together, via the Evaluation Officer Council, to design a baseline survey template. Individuals could then work with their teams to adapt the baseline template as needed for each agency, including identifying which agency staff to prioritize as well as the best way to phrase particular questions (e.g., regarding the types of connections that employees want in order to improve the effectiveness of their work or the types of hesitancies to ask about). Given that the question content is highly flexible, unmet desire surveys can directly accelerate learning agendas and build buy-in at the same time. Thus, they can yield tangible, concrete benefits with very little upfront cost.
Step 2. Meet unmet desires by matchmaking.
After the pilot surveys are administered, evaluation staff should act on their results. There are several ways to do this without new appropriations. One way is to create a posting for the Evidence Project Portal, which is explicitly designed to advertise opportunities for new collaborative relationships, especially with researchers outside the federal government. Another way is to field unmet desire surveys in advance of already-planned convenings, which themselves are natural places for matchmaking (e.g., the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality experience described in the FAQs). Lastly, for new cross-agency collaborative relationships along with other situations, evaluation staff may wish to engage in other low-lift matchmaking on their own. Depending upon the number of people they choose to survey, and the prevalence of unmet desire they uncover, they may also wish to bring on short-term matchmakers through flexible hiring mechanisms (e.g., through the Intergovernmental Personnel Act). Regardless of which option is pursued, the key point is that matchmaking itself must be a valued part of this process. Documenting successes and lessons learned then set the stage for using agency-specific discretionary funds to hire one or more in-house matchmakers as longer-term or staff appointments.
Step 3. Collect information on successes and lessons learned from the pilot.
Unmet desire surveys can be tricky to field because they entail asking employees about topics they may not be used to thinking about. It often takes some trial and error to figure out the best ways to ask about employees’ substantive goals and their hesitations about interacting with people they do not know. Piloting unmet desire surveys and follow-on matchmaking can not only demonstrate value (e.g., the impact of new collaborative relationships fostered through these combined efforts) to justify further investment but also suggest how evaluation leads might best structure future unmet desire surveys and subsequent matchmaking.
Conclusion
An unmet desire survey is an adaptable tool that can reveal fruitful pathways for connection and collaboration. Indeed, unmet desire surveys leverage the science of collaboration by ensuring that efforts to broker connections among strangers consider both substantive goals and uncertainty about relationality. Evaluation staff can pilot unmet desire surveys using existing authorities and resources, and then use the information gathered to identify opportunities for productive matchmaking via the Evidence Project Portal or other methods. Ultimately, positioning the survey as a standard component of the government’s evidence toolbox has great potential to support agency staff in advancing federal learning agendas and building a robust culture of evidence across the U.S. government.
This action-ready policy memo is part of Day One 2025 — our effort to bring forward bold policy ideas, grounded in science and evidence, that can tackle the country’s biggest challenges and bring us closer to the prosperous, equitable and safe future that we all hope for whoever takes office in 2025 and beyond.
Yes, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) has used unmet desire surveys several times in 2023 and 2024. Part of AHRQ’s mission is to improve the quality and safety of healthcare delivery. It has prioritized scaling and spreading evidence-based approaches to implementing person-centered care planning for people living with or at risk for multiple chronic conditions. This requires fostering new cross-sector collaborative relationships between clinicians, patients, caregivers, researchers, payers, agency staff and other policymakers, and many others. That’s why, in advance of several recent convenings with these diverse stakeholders, AHRQ fielded unmet desire surveys among the participants. The surveys uncovered several avenues for informal and formal collaboration that stakeholders believed were necessary and, importantly, informed the agenda for their meetings. Relative to many convenings, which are often composed of scripted presentations about individuals’ diverse activities, conducting the surveys in advance and presenting the results during the meeting shaped the agenda in more action-oriented ways.
AHRQ’s experience demonstrates a way to seamlessly incorporate unmet desire surveys into already-planned convenings, which themselves are natural opportunities for matchmaking. While some evaluation staff may wish to hire separate matchmakers or engage in matchmaking using outside mechanisms like the Evidence Project Portal, the AHRQ experience also demonstrates another low-lift, yet powerful, avenue. Lastly, while the majority of this memo and the FAQs focus on measuring unmet desire among agency staff, the AHRQ experience also demonstrates the applicability of this idea to other stakeholders as well.
The best place to start—especially when resources are limited—is with potential evidence champions. These are people who are already committed to answering questions on their agency’s learning agenda and are likely to have an idea of the kinds of cross-agency or cross-sector collaborative relationships that would be helpful. These potential evidence champions may not self-identify as such; rather, they may see themselves as program managers, customer-experience experts, bureaucracy hackers, process innovators, or policy entrepreneurs. Regardless of terminology, the unmet desire survey provides people who are already motivated to collaborate and connect with a clear opportunity to articulate their needs. Evaluation staff can then respond by posting on the Evidence Project portal or other matchmaking on their own to stimulate new and productive relationships for those people.
The administrator should be someone with whom agency staff feel comfortable discussing their needs (e.g., a member of an agency evaluation team) and who is able to effectively facilitate matchmaking—perhaps because of their network, their reputation within the agency, their role in convenings, or their connection to the Evidence Project Portal. The latter criterion helps ensure that staff expect useful follow-up, which in turn motivates survey completion and participation in follow-on activities; it also generates enthusiasm for engaging in new collaborative relationships (as well as creating broader buy-in for the learning agenda). In some cases, it may make the most sense to have multiple people from an evaluation team surveying different agency staff or co-sponsoring the survey with agency innovation offices. Explicit support from agency leadership for the survey and follow-on activities is also crucial for achieving staff buy-in.
Survey content is meant to be tailored and agency-specific, so the sample questions can be adapted as follows:
- Which learning agenda question(s) are you focused on? Is there information about other programs within the government and/or information that outside researchers and other stakeholders have that would help answer it? What kinds of people would be helpful to connect with?
This question can be left entirely open-ended or be focused on particular priorities and/or particular potential collaborators (e.g., only researchers, or only other agency staff, etc.). - Are you looking for informal collaboration (oriented toward knowledge exchange) or formal collaboration (oriented toward projects with shared ownership, decision-making authority, and accountability)?
This question may invite responses related to either informal or formal collaboration, or instead may only ask about knowledge exchange (a relatively lower commitment that may be more palatable to agency leadership). - What hesitations (perhaps due to prior experiences, lack of explicit permission, stereotypes, and so on) do you have about interacting with other stakeholders? What hesitations do you think they might have about interacting with you?
This question should refer to specific types of hesitancy that survey administrators believe are most likely (e.g., ask about a few hesitancies that seem most likely to arise, such as lack of explicit permission, concerns about saying something inappropriate, or concerns about lack of trustworthy information). - Why should they want to connect with you?
- Why do you think these connections don’t already exist?
These last two questions can similarly be left broad or include a few examples to help spark ideas.
Evaluation staff may also choose to only ask a subset of the questions.
Again, the answer is agency-specific. In cases that will use the Evidence Project Portal, agency evaluation staff will take the first stab at crafting postings. In other cases, meeting the unmet desire may occur via already-planned convenings or matchmaking on one’s own. Formalizing this duty as a part of one or more people’s official responsibilities sends a signal about how much this work is valued. Exactly who those people are will depend on the agency’s structure, as well as on whether there are already people in a given agency who see matchmaking as part of their job. The key point is that matchmaking itself should be a valued part of the process.
While unmet desire surveys can be done any time and on a continuous basis, it is best to field them when there is either an upcoming convening (which itself is a natural opportunity for matchmaking) or there is identified staff capacity for follow-on matchmaking and employee willingness to build collaborative relationships.
Many evaluation officers and their staff are already forming collaborative relationships as part of developing and advancing learning agendas. Unmet desire surveys place explicit focus on what kinds of new collaborative relationships agency staff want to have with staff in other programs, either within their agency/department or outside it. These surveys are designed to prompt staff to reflect on how the success of their program relates to what is happening elsewhere and to consider who might have information that is relevant and helpful, as well as any hesitations they have about interacting with those people. Unmet desire surveys measure both substantive goals as well as staff uncertainty about interacting with others.
To improve program outcomes, federal evaluation officers should conduct “unmet desire surveys” to advance federal learning agendas and built agency buy-in.
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