FHWA Knowledge Management Initiative Wins Leadership Award

Federal Highway Administration
February 26, 2002

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Tuesday, February 26, 2002
Contact: Lori Irving
Telephone: 202-366-0660
FHWA 3-02

The Federal Highway Administration's (FHWA) Knowledge Management Initiative has been awarded Government Executive magazine's 2001 Government Technology Leadership or "Gracie" Award in recognition of the agency's efforts to break down information barriers between agencies and between federal, state and local governments.

"Knowledge management is facilitating the transformation of our agency into an organization primed to meet the transportation challenges of the 21st century," FHWA Administrator Mary Peters said. "This initiative takes advantage of our most valuable asset, the collective expertise of our employees and partners, to make FHWA a more effective government agency."

The magazine calls the award "Gracie" because it "embodies the spirit and foresight of Rear Admiral Grace Hopper." During her 43-year career in the Navy, Adm. Hopper became known as a trailblazer in technology, supported innovation and bucked the "shortsighted strictures of bureaucracy."

Knowledge management acts as a library in that it captures and broadly shares written information on a given subject but also makes available to the organization as a whole the information people have accumulated in their memories. This type of knowledge may be the most valuable of all because, in context, it is frequently more extensive and up-to-date and thus more useful for decision making.

In addition to the Government Technology Leadership Award, the knowledge management initiative program received the E-Gov 2001 Explorer Award in May 2001 from the Government Solutions Center and the Intergovernmental Solutions Award in June 2001 from the Federation of Government Information Processing Councils.

More information about FHWA's knowledge management program is on the Internet at http://www.fhwa.dot.gov.