User Archetypes

This is a living document of the user archetypes for the OMB policy library, to be updated as we learn more through user research. A user archetype is a research-based summary of findings about particular user groups – none of the descriptions represent any single individual.

Agency implementer (primary user)

Responsible for understanding and complying with OMB policy while fulfilling their agency's mission.

Goals

• Do their job while complying with OMB policy.
• Know what all the policies and requirements are that apply to their programs.
• Know how their agency has interpreted OMB policy.
• Know about updates to policies and requirements that apply to their programs.
• Minimize time spent reading policies and requirements that don’t apply to them.
• Understand the intent and goal behind a specific policy.
• Translate what is broadly written in policy into day-to-day practices for their team.
• Be brought in for feedback while a policy is being drafted.

Behaviors

• Refers to policies or their “area of focus” to figure out which policies are important for them to pay attention to.
• Seeks policies from a specific time period. For folks in IT, they mostly care about newer policies. “OMB doesn’t care about older policies, so why should I?” For folks in contracting, they may care more about the policy that was in place at the time a contract was signed.
• Seeks out policies by policy number or title.
• Searches by a word or phrase that they remember seeing in a policy.
• Searches for policy guidance based on a specific topic or keyword.
• (Sometimes, usually more for the less experienced) Focuses more on their own agency’s documents that interpret OMB policy over the original policy. For example, new contracting officers may only consult the FAR (Federal Acquisition Regulation – the handbook on federal contracting) and never look at OMB policy. OMB policy can take up to two years to be incorporated into the FAR, but take effect as soon as they're issued.
• Shares specific parts of policies with others in their agency, pointing out important sections.
• Reads ‘between the lines’ of policies to interpret requirements that apply to their program.
• Expert users may be very familiar with a specific policy, referring to the policy by the document number (for example, "M-16-19") and even navigating the policy by page (for example, "I usually refer to page five.")

Pain points

• Policy interpretations differ between agencies, offices within agencies, and between OMB and the Inspector General. This causes a lot of confusion, stress, and extra work for the people in agencies trying to comply with the policy.
• Feels like they’re only asked for feedback on a new policy once it’s already 80 percent complete.
• Doesn’t have a clear source for learning about new policy changes and updates, it’s hard to stay current.
• There’s no clear way to find out about all the policies or requirements that apply to their program – it’s like - trying to find a needle in a haystack.
• Legalese.
• Finding the original documents can be logistically challenging – it’s often unclear who the originating body is and links to the documents are often broken.

OMB desk officer (WIP)

• Works with agencies to help them understand OMB policy and makes sure they are complying with it.

Goals

• Field questions about policies from different agencies.
• Explain the history or the ‘why’ behind a policy to agency representatives.

Behaviors

Pain points

OMB Policy library admin (WIP)

Inputs existing OMB policies into the online policy library – this person may be a contractor or may be a policy analyst.

Goals

• Get policy documents entered into the policy library with no errors.
• Minimize effort needed to get documents into the policy library.

Behaviors

Pain points

OMB Policy analyst (WIP)

Writes OMB policy and other guidance documents.

Goals

• Get feedback from various agencies during the process of writing policy.
• Get new policies through the internal OMB approvals process.

Behaviors

Pain points