Workforce challenges and management issues are hindering the ability of the U.S. Agency for International Development’s Bureau for Global Health — one of the most important entities within the agency — to deliver on its mission, according to a U.S. government watchdog.
In a report dated in June and shared with Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chair Robert Menendez, a Democrat from New Jersey, the Government Accountability Office, or GAO, outlined a series of failings.
The report follows previous criticism, reported by Devex, over an attempt by the agency to move staff to a different contracting firm, which sparked a bitter fight over benefits, equity, and transparency. Some contractors at the bureau were so frustrated by their treatment at the agency that they organized a “sick-out” to protest the move.