This series provides the essential information needed to assure a smooth transition. Reports in this series detail organization and operations in a range of offices critical to a properly functioning White House. These reports rely heavily on the extensive interviews conducted by WHTP's White House Interview Program, an innovative program that has given practitioners a useful way to pass on their experiences to those that follow, regardless of party. Pictured at left, WHTP Director, Martha Kumar reviews with Bush Transition Director Clay Johnson one of the briefing books WHTP provided for each of the offices covered by the 2001 series: Chief of Staff, Staff Secretary, Director of Personnel, White House Administration, White House Counsel, Press Secretary, and Office of Communications. Mr. Johnson had served as the Bush for President Transition planner and had worked with WHTP staff for almost two years by the time the new administration took office. He would go on to serve as Director of Presidential Personnel in the new White House.

The institutional memory series office descriptions detail basic organizational structures, as well as typical work routines, identify what those who have done the job commonly think has worked and what has not.

The series for 2009 begins with updated descriptions for each of the seven offices covered in the original and highly acclaimed 2001 series. In addition, this series includes organizational charts for many offices typically running from 1978 through 2000 at six month intervals.

A shortcut to the Institutional Memory Series, The White House World gathers and digests the same material provided to the Bush White House staff in 2001.

This series details general challenges to previous transitions. The reports here come from authors and practitioners alike. Click here to jump to the General Transition Series or select one of the individual studies listed below for the specific report. This series has two sets of reports, covering past transitions and the general topic of transitions. [All in PDF Format]

General Guides

• Presidency & the Political Environment by John H. Kessel
• The White House World: Start Up, Organization, and The Pressures of Work Life by Martha J. Kumar
• Meeting the Freight Train Head On: Planning for the Transition to Power by Martha J. Kumar, George C. Edwards, III, James Pfiffner, & Terry Sullivan

Presidential Transition Discussions
A Partnership with the Council on Excellence in Government

• Martha Kumar on the Importance of Transitions.

A Special Symposium of the Public Administration Review (reprinted here by permission PAR)

• Getting Ready for Day One by Martha J. Kumar
• For an Effective 2008 Transition by Clay Johnson III
• Preparing to Be President on Day One by Harrison Wellford

Evaluating Past Transitions

• Lessons from Past Transitions by John P. Burke
• Tales of Transitions 1980 and 1988 by John P. Burke
• Evaluating Transition 2001 by Terry Sullivan

A new series for the 2009 transition, these briefing papers concentrate on issues and resources identified in discussions with past White House staff, including those attending the WHTP and James Baker Institute's meeting of the former White House Chiefs of Staff.

New Institutional Data

• Presidential Work During the First 100 Days
  by Terry Sullivan
• The President on the Road
  by Brendan Doherty
• The Cost of the White House
  by Bradley Patterson from his new book from Brookings
  (released here by permission of Brookings Press)
• Presidential Power in National Security: A Guide to the President-Elect
  by Louis Fisher
• Presidential Communications Lessons Learned by Martha Kumar
• Presidential Interchanges with Press by Martha Kumar

Appointments Database and Analysis

• The 2008 Plum Book has arrived. WHTP makes it available by download (pdf): download here.
• The Details of Inquiry — Fixing the Presidential Appointments Process by Terry Sullivan Revised!
• The Real Invisible Hand: Presidential Appointees in the Administration of George W. Bush by G. Calvin MacKenzie

Special Report: The View from the Nerve Center

In its first book in the special studies series, WHTP and its partner The James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy of Rice University focus on the specific operational problems faced by the White House Chief of Staff. The book, Nerve Center: Lessons on Governing from the White House Chiefs of Staff is published by the Texas A&M University Press.

Nerve Center compiles the collective judgments of 12 of the 14 living former White House Chiefs of Staff who convened to discuss the challenges that present every White House trying to move the nation's agenda forward. "Some of us have tried to oust others of us from office," noted James A. Baker III in his remarks opening the conference, "but on many issues about how to do the nation's business, we are all agreed there is no partisan answer. Every new administration deserves a chance to realize the electorate's will without stumbling through the simplest mistakes. We've all been there and regardless of who steps into this job on the twentieth of January, we want the best for them."

Those involved in the conference and covered in the book include:

• Former Congressman, Sec. of Defense, and Vice-President Richard Cheney
• Former Sec. of Treasury and State James A. Baker III
• Former Senate Majority Leader and Ambassador Howard Baker, Jr.
• Former Congressman and Sec. of Defense Donald Rumsfeld
• Former Congressman Leon Panetta

• Former Governor John Sununu
• Erskine Bowles
• John Podesta
• Jack Watson
• Thomas "Mack" McClarty
• Former Sec. of Transportation Samuel Skinner and
• Kenneth Duberstein.

Their discussions in Nerve Center range over topics about staffing the White House, crisis management, political leadership, predatory partisanship in Washington, presidential decision-making, and a host of other topics associated with presidential transitions and governing from the modern White House. Two scholarly articles summing up the operational dilemmas the Chiefs face and evaluating the 2001 transition round out this useful resource from the WHTP.

• Midyear Review by WHTP authors
• Appointments Summary, Day 255 (10/01)
• WHTP Publishes Appointments Reform Agenda
• In Brief: Six-Month Review of Travel

WHTP Introduces Six Month Reviews

On the conclusion of the first 180 days, the White House Transition Project has gathered together review essays from authors in its Institutional Memory program.

• John Burke on the National Security Advisor
• David Cohen on the White House Chief of Staff
• Brendan Doherty on presidential travel
• Bradley Patterson on White House organization
• David Lewis and Gabe Horton on presidential appointments
• Martha Kumar on Presidential Press Relationships

Appointments Summary for Day 255:
Administration Passes Halfway; Senate Backlog Continues

General Summary on Pace

As of day 255, the Obama administration has secured 271 confirmed appointments. These statistics compare quite closely to figures compiled by WHTP for the George W. Bush presidency at the same point in his administration. By 10/01/2001, the Bush White House had gotten confirmations on some 268 appointments. President Obama has sent to the Senate 403 nominations for positions tracked by WHTP while President Bush had sent 392. See below for detailed comparisons by cabinet posts.

Summary Of All PAS Positions in Executive Branch
(As of 10/01/09 - Day 255)

Summary for PAS Appointments to Cabinet Departments - with overall comparisons for President Bush

Comparisons by Cabinet Agencies

WHTP has now produced comparative statistics on the George W. Bush administration for use in comparisons with the current administration. These comparisons included all of the detailed breakdowns reported in the past (some presented here), including statistics on "staffing up" the cabinet agencies.

Currently, President Obama overall performance tracks closely with President Bush's at this point in the administration. In the cabinet agencies, President Obama has sent forward nominations for 263 positions, whereas President Bush had submitted 236 nominations. The Senate has approved 205 (or 53%) of the 385 positions the President must fill. President Bush had obtained 200 confirmations but having about 50 fewer positions to fill results in a higher 60% rate.

Among the Cabinet, both presidents had difficulty staffing Treasury and Justice. For President Obama, Treasury and Justice are two of four least staffed up agencies (percentage of positions confirmed). Health and Labor make up the other two. For President Bush, the four least staffed up cabinet agencies included Treasury and Justice along with Interior and Transportation.

In the other direction, the top three staffed up agencies of both presidents included Agriculture. For Obama, Interior and State round out the top three while for Bush, Defense and Energy finished out the top three.

Notes on Sources

The research relies on White House releases and information found in the Senate and Senate committee calendars for Presidential Appointees requiring Senate confirmation(designated "PAS" in OPM lists). It tracks all appointments from the point of an administration announcement through to a Senate decision. Similar resources inform comparisons with the George W. Bush administration.

WHTP Appointments Process Reform Agenda

One of WHTP's primary missions has focused on understanding the details of the presidential appointments process. "There is so much of that process that is simply myth," said Terry Sullivan, who directs the Institutional Anatomy Series. "Until WHTP got into it, no one really understood the breadth or depth of the inquiry that nominees face and which demoralizes them and threatens the system."

WHTP has published recommendations on reforming the appointments process: The Details of Inquiry. The report covers three problems with appointments: inexperience, lengthening process, and needlessly adversarial and tedious inquiry. It makes 8 recommendations which would relieve nominees of 31% of their reporting burdens. Access this and other reports in the Institutional Anatomy Series on this site by clicking here.

In Brief:
from Brendan Doherty's Six-month Review of
Presidential Travel

In his first six months as president, President Obama devoted far more time to traveling internationally than did any of the past five presidents. His 18 days spent abroad are more than the combined totals of Presidents Jimmy Carter (six days), Ronald Reagan (two days), and Bill Clinton (two days), and far outpace both George H.W. Bush (12 days) and George W. Bush (nine days). President Obama’s 18 days out of the country spanned four different trips, as compared to just one international journey apiece for Carter, Reagan, and Clinton, and three for both the first and second Presidents Bush. Click here to get the full report.