OPM poised to pick HR integrator

Training and Management Assistance site

The Office of Personnel Management plans to select a systems integrator in the next few weeks to streamline and automate how human resources information is stored, accessed and exchanged across government.

OPM manages the Enterprise Human Resources Integration (EHRI) program, which is one of the Bush administration's 24 e-government initiatives.

EHRI will:

* Eliminate the need for paper employee records.

* Provide a way to electronically exchange standard HR data across government.

* Enable managers to report benefits and transfer HR data electronically during an employee's career.

* Streamline governmentwide workforce reporting and data analysis.

* Provide timely and accurate data for retirement claims processing.

* Enable strategic workforce analysis and planning.

EHRI will include a central repository, expected to be up and running by the end of September, that will contain data on 1.8 million civilian employees. Agencies will be able to use that data for workforce planning and analysis.

OPM plans to compete the EHRI task order under its Training and Management Assistance contract, which provides a pool of pre-approved companies that agencies can use to help them develop their HR systems.

Some of the firms represented under the TMA contract include Booz Allen Hamilton, Science Applications International Corp. and Anteon Corp.

According to an OPM spokesman, the agency is "in the middle of the task order competition process [for EHRI], and it will take a few weeks before that competition can be completed and a selection made."

Upcoming milestones for EHRI include:

* Sept. 30, 2003: Establish EHRI data repository.

* Sept. 30, 2003: Define policy, process, and business rule environment.

* Sept. 30, 2004: Modernize the Central Personnel Data File.

* Sept. 30, 2004: Acquire EHRI data.