OPM seeks to streamline hiring

The Office of Personnel Management has released a federal hiring guide in partnership with the Chief Human Capital Officers Council to help agencies improve their ability to attract and retain top talent. Agencies will have their first deadline related to implementing the framework in December. The End-to-End Hiring Roadmap released Sept. 5 outlines how agencies can integrate and streamline workforce planning, recruiting, the hiring process, security. suitability and orientation. It also establishes governmentwide measures for the effectiveness of federal hiring, said Michael Hager, acting OPM director. The framework sets a target to start and complete the hiring process for a federal employee of in 80 calendar days, he said in a memot. The road map “is designed to transform competitive hiring for applicants into a strategic relationship between hiring managers and human capital officials to attract, hire and retain top talent,” Hager said. The plan focuses on the experience of applicants, making sure they understand the hiring process, receive timely and clear communications to manage their expectations and, once hired, are acculturated quickly into their new organization. In a first step, agencies are to establish their baselines against the road map’s governmentwide measures. From this baseline, agencies will conduct gap analyses and then set aggressive targets to establish a path for implementation, Hager said. Agencies will report their baselines and one-year improvement targets in the 2008 Human Capital Management Report, which they must submit to OPM by Dec. 15, he said. Agencies will put in place the improvement plans through fiscal 2009. Tracking and measuring actions to implement the framework are critical to its success, he said. Agencies should use the CHCO Council network to share best practices, including applications that might be useful for implementing and tracking progress such as those included in USA Staffing, Hager said.