CURRENT POLICIES OF THE OFFICE OF PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT
Marjorie L. Budd
Office of Personnel Management
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The Office of Personnel Management has policy leadership for governmentwide training and development under the Government Employees Training Act and various Executive Orders from the President.
Each agency has responsibility to identify training needs of its employees and to develop or identify training resources to meet those needs. OPM issues regulations and policy guidance to help agencies comply with legal requirements, promote consistency in administering governmentwide programs, raise the level of quality, share best practices, and ensure research-based, cost-efficient approaches.
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Currently OPM is updating and strengthening governmentwide training policy, particularly in areas of continuing education.
We’re now in an environment of unprecedented interest in Human Resource Development (HRD) and high expectations.
Globally, there is realization that with all the advances in technology we are still dependent on labor to meet long-term competitive challenges of a rapidly changing world market. Training is critical in expanding productivity and economic growth of nations. The need is for skilled workers who can solve problems, adapt to changes in technology, and communicate effectively across all boundaries. Countries like Japan and Germany recognize that human capital is the competitive advantage and invest as much as 10 percent of payroll on training. While U.S. lags far behind at less than 2 percent, the best companies in the U.S. collectively invest billions of dollars in training and are finding it pays off. In the new economic order, countries that invest most in education and training will be the most competitive (Naisbit, Megatrends 2000).
In the public sector, studies like Civil Service 2000 and the Volcker Commission Report point to the increasing need for a highly trained work force in the federal government. Even now the federal government employs the largest percentage of college graduates and more professionals and technical experts
compared to other U.S. employers. Moreover, federal jobs are shifting toward higher skills at a rapid rate. The largest and fastest growing professional fields are engineering and the medical sciences. As the social, environmental, and health issues of our nation become more complex and the scope and impact continue to broaden, projections by the Department of Labor suggest that federal employment will require higher levels of technical expertise and shrinking levels in clerical and blue-collar jobs.
In January 1992, after several months of dialog and debate with agencies around these issues, OPM issued new HRD Policy Initiatives that constituted a comprehensive plan to shape a “new paradigm” for HRD--one where HRD is viewed as a long-term strategic investment in human resources, where it is linked to organizational business plans and priorities, and where it is an integral, ongoing part of the workplace.
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The HRD Policy Initiatives are in 3 major areas: Agency Management of HRD; Career Development of Federal Employees; and Supervisory, Managerial, and Executive Development. There is a specific initiative on Continuing Professional/Technical Education and there are several others that have a direct impact on this area.
In the area of career development, OPM has crafted regulations requiring that all new federal employees receive a comprehensive orientation at the outset of their careers and that it be a continuing process involving the supervisor back at the workplace. There is a growing body of evidence that the attention paid to new employees at the initial stages of their careers has a significant effect on retention rates and employee commitment levels. Probationary period training extends the rationale for new employee orientation to the job-related knowledges needed to perform successfully in the employee’s career.
Workplace Basics Training calls for more attention and support to agencies to assess and attend to the basic skill deficiencies of their work force, as well as to identify the need for workplace basics such as the ability to communicate effectively, to problem-solve, to negotiate, to work with teams to set goals, and to learn how to learn.
Continuing Technical and Professional Education calls for guidance to agencies to 1) assess the job related needs of mission critical occupations at key developmental stages; 2) make available various formal and informal developmental experiences to assure technical and professional growth for employees; 3) link development of employees to: a) current and future skills needed in the organization, b) occupational requirements necessary to maintain professional standards and skills in regulated professions such as accountants, engineers, health care professionals), and c) individual needs of employees to develop in their career.
New regulations on Academic Degree Training delegate authority to agencies to lift the constraint on training for an academic degree for shortage and hard-to-fill
occupations. Most of the 190,000 federal workers who are in shortage-category jobs are scientists and engineers. This authority gives agencies the means to identify their own shortage positions and to pay an employee’s way through school in a program leading to a degree (even advanced degrees) in that field. This year OPM will sponsor legislation that would allow agencies the authority to support the cost of individual memberships in professional associations. Such support is now prohibited by law.
Training for recertification will be strengthened through OPM’s work with professional associations to ensure that employees who are members of such professions receive training comparable to their colleagues in the private sector.
There will be new policy guidance on Retraining for Occupational Change. Specifically it will focus on 1) linking retraining strategies to the business plan of the agency, and 2) outlining strategies for occupational change due to technological advances, mission changes, downsizing, and disability, and 3) outlining strategies to combat skills obsolescence.
There will be guidance on how to identify and develop career paths and career ladders so that agencies can articulate the steps that an employee would take from initial entry through journeyman and senior-levels in major and related occupations.
There are several initiatives that focus on strengthening training for supervisors, managers, and executives, and proposed regulations requiring agencies to institute candidate development programs.
The centerpiece--the underpinning of all the initiatives--is OPM’s proposed new regulations on needs assessment. These will require each agency to establish a process that systematically links its training and development plans and resources to the agency’s mission, strategic plans, performance goals, and priorities.
This is crucial. It is OPM’s response to the Volcker Commission findings that agency practices regarding needs assessment vary widely and are inconsistently applied. The Commission found that training is frequently ad hoc and self initiated; that agencies are not certain what they should train for (short or long term), which employees should receive the greatest amount of training, or when or how often employees need continuing education. The Commission found that career paths are not well planned, and most federal training is voluntary, individually focused, and bears little relation to major agency objectives and missions. This leaves agencies unable to justify costs in an era of tight budgets.
The new regulations will require agencies to analyze desired levels of performance at multiple levels: 1) organizational--to identify broad agency improvements and concerns linked to the strategic business plans; 2) occupational--to identify short- and long-term training requirements within major occupations and for all levels of management; and 3) individual--to identify specific knowledges and skills for an employee’s job performance and development.
This process will result in master organizational training plans and occupational training plans--giving agencies the “big picture ” and the information
they need to establish priorities and justify expenditures. The regulations offer agencies the means to work smarter, not harder, and get more for their limited training dollars. By working with agency leaders to help them realize their goals and objectives, and by systematically analyzing the mission-critical occupations that feed into those goals, HRD offices can target their resources to areas of greatest need and maximum potential for productivity improvement.
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IV. OPM’s policies on continuing technical and professional education are being developed now, and they will constitute the first official guidance in this area. The policies will be incorporated into a revised FPM Chapter 410 on Training. Based on a review of the research and best practices, OPM’s preliminary thinking includes these points:
Continuing education (CE) is broader than training for specific skills and long term in focus. CE programs extend beyond an occasional course or seminar to include continual, long-term development efforts that are organized and coordinated. While technical training may show immediate benefits, professional development programs show their payoff over longer time spans.
CE is necessary 1) to ensure professionals remain up to date in a changing world; 2) to enhance the reputation of the profession as a whole within the agency and on behalf of the agency; 3) to ensure that professionals see learning as an integral part of work; 4) to motivate employees throughout their career; 5) to recruit and retain more productive workers; 6) to broaden the experience of professionals in related fields; and 7) to compete with professional standards outside of federal government.
CE is an effective tool for breaking the glass ceiling--an opportunity for agency management to develop women and minorities in occupations where they are underrepresented.
CE is extremely cost effective to the federal government as an alternative to educate professionals already on board rather than hire new employees and train them. Also it is a competitive advantage the government can offer as a way to attract and retain employees who are concerned about their ability to stay current and grow in their profession. Professional development programs help meet employees, individual needs while also reaching the organizations’ goals.
There is a growing trend for professional associations to assist organizations in delivering continuing education programs. These professional associations regularly track new developments in their area, set guidelines for accepted practices, publish the latest literature, and often sponsor professional development activities. They also define competencies for their areas of expertise and often provide training programs focused on these competencies.
Higher level learning should be focus of CE. Workers must be capable of going beyond the basics of specialized technical training to get knowledge essential
for success in new work environment requiring more judgment and decisionmaking.
CE should be viewed as an investment rather than an operating expense. Professional development programs should be expected to assist in carrying out an organization’s strategic plans. They should be viewed as a critical business priority, not a tack-on extra.
CE programs should be based on needs assessment--at the organizational, occupational, and individual levels. They should reflect priorities of the agency as well as the professional development needs of the employee.
Successful CE programs require the support of management--line managers to agency executives. Without such support from top to bottom, programs will not succeed. They must be structured carefully and systematically planned. The delivery can be informal or formal; there are wide ranges of instructional activities that extend beyond traditional training approaches. Some of the best alternative methods are low cost/no cost.
Professional Activities/Associations
Taskforce Committees
Mentoring
Self-directed and informal learning (journals, seminars, showcases, professional networks)
Details
Apprenticeships
Job Rotations
Special Assignments
Coaching
Formal classroom training
CBT
Satellite (distance learning)
CE should be shared responsibility between agency and employee. It should be owned and managed by learner; the agency should enable the process.
CE is an integral part of the learning organization concept. This will be an underlying theme of the entire new training policy in FPM Chapter 410--that whole organizations must commit to continually expanding their capacity, their “people capacity” to create results they desire. Learning organizations encourage members to engage in “life-long learning” and identify every opportunity in the workplace for continuous, deliberate learning to occur, e.g., pilots, taskgroups, study units, etc.
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OPM’s next steps include:
The publication of the new FPM Chapter 410 with new policy guidance in FY94;
the publication of a companion handbook that will illustrate procedures, examples, and models for carrying out the policy guidance;
issuing final rulemaking on training needs assessment this summer, and distributing a reference guide of tools and examples for agency use in implementing the regulations;
finding the “pockets of excellence” in the federal sector--agencies who are consistently providing good programs to support these policies;
showcasing the best practices in workshops around the nation; describing them as examples in OPM handbooks; helping agencies to network with each other; finding ways to leverage resources.
