Federal Manager's Daily Report

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The lead FAA office overseeing commercial operations in space needs to better assess its workforce and plan for future needs, GAO has said.

The office of commercial space transportation, known as AST, does not collect sufficient information on its current staff in order to identify current and potential skills gaps in areas such as flight safety analysis, a report said. Officials told GAO that they plan to develop a such a tool but currently has not developed even a draft of the tool nor established a timeline for finalizing it, “it said.

“Without this information, AST lacks reasonable assurance that its current workforce possesses the requisite skills and competencies, and AST may not be best positioned to proactively determine how to align its staff to carry out its mission,” the report said.

Further, that office assesses workforce needs only on a two-year budget cycle, “limiting its ability to effectively and strategically plan for its longer-term workforce needs. According to officials, it can take a few years for engineers with certain skills to be trained and have sufficient experience to lead projects.”

It added that those officials said that “hiring technically qualified personnel, including positions that require considerable training and experience to be a fully functioning employee, is challenging. AST officials said that they are considering projecting their workload estimates further into the future, but they have neither formally committed to doing so nor established a timeline with milestones.”