The 2013 defense budget measure required setting up an interagency rotation program for national security personnel designed to foster a workforce that can collaborate effectively across agency lines, but the program has “languished” with no one actually making such a rotation as of September, GAO has said.
An interagency committee was established to develop a national security human capital strategy to include the rotational program, a report said. Progress has been made in areas including setting training and education requirements, prerequisites or requirements for participation, and performance measures to be used for personnel participating in the program, it said.
But the rotational program has not progressed “because there has been limited leadership and oversight of the program, including necessary actions to be taken by the departments, agencies, and other organizations to complete their assigned roles, responsibilities, and tasks,” it said. For example, OPM is tasked with issuing guidance on the rights and responsibilities of employees returning from rotational service, “but OPM officials told GAO that they have not done so and could not give timeframes for completion.”
Participating departments and agencies meanwhile are to identify positions and personnel for rotations, “but they have not used the procedures laid out in the strategy because officials said they needed further guidance from OPM. OPM officials stated that the departments and agencies do not need further guidance from them to proceed with their assigned roles, responsibilities, and tasks.”
OPM generally concurred with recommendations to establish a clear leadership and oversight structure but raised issues about the roles and responsibilities that GAO addressed.
