The committee's name have evolved over the years, and is sometimes updated to reflect the majority's direction. Image: Katherine Welles/Shutterstock.com
By: FEDweek StaffFollowing is a letter Rep. James Comer of Kentucky and Rep. Pete Sessions of Texas—chair of the Oversight and Accountability Committee and its federal workforce subcommittee—asking OMB for the status of actions to increase onsite work by federal employees, the latest in a series of such letters and queries at hearings skeptical about the continued relatively high levels of telework.
The Committee on Oversight and Accountability is conducting oversight of agency telework policies and their impact on agency missions. As part of this oversight, we seek an update on the implementation of Office and Personnel Management memorandum M-23-15, Measuring, Monitoring, and Improving Organizational Health and Organizational Performance in the Context of Evolving Agency Work Environments, to include progress in increasing in-person work.
M-23-15 was issued in April 2023 and appears to envision an improved, data-driven approach to measuring agency performance and customer service, to include the impact of telework. In May 2023, Committee Republicans sent requests to 25 agencies seeking telework related data to assess the claims of the Biden Administration that telework in Federal agencies had been an unmitigated success and therefore justified a permanent shift to widespread telework. It stood to reason that in the wake of OMB publishing M-23-15, agencies would be compiling the data we requested. Yet, even after a protracted delay in providing any response at all, agencies generally produced very little quantitative data underpinning their telework and remote work policies. While the Committee continues our efforts to obtain substantive responses, we assume these agencies have been more responsive to your agency. In fact, in a July 2023 briefing, OMB staff reported that “nearly all CFO Act agencies have submitted plans for review.” Thus, we assume agencies have provided OMB with significant data relevant to our inquiry.
In addition, M-23-15 states there is an “expectation…agencies will continue to substantially increase meaningful in-person work at Federal offices, particularly at headquarters and equivalents…” In the July briefing, OMB stated it anticipated “establishing a minimum of 4-6 days in-person per pay period or existing expectations already in excess of 6 days per pay period due to ongoing mission needs” at agency headquarters. It is important to understand the status of in-person work plans, so we seek updates regarding these as well. This is especially true in light of recent reports that White House chief of staff Jeffrey Zients has yet again had to personally insert himself into the effort to increase in-person work at Federal agencies. This report says he is “demanding proof” of return-to-office plans and progress. So are we. Over and above the effort to increase in-person work, this highlights concerns the federal workforce may believe it can do as it sees fit, regardless of which administration is in charge.
Ultimately, the telework debate is about agency performance. The better agencies are able to measure performance, the better they can improve customer satisfaction and use taxpayer dollars more efficiently. Both Congress and the Administration will also be able to better conduct oversight and make policy and budgeting decisions. As your own guidance states, current performance frameworks do not reach to a sufficiently granular level, a possible contributing factor to the public being “often dissatisfied with government services when compared to the private sector.” The public’s perception of federal agency performance is likely further damaged by reports that federal workers are resisting even the President’s own direction to increase in-person work, as well as union grievances that hinder agency management’s efforts to increase in-person work to better accomplish their missions. To assist the Committee in its oversight, please provide the following information, documents and communications no later than February 14, 2024:
1. Copies of Workplace Environment Plans for all Chief Financial Officer Act agencies;
2. A status report on all agency plans to increase in-person work, to include an implementation timeline and an explanation of any obstacles that have impeded such efforts;
3. In cases in which either collective bargaining agreements or grievances filed by collective bargaining units have impeded efforts to increase in-person work, a description of the circumstances and outcomes;
4. A description of employee resistance to increased in-person work;
5. A description of any findings regarding the impact, positive or negative, of increased telework or remote work on agency performance, to include observations down to the most granular work element possible. Also include the data underlying these findings;
6. An explanation of new or evolving best practices regarding organizational performance and organizational health measurement in federal agencies, to include the impact of telework and remote work;
7. An explanation of how federal “leaders, managers, and supervisors are being held to the highest standards of accountability for understanding how their operational units are performing and …(maximizing) organizational performance and organizational health;”
8. An explanation of challenges federal leaders, managers, and supervisors face in “maximizing organizational performance and organizational health;” and
9. An analysis of agency continuity of operations capabilities vis-à-vis alternative work capabilities.
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