Human Capital: DOD Needs Complete Assessments to Improve Future Civilian Strategic Workforce Plans
Published: 2012-09-27T00:00:00

Fast Facts:

Highlights:
section_title: Why GAO Did This Study
paragraphs: As of June 2012, DOD reported a full-time civilian workforce of about 780,000 personnel. According to DOD, about 30 percent of its civilian workforce and 60 percent of its civilian senior leaders will be eligible to retire by March 31, 2015. Such potential loss may result in significant skill gaps. The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010 requires GAO to submit a report on DOD's 2010-2018 strategic civilian workforce plan. In response, GAO determined the extent to which DOD identified critical skills, competencies, and gaps; assessed its workforce mix; and measured progress in implementing its strategic workforce plan. GAO analyzed DOD's strategic workforce plan and supporting documents, and met with managers of four functional communities within the civilian personnel community (information technology, financial management, logistics, and law enforcement), because they represent the three largest and the one smallest of the functional communities, to determine how they conducted their strategic workforce planning.
section_title: What GAO Found
paragraphs: Over the last decade, Congress has passed legislation requiring the Department of Defense (DOD) to conduct human capital planning efforts for the department's civilian workforce. Specifically, section 115b of Title 10 of the United States Code, enacted in October 2009, requires DOD to develop and submit to congressional defense committees a strategic workforce plan to shape and improve the department's civilian workforce. Among other things, the law requires DOD to report on the mission-critical skills, competencies, and gaps in its existing and future civilian workforces; the appropriate mix of military, civilian, and contractor personnel capabilities; and the department's progress in implementing its strategic workforce plan using results-oriented performance measures. While DOD has addressed some of its reporting requirements to some extent, it has not addressed others.
DOD, to varying degrees, assessed the existing and future critical skills and competencies for 21 of the 22 occupations that it has identified as mission critical, but conducted competency gap assessments only for 8 of these 22 occupations. In some but not all cases, DOD provided details about skills and competencies. However, it did not report the results of any of its gap analyses for its mission-critical occupations.
DOD did not assess the appropriate mix of military, civilian, and contractor workforces or provide an assessment of the capabilities of each of these workforces. Only two of the civilian community managers who provided input presented data on all three workforces. The remaining nine community managers provided data only on military and civilian personnel. DOD guidance requires, among other things, that DOD missions be accomplished with the least costly mix of military, civilian, and contractor personnel, consistent with military requirements and other needs of the department.
DOD assessed progress in implementing its strategic workforce plan by using newly developed measures that contain characteristics of valid results-oriented performance measures, but these measures are not aligned with DOD's statutory reporting requirements. For example, although DOD is required to conduct gap analyses and assess its workforce mix, it is unclear how the measures that DOD developed will help to address these requirements.
The input to DOD's strategic workforce plan on critical skills and competencies varied, in part, because the reporting template that DOD sent to its civilian personnel community managers did not contain sufficient detail and clear definitions. Also, the template did not provide departmental expectations for conducting gap analyses or communicate clear guidance for reporting on workforce mix assessments. Without sufficiently detailed guidance to help ensure complete reporting, input into future plans will continue to vary and the plan's usefulness as a workforce planning document will be diminished. Further, in those cases where DOD's performance measures are not aligned with its congressionally mandated reporting requirements, it is difficult for DOD to demonstrate progress against those requirements.
section_title: What GAO Recommends
paragraphs: GAO recommendations include that DOD issue clearer guidance for assessing its skills and competencies, conduct and report on gap analysis of mission-critical occupations, clarify its guidance for assessing workforce mix issues, and enhance its performance measures to align with congressionally mandated reporting requirements. DOD concurred or partially concurred with GAO's recommendations. While DOD raised some issues about the need for further actions, GAO continues to believe that DOD's workforce planning could be enhanced.

section_title: Letter
paragraphs: The current and long-term fiscal pressures facing the Department of  Defense (DOD) underscore the importance for DOD to employ a strategic  and efficient approach to recruit, develop, and retain individuals with the  necessary skills and competencies for the department to meet its mission.  DOD’s civilian workforce performs a wide variety of duties and  responsibilities, including mission-essential combat-support functions— such as logistics support and maintenance—that traditionally have been  performed by the uniformed military. A key component of this workforce  also provides deployable civilian experts to Afghanistan and other  theaters of operation. According to the department, as of June 2012,  DOD’s total civilian workforce included about 780,000 full-time civilians.  The department has acknowledged a number of challenges in managing  this large, diverse workforce. Among them, DOD has reported that about  30 percent of its civilian workforce and 60 percent of its civilian senior  leaders will be eligible to retire by March 31, 2015. DOD is also reducing  its reliance on contractors and increasing the expertise of its in-house  workforce. According to DOD’s 2010 Quadrennial Defense Review, the  department’s priorities include the need for increased leadership in  human-capital management, improvement in capabilities within its  civilian-led activities, and acquisition personnel who have the skills and  training necessary to successfully perform their jobs.
Strategic workforce planning—an integral part of human-capital  management—helps organizations to determine if they have staff with the  necessary skills and competencies to achieve their strategic goals. We  have previously reported that having the right number of civilian  personnel with the right skills is critical to achieving DOD’s mission, and  that it is important for DOD, as part of its workforce planning, to conduct  gap analyses of its critical skills and competencies. In 2001, we included strategic human-capital management for all federal civilians—including  DOD—on our high-risk list because of the long-standing lack of  leadership in this area. While DOD has taken significant steps to address  human-capital issues, strategic human-capital management remains high  risk government-wide because of a need to develop and implement  plans to address current and emerging critical-skill gaps that are  undermining agencies’ abilities to meet their vital missions.
Over the last decade, Congress has passed legislation requiring DOD to  conduct human-capital planning efforts for the department’s civilian  workforce. Specifically, section 115b of Title 10 of the United States   requires DOD to periodically develop  Code, enacted in October 2009, and submit to congressional defense committees a strategic workforce  plan to shape and improve the department’s civilian workforce. While the  law does not specify a date for DOD to submit the plan, it does stipulate  several requirements for the plan. These include an assessment of:  the mission-critical skills and competencies of the existing and future  civilian workforce and projected trends in that workforce based on  expected losses due to retirement and other attrition; gaps in the existing or projected civilian workforce that should be  addressed to ensure that the department has continued access to the  critical skills and competencies;  the appropriate mix of military, civilian, and contractor personnel  capabilities; and  the department’s progress in implementing its strategic workforce plan  using results-oriented performance measures.
DOD’s mandate previously required that the department’s assessments  cover a 7-year period following the year in which the plan is submitted to  Congress.covers the period 2010-2018.
Therefore, DOD’s latest civilian senior leader workforce plan  In March 2012, DOD issued its 2010-2018 Strategic Workforce Plan.  GAO, as mandated by the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal  Year 2010, is required to report on DOD’s plan within 180 days of its  submission to the congressional committees. the extent to which DOD assessed (1) the existing and future critical  skills, competencies, and gaps in its civilian workforce; (2) its workforces  to identify the appropriate mix of military, civilian, and contractor  personnel capabilities; and (3) its progress in implementing the strategic  workforce plan by using results-oriented performance measures.
The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010, Pub. L. No. 111-84 (2009)  also requires GAO to report on DOD’s civilian senior-leader workforce plan. See GAO,  Human Capital: Complete Information and More Analyses Needed to Enhance DOD’s  Civilian Senior Leader Workforce Plan, GAO-12-990R (Washington D.C.: Sept. 19, 2012). communities because they represent three of the largest and one of the  smallest functional communities included in the plan. Further, DOD  business-systems modernization (information technology), DOD financial  management, and DOD supply-chain management (logistics) are on  GAO’s 2011 High-Risk list. To aid all aspects of our review, we also met  with Office of Personnel Management (OPM) officials to identify relevant  policy and guidance to federal agencies. To determine the extent to which  DOD assessed existing and future critical skills, competencies, and any  gaps in its civilian workforces, we obtained and reviewed existing DOD  guidance, including guidance related to any automated systems the  department may use to facilitate these assessments. We also reviewed  documents to ascertain how DOD used OPM’s Workforce Analysis  Support System and Civilian Forecasting System to develop the  department’s civilian-workforce forecasts and projections. To determine  the extent to which DOD assessed its workforces to identify the  appropriate mix of military, civilian, and contractor personnel capabilities,  we obtained and reviewed DOD guidance on conducting these  assessments and analyzed DOD’s efforts to apply the guidance. We  compared DOD’s efforts to prior GAO work on assessing the appropriate  mix of workforces and identifying capabilities of those workforces. To  determine the extent to which DOD assessed its progress in  implementing its strategic workforce plan by using results-oriented  performance measures, we obtained and reviewed relevant DOD  guidance and analyzed DOD’s efforts to apply the guidance. We also  compared DOD’s performance measures to its reporting requirements in  the United States Code and our prior work on valid performance  measures to determine how DOD’s measures aligned to both. We found  the data contained within the plan to be sufficiently reliable for purposes  of assessing efforts in developing and producing civilian strategic  workforce plans and providing context of these efforts.
We conducted this performance audit from July 2011 through September  2012 in accordance with generally accepted government auditing  standards. Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to  obtain sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for  our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe  that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings  and conclusions based on our audit objectives. Additional details on our  scope and methodology are in appendix I.
subsections: section_title: Background
paragraphs: To help conduct human-capital planning efforts for the department’s  civilian workforce, DOD’s Strategic Human Capital Planning Office used  functional community categories to group together employees who  perform similar functions. Each of these communities includes a varying  number of mission-critical occupations. For the 2010-2018 strategic  workforce plan, 11 functional communities provided some information on  their 22 mission-critical occupations in an appendix to the plan. Mission- critical occupations are positions key to DOD’s current and future mission  requirements, as well as those that present recruiting and retention  challenges. Table 1 lists the 11 functional communities along with their  mission-critical occupations.
DOD’s mandated strategic workforce plans are developed by the Defense  Civilian Personnel Advisory Service’s Strategic Human Capital Planning  Office, which is within the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for  Personnel and Readiness. To collect data and information from the  functional communities, the Strategic Human Capital Planning Office  develops a reporting template that it sends to the 11 functional community  managers within the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD). The  template consists of three sections that request information and data on  areas such as workforce end-strength forecasts, constraints that impact  the ability to meet end-strength targets, status of competency  development, and strategies to fill gaps. To complete the template, the  functional community managers work with their counterparts at the  component level to collect the necessary information and data for the  mission-critical occupations. Once the component-level functional  community managers collect the necessary information and data, they  send their completed templates back to the functional community  integrators, who compile all the information and data for each community  into one cohesive functional community document. The Strategic Human  Capital Planning Office then compiles the various reports from the  functional community managers and integrators and issues the report  after it passes an internal review. Figure 1 identifies the key offices that  develop the strategic workforce plan.
Our previous work has found that, in general, DOD’s efforts to develop  workforce plans have been mixed. In our February 2009 report, we  recommended that DOD develop performance plans for its program  offices that have responsibilities to oversee development of the strategic  workforce plan. Specifically, we recommended that the performance  plans include establishing implementation goals and time frames,  measuring performance, and aligning activities with resources to guide its  efforts to implement its strategic workforce plan. DOD partially concurred  with our recommendations and noted that efforts were underway to  develop performance plans.
section_title: DOD’s Assessments of Existing and Future Critical Skills, Competencies, and Gaps Varied
paragraphs: DOD assessed, to varying degrees, the existing and future critical skills  and competencies for all but one of its mission-critical occupations, but  the department did not assess gaps for most of them. Further, DOD’s  report did not include the most up-to-date or timely information when it  issued its most recent report.
subsections: section_title: DOD Assessed Skills and Competencies for a Majority of Its Mission- Critical Occupations, but the Assessments Varied Widely
paragraphs: Section 115b of Title 10 of the United States Code requires that DOD’s  strategic workforce plan include an assessment of the critical skills and  competencies of the existing civilian-employee workforce and DOD, in  response to that requirement, assessed to varying degrees the existing  critical skills and competencies for 21 of its 22 mission-critical  occupations. We have previously reported that it is essential for agencies  to determine the skills and competencies that are critical to successfully  achieving their missions and goals. This is especially important as  changes in national security, technology, budget constraints, and other  factors change the environment within which federal agencies operate.  The assessments contained in DOD’s 2010-2018 plan, however, varied  significantly in terms of the amount of detail provided. This variation can  be attributed, in part, to the fact that some communities are able to draw  on existing requirements and standards. For example, the information  technology functional community used the Clinger-Cohen Competencies  for the Information Technology Workforce, which provide a description  of the technical competencies for various information technology  occupations, to assess the critical skills and competencies within its  workforce. Accordingly, the information technology functional community  manager was able to provide detail and specificity when describing this  community’s assessment processes and the results of those  assessments. Similarly, the medical functional community was able to  use existing national standards for licensure and board certification for  physicians when it assessed particular critical skills and competencies.  This community was able to provide specific details about its assessment  processes and the results from those assessments. In contrast, while the  installations and environment functional community reported on the  competency models available for assessing its two mission-critical  occupations, firefighters and safety-and-health managers, this community  did not provide the results of any analyses using these models.
DOD is also required to report on the critical skills and competencies that  will be needed in its future workforces. We have previously reported that  an agency needs to define the critical skills and competencies that it will  require in the future to meet its strategic program goals. Doing so can  help an agency align its human-capital approaches that enable and  sustain the contributions of all the critical skills and competencies needed  for the future.  Our assessment of DOD’s 2010-2018 strategic workforce  plan found that for 17 of the 22 mission-critical occupations, DOD  provided some discussion of future competencies. For the remaining five  mission-critical occupations, DOD reported that functional community  managers were waiting for the completion of competency models for their  specific mission-critical occupations before assessing future  competencies. One functional community, Intelligence, did not provide an  assessment of skills and competencies for either its existing or future  mission-critical occupations. DOD officials told us that the intelligence  community’s assessments are maintained in classified documents and  could not be provided in the department’s 2010-2018 strategic workforce  plan. According to the plan, the Offices of the Under Secretary of Defense  for Intelligence and the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and  Readiness, along with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence,  agreed instead to capture the reporting requirements in already  established human-capital employment plans that were submitted by  intelligence-community elements to the Office of the Director of National  Intelligence. Officials from the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense  for Intelligence acknowledged that they should provide input into DOD’s  strategic workforce plan and stated that they would provide input into the  next submission of the plan.
DOD officials responsible for developing the strategic workforce plan said  they followed a collaborative process and met numerous times to seek  input and guidance for developing the plan. To obtain information and  data from each functional community, the Strategic Human Capital  Planning Office distributed a reporting template to the functional  community managers that contained a series of questions related to the  requirements of section 115b of Title 10 of the United States Code. For  the 2010-2018 plan, from May 2009 through October 2010 the Strategic  Human Capital Planning Office provided informal guidance for template  development to functional community managers, integrators, and action  officers. This office also provided additional training and one-on-one  sessions with integrators, and tailored meetings with functional  community managers to address completion. The template, however, did  not define key terms such as skills and competencies. Accordingly, we  found that the functional community managers interpreted the questions  within the template differently and developed different understandings of  key terms. For example, officials in one functional community explained to  us that they viewed skills as a subset of a larger category of  competencies. Officials in a separate functional community associated  skills with employee capabilities and competencies with occupational  descriptions. Without clear guidance for assessing skills and  competencies, functional community managers are likely to continue to  provide inconsistent responses that vary in detail and usefulness to  decision makers.
section_title: A Majority of Functional Communities Did Not Conduct Competency Gap Assessments for Mission- Critical Occupations, and None Reported the Results of Gap Assessments
paragraphs: Section 115b of Title 10 of the United States Code requires DOD to  include an assessment of gaps in the existing and future civilian  employee workforce that should be addressed to ensure that the  department has continued access to the critical skills and competencies  needed to accomplish its mission. We have previously reported that  once an agency identifies the critical skills and competencies that its  future workforce must possess, it can develop strategies tailored to  address gaps in the number, skills and competencies, and deployment of  the workforce. Our analysis found, however, that functional community  managers reported conducting competency gap assessments for only 8  of the 22 mission-critical occupations. These 8 occupations include  nurses, pharmacists, clinical psychologists, social workers, medical  officers, security specialists, police officers, and human-resources  managers. Further, in cases where the functional community managers  did conduct gap analyses, they did not report the results of these  assessments. Officials responsible for developing the 2010-2018 plan told  us that they focused on identifying critical-skill gaps based on staffing  levels in the mission-critical occupations. According to these officials,  competency gaps will be assessed using the Defense Competency  Assessment Tool that is scheduled for initial deployment in late fiscal year  2013.
In some cases, competency models are still being developed that will  enable the functional communities to conduct gap assessments for their  mission-critical occupations. For example, the financial-management  functional community stated specifically in DOD’s plan that it did not  complete a gap assessment because competency models for its mission- critical occupations remain incomplete. The financial-management  community reported in the plan that, upon completion of its competency  models, it will be able to fully assess gaps in knowledge and skills. DOD  officials responsible for the plan told us that they anticipate these models  to be completed by the end of 2012.
Some functional communities, similarly, are waiting for the completion of  an automated competency assessment tool in order to complete their gap  assessments. The logistics functional community stated in the plan, for  example, that it will use DOD’s Defense Competency Assessment Tool  when it becomes available. Because this community, as of September  2010, had more than 18,000 personnel serving in the mission-critical  occupation of logistics-management specialist, community officials  explained that the workforce is too large to track without an automated  tool.
Further, some officials attributed the absence of gap analyses to other  priorities that took precedence. Officials acknowledged that they did not  address all of the statutory requirements and explained that their work on  the Secretary of Defense’s 2010 efficiency initiatives—which were  introduced to reduce duplication, overhead, and excess—preempted their  efforts to develop responses for DOD’s 2010 Strategic Workforce Plan.
Finally, of the functional communities that reported completing gap  assessments for eight of the mission-critical occupations, none reported  the results. For example, the medical functional community reported that  DOD’s Medical Health System analyzed a variety of data monthly to  ensure goals are met and to assess and respond to gaps for all five of its  mission-critical occupations: nurses, pharmacists, clinical psychologists,  social workers, and physicians. However, the plan did not report the  results of any of these assessments. Our analysis of the template DOD  sent to the functional community managers found that it was not clear in  all cases that each functional community should report the results of any  gap analyses or report the reasons why it could not conduct these  assessments—if that is the case—or report timelines for when the  assessments would be conducted. Without this information, DOD is  limited in its ability to identify where its critical shortages lie so that it may  direct limited resources to the areas of highest priority.
section_title: DOD Delayed the Issuance of Its Workforce Plan, and Did Not Update Data
paragraphs: Under a previous strategic-plan requirement, DOD was required to submit  a strategic plan to Congress by January 6, 2007, with updates of that plan  to be submitted on March 1 of each subsequent year through 2009. The  National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010 repealed this  requirement, and enacted section 115b of Title 10 of the United States  Code. From October of 2009 until December 2011, section 115b required  the submission of the plan on an annual basis, rather than on any specific  date. In December of 2011, the National Defense Authorization Act for  Fiscal Year 2012 amended section 115b to make the strategic plan a  biennial requirement, rather than an annual one. Our analysis shows,  based on these requirements, that DOD’s first three submissions were  304, 115, and 395 days late, respectively. Additionally, while DOD issued  its third strategic workforce plan on March 31, 2010, the department  issued its fourth, and most recent, plan 24 months later on March 27,  2012. When DOD began development of its fourth plan, the department  was required to submit its workforce plan on an annual basis; by the time  DOD issued the plan the reporting requirement had been revised from an  annual to a biennial requirement. We note, however, that DOD’s report  was already at least 8 months overdue at the time of that revision.  Further, while DOD delayed issuance of its fourth plan until March 2012, it  continued to use fiscal year 2010 data as its baseline. Figure 2 shows the  number of days each of DOD’s strategic workforce plans has been late  since 2007.
Officials attributed the delays in the production of DOD’s 2010 strategic  workforce plan to long internal processing times and staff turnover.  According to these officials, the plan’s progress was affected by turnover  among contractor personnel as well as the leadership and staff within the  strategic workforce planning office at DOD. DOD recognized these  delays, and the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Defense for Civilian  Personnel Policy testified before the House Armed Services Committee in  July 2011 that the 2010-2018 report would be issued in late August 2011.  However, it remained in draft form for another 7 months and was not  issued until March 2012.
Our prior work on internal control standards for the federal government  has shown that agencies rely on timely information to carry out their  responsibilities. For an agency to manage and control its operations  effectively, it must have relevant, reliable, and timely communications  relating to internal as well as external events. We found that although the  Strategic Human Capital Planning Office provided suggested timeframes,  DOD officials did not adhere to this schedule. Without up-to-date  information, decision makers do not have relevant information for  managing the critical needs of the federal workforce in a timely manner.  Officials responsible for the plan told us they anticipate issuing the 2012  strategic workforce plan between July and September of 2013.
section_title: DOD Did Not Assess the Appropriate Mix of Military, Civilian, and Contractor Personnel Capabilities
paragraphs: DOD, in its 2010-2018 workforce plan, did not include an assessment of  the appropriate mix of military, civilian, and contractor personnel or an  assessment of the capabilities of each of these workforces. Section 115b  of Title 10 of the United States Code requires DOD to conduct an  assessment of the appropriate mix of military, civilian, and contractor  personnel capabilities. To compile the workforce mix data, DOD officials  responsible for the plan developed and distributed a reporting template to  be completed by functional community managers. This template  requested the functional community managers to provide the percentages  of DOD civilian personnel, military personnel, and contractors in each  mission-critical occupation. Additionally, the template requested each  functional community to provide information on the desired workforce mix  for fiscal year 2016, and interim goals if possible.
Our review found that 2 of the 11 functional communities provided the mix  of their workforces, while 9 communities provided partial or no data.  Specifically, the medical and human-resources functional communities  provided the percentages of military, civilian, and contractor personnel for  their current workforce, and reported their desired mix for fiscal year  2016, as the template requested. For example, the medical functional  community provided workforce mix data for its military, civilian, and  contractor personnel in each of its mission-critical occupations. According  to officials responsible for the strategic workforce plan, the medical  functional community was able to provide workforce mix data because the  community already tracked personnel data as a way to maintain  oversight. Conversely, the logistics and information-technology functional  communities provided only the military and civilian workforce data and did  not include contractor data. The intelligence functional community did not  provide any workforce mix data for inclusion in the 2010 strategic  workforce plan.
Moreover, data on contractor personnel was incomplete. During this  review, DOD officials responsible for the plan stated that they have  difficulties tracking contractor data, explaining that DOD contracts for  services rather than for individuals. We note, however, that this issue is  not new. DOD guidance requires defense officials to consider personnel  costs, among other factors, when making certain workforce decisions. For  example, a February 2005 DOD directive states that missions shall be  accomplished using the least costly mix of personnel (military, civilian,  and contract) consistent with military requirements and other needs of the  department. Subsequently, in April 2010, DOD issued an instruction that  included guidance on implementing the prior directive. Further it is DOD  policy that DOD components follow prescribed business rules when  performing an economic analysis in support of workforce decisions.  These rules apply when, among other circumstances, DOD’s components  decide whether to use DOD civilians to perform functions that are  currently being performed by contractors but could be performed by DOD  civilians.
By law, DOD is required to annually compile and review an inventory of  activities performed pursuant to contracts to help provide better insights  into the number of contractor full-time equivalents providing services to  the department, and the functions they are performing. Additionally, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012 requires  appropriate DOD officials to develop a plan, including an enforcement  mechanism, to ensure that this inventory of contracted services is used to  inform strategic workforce planning, among other things. The act also  directed the Secretary of Defense to establish policies and procedures for  determining the most appropriate and cost-efficient mix of military,  civilian, and contractor personnel to perform the mission of the  department. Further, the act directed that these policies and procedures  should specifically require DOD to use the strategic workforce plan,  among other things, when making these determinations, and that these  policies and procedures, once developed, should inform the strategic  workforce planning process. Earlier this year, we reported that DOD has  difficulty collecting data on the number of contractors performing work,  and that DOD is working on a means to collect the data. We also reported  that DOD has submitted to Congress a plan to collect personnel data  directly from contractors that would help inform the department of the  number of full-time-equivalent contractor staff. According to this plan,  DOD will institute a phased-in approach to develop an inventory of  contracted services database by fiscal year 2016.
In the meantime, the functional communities did not provide all required  information, in part, because the department did not request it. The  template, for example, did not ask the functional communities to report  the capabilities of their civilian, military and contractor personnel in  mission-critical occupations, and as a result none of the functional  communities reported them. Further, the template did not ask the  functional communities to report on their assessments of the appropriate  mix of these workforces within their communities and, accordingly, none  of the communities provided this type of assessment. Without a complete  assessment, it is difficult for DOD to know if its civilian workforce is  properly sized to carry out its vital missions.
section_title: DOD Developed Results-Oriented Performance Measures to Assess Progress, but These Measures Do Not Fully Align with Congressional Reporting Requirements
paragraphs: DOD developed five performance measures to assess progress in  implementing its strategic workforce plan, and the measures generally  align with the department’s goals. We have previously reported that  performance measures should align with goals and track progress toward  the goals of the organization. However, it is not clear in all cases how  these measures will help DOD demonstrate progress in meeting all of the  reporting requirements contained in section 115b of Title 10 of the United  States Code.
subsections: section_title: DOD Identified Performance Measures to Assess Progress in Implementing Its Strategic Workforce Plan
paragraphs: In response to statutory requirements, DOD developed five results- oriented performance measures to assess progress in implementing its  strategic workforce plan. Specifically, the Office of the Undersecretary of  Defense for Personnel and Readiness developed five baseline  performance measures, which address: workforce-mission readiness (the percentage of managers reporting  that they have the talent needed to meet their mission); mission-critical occupations’ end-strength (the percentage difference  between the actual end-strength and the target end-strength for  mission-critical occupations);  key milestones (the percentage of key milestones met by each  mission-critical occupation);  competency-model development (the number of competency models  developed for mission-critical occupations); and  loss rates for new hires (18-month loss rate from hiring date for new  federal-civilian hires in mission-critical occupations).
According to the 2010-2018 plan, the Office of the Undersecretary of  Defense for Personnel and Readiness based the first four of these  measures—workforce mission readiness, mission-critical occupations’  end-strength, key milestones, and competency-model development—on  goals identified in DOD’s companion document to its overall civilian  human-capital strategic plan. According to the plan, officials developed  the fifth measure—loss rates for new hires—to support the overall  strategic plan for the Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for  Personnel and Readiness. Collectively, these baseline measures were  established relative to the strategic objectives set for tracking and  supporting organizational decision making within the Office of the  Undersecretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness.
We have previously reported that performance measures should align  with goals and track progress toward the goals of the organization.  Additionally, OPM best practices state that performance measures can  help drive desired behavior, provide direction, and enable an organization  to test its progress in achieving goals. Accordingly, DOD developed the  five measures to meet goals and objectives identified in a key DOD  strategic document. All five performance measures include targets to  track progress toward goals—such as a 70 percent target for key  milestones in mission-critical occupations—so that the results of any  progress can be easily compared to the targets. Additionally, the  performance measures are quantifiable. For example, one of the  performance measures establishes a 15 percent variance between the  actual end-strength and the target end-strength of mission-critical  occupations.
While DOD introduced these measures for the first time in its 2010-2018  strategic workforce plan, the department conducted preliminary  assessments of its progress against those measures. In this plan, DOD  reported in its preliminary observations that it has met two performance  measures—key milestones and competency-model development—and  partially met two other measures—workforce-mission readiness and the  end-strength of mission-critical occupations. For example, according to  OSD’s preliminary assessment, more than half of the mission-critical  occupations were within the 15 percent variance. DOD will use the fifth  performance measure, which addresses loss rates for new hires, to  assess the department’s progress in implementing the plan in the next  strategic workforce planning cycle.
section_title: DOD’s Performance Measures Are Not Fully Aligned With Congressional Reporting Requirements
paragraphs: We have previously recommended that DOD develop a performance plan  that includes establishing implementation goals and time frames,  measuring performance, and aligning activities with resources. While the  performance measures that DOD established to monitor the department’s  progress in implementing its strategic workforce plan generally align with  departmental goals and priorities, it is not clear in all cases how the five  measures will help DOD demonstrate progress in meeting all the  reporting requirements contained in section 115b of Title 10 United States  Code. While DOD is not required to develop performance measures that  monitor progress in meeting the statutory requirements, our prior work  has shown that agencies that have been successful in measuring their  performance generally developed measures that are responsive to  multiple priorities and complement different program strategies.  Additionally, DOD is required to develop performance measures to  monitor progress in implementing the strategic workforce plan, and the  plan itself states that one of its goals is to make progress toward meeting  the statutory requirements.
Section 115b of Title 10 of the United States Code requires DOD to  include in its 2010-2018 strategic workforce plan an assessment of,  among other things, gaps in the existing and future civilian workforce that  should be addressed to ensure that the department has continued access  to the critical skills and competencies, and the appropriate mix of military,  civilian, and contractor personnel capabilities. During this review, we  found, as we reported earlier in this report, that the department did not  conduct comprehensive assessments in these two areas. Although one of  DOD’s performance measures—key milestones—identifies assessments  of competency gaps and workforce mix as key milestones, the plan does  not describe how the department assessed progress in these areas or  interim steps as to how it plans to meet these milestones. As a result, it is  unclear how this measure addresses DOD’s progress in implementing the  portions of the plan related to these two requirements, and how the  performance measures and the department’s efforts align with and  address congressional requirements. According to prior GAO work,  performance measures should align with and indicate progress toward  the goals of the organization. Without a clear, effective alignment of  DOD’s performance measures with United States Code requirements, the  department will not be in the best position to measure and report how it is  meeting its congressional requirements.
section_title: Conclusions
paragraphs: With about a third of DOD’s civilian workforce eligible to retire by 2015— during a time of changing national security threats and challenging fiscal  realities—it is imperative that decision makers in DOD and Congress  have access to complete and timely information on the skills,  competencies, and any associated gaps within DOD’s civilian workforce.  However, because the office responsible for developing the plan did not  provide sufficiently detailed guidance to the managers who were  responsible for providing key data, the information in the current plan on  skills and competencies varies significantly. Further, while DOD officials  have stated that they do not have the necessary tools in place to conduct  gap analyses across the board, the department has not reported the  results of any gap analyses that it has conducted nor provided reporting  timeframes for conducting remaining gap analyses; this situation  diminishes the plan’s utility as a workforce planning document. To the  extent that DOD provided data in 2012, the data was based on  information from 2010, which further limits this document’s use for  planning purposes. When the reports use dated information, decision  makers do not have relevant information for managing the critical needs  of the federal workforce. Further, DOD did not collect all required  information for its 2010-2018 strategic workforce plans, including the  number or percentage of military, civilian, and contractor personnel and  the capabilities for those three workforces. Without revised guidance  specifying the need to collect all information required for a complete  assessment to determine the appropriate mix of the three workforces,  DOD will have difficulty in determining if its civilian workforce is properly  sized to carry out essential missions. Finally, where DOD has identified  performance measures and indicated progress toward the goals of the  strategic plan, those measures are not, in all cases, aligned with DOD’s  congressionally mandated reporting requirements; also, the measures do  not provide detail about how DOD plans to meet those requirements,  making it difficult for DOD to demonstrate progress.
section_title: Recommendations for Executive Action
paragraphs: To meet the congressional requirement to conduct assessments of critical  skills, competencies, and gaps for both existing and future civilian  workforces, we recommend that the Secretary of Defense direct the  Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness to include in  the guidance that it disseminates for developing future strategic workforce  plans clearly defined terms and processes for conducting these  assessments.
To help ensure that Congress has the necessary information to provide  effective oversight over DOD’s civilian workforce, we recommend that the  Secretary of Defense direct the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel  and Readiness to conduct competency gap analyses for DOD’s mission- critical occupations and report the results. When managers cannot  conduct such analyses, we recommend that DOD report a timeline in the  strategic workforce plan for providing these assessments.
To help ensure that the data presented in DOD’s strategic workforce  plans are current and timely, we recommend that the Secretary of  Defense direct the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and  Readiness to establish and adhere to timelines that will ensure issuance  of future strategic workforce plans in accordance with statutory  timeframes.
To enhance the information that DOD provides Congress in its strategic  workforce plan, we recommend that the Secretary of Defense direct the  Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness to provide  guidance for developing future strategic workforce plans that clearly  directs the functional communities to collect information that identifies not  only the number or percentage of personnel in its military, civilian, and  contractor workforces but also the capabilities of the appropriate mix of  those three workforces.
To better develop and submit future DOD strategic workforce plans, we  recommend that the Secretary of Defense direct the Office of the Under  Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness to enhance the  department’s results-oriented performance measures by revising existing  measures or developing additional measures that will more clearly align  with DOD’s efforts to monitor progress in meeting the strategic workforce  planning requirements in section 115b of Title 10 of the United States  Code.
section_title: Agency Comments and Our Evaluation
paragraphs: In written comments on a draft of this report, DOD concurred with our first  recommendation and partially concurred with the remaining four  recommendations. DOD comments are reprinted in appendix II.
While DOD acknowledged that we had conducted a thorough review and  assessment of DOD’s Fiscal Year 2010-2018 Strategic Workforce Plan  for, DOD also expressed its disappointment that we did not appear to give  the department credit for the major progress that it has made, including  actions to reframe its planning progress from the current state to a  comprehensive future state by 2015.  Further, DOD stated that the overall  negative tone – in its opinion – overshadowed the monumental efforts of  the department. We disagree. The objectives in our final report are  consistent with the objectives we presented to DOD when we first notified  the department of our review at the beginning of this engagement, and we  did provide positive examples where DOD had responded to  congressional direction, especially as those actions related to our report’s  objectives.  For example, we state clearly in our report, among other  things, that DOD assessed to varying degrees the existing and future  critical skills and competencies for all but one of its mission-critical  occupations.  This has been a longstanding issue and represents  progress.  Further, we reported that DOD developed performance  measures to assess progress in implementing its workforce plan.  This  was a new reporting requirement for DOD, and we reported that DOD had  been responsive to this requirement.
DOD also asserted that our recommendations simply restate areas for  improvement that the department already identified in its plan, and which  have already been implemented since the plan was published.  We note,  however, that these issues are not new.  We first reported on DOD’s  strategic workforce planning for its civilian workforce in 2004.    Subsequently, Congress mandated that DOD develop and submit civilian  workforce strategic plans to the congressional defense committees, and  that we conduct our own independent assessment of those plans.   We  have previously conducted 3 reviews of DOD’s plans since 2008 and our  work has reported mixed results.   We recommended in 2008, for  example, that DOD address all of its statutory reporting requirements, and  note that DOD did not concur with this recommendation.   (In 2010, we  reported that DOD’s civilian workforce plan addressed 5 and partially  addressed 9 of DOD’s 14 legislative requirements.)   In 2009, we  recommended, among other things, that DOD develop a performance  plan that includes establishing implementation goals and timeframes,  measuring performance, and aligning activities with resources.   DOD  partially concurred with these recommendations. Given the response by  DOD to our previous reports and recommendations on these issues, we  have reviewed the recommendations that we present in this report and  continue to believe that corrective action is needed.
DOD concurred with our first recommendation to include in guidance that  it disseminates for developing future workforce plans clearly defined  terms and processes for conducting these assessments.  DOD stated in  its agency comments, among other things, that it has already provided  numerous governance and policy documents, and more, to assist key  stakeholders in meeting strategic workforce plan reporting requirements.   We make similar statements in our report. DOD also stated in its agency  comments, however, that the department strives for continuous  improvement and has already provided additional guidance for the next  planning cycle, for this reason they believe no additional direction from  the Secretary of Defense is needed. We do not disagree that DOD strives  for continuous improvement.  However, during the course of our audit  work, we found, as we state in our report, that functional community  managers interpreted questions in DOD’s guiding template differently and  developed different understandings of key terms.  Therefore, we continue  to believe that this recommendation will enhance the development of  DOD’s next strategic workforce plan.
DOD partially concurred with our second recommendation that DOD  conduct gap analyses for DOD’s mission-critical occupations and report  on the results, and, when managers cannot conduct such analyses,  report a timeline for providing these assessments.  DOD also stated its  belief that no additional direction from the Secretary of Defense is needed  with regard to this recommendation.  In its agency comments, DOD  stated that the department focused on the identification of critical skill  gaps based on staffing levels in its mission-critical occupations.  We  agree that DOD’s plan includes these data.  However, we reported that  DOD is required to include an assessment of competency gaps in its  existing and future civilian employee workforces, and that our analyses  found that DOD’s functional community managers reported conducting  gap assessments for only 8 of DOD’s 22 mission-critical occupations.    Therefore we continue to believe that DOD needs to conduct these  analyses and, for clarity, we added references to competency gap  analyses in our finding and recommendation, as appropriate. DOD stated  in its agency comments that competency gaps will be assessed in the  future.
DOD also partially concurred with our third recommendation that DOD  establish and adhere to timelines that will ensure issuance of future  strategic workforce plans in accordance with statutory timeframes but,  similarly to its other responses, added that no additional direction is  needed from the Secretary of Defense at this time.  In its comments, DOD  stated that the department does have an established planning process  and timeline, and that this established process aligns with the budget  cycle and takes about a year to complete because of the size and  complexity of the department.  DOD added that the planning cycle  timeline is flexible enough to allow for significant events, among other  things, and provided a notional strategic workforce plan timeline as an  attachment to its agency comments.  However, we continue to believe it  is key that DOD take steps to adhere to the timelines it establishes to  meet congressional reporting requirements and enhance the utility of its  future reports.  As we note in our report, DOD has issued all of its  strategic workforce plans late since 2007.
Regarding our fourth recommendation, DOD also partially concurred that  DOD provide guidance for developing future workforce plans that clearly  directs the functional communities to collect information that identifies not  only the number or percentage of personnel in its military, civilian, and  contractor workforces but also the capabilities of the appropriate mix of  those three workforces.  While DOD agreed that additional improvements  are necessary, the department again stated that it did not believe  additional direction is necessary from the Secretary of Defense.  In its  comments, DOD stated that is preparing to pilot a capabilities-based  approach to assess civilian and military workforce and contract support.   We continue to note DOD’s existing requirement to conduct an  assessment of the appropriate mix of military, civilian, and contractor  personnel capabilities, and we look forward to seeing the results of DOD’s  pilot program.
Finally, DOD also partially concurred with our fifth recommendation that  the department enhance its results-oriented performance measures by  revising existing measures or developing additional measures that will  more clearly align with DOD’s efforts to monitor progress in meeting the  strategic workforce planning requirements contained in statute. However,  again, DOD did not believe any additional direction from the Secretary of  Defense was needed. In its response, DOD stated that the measures in  the fiscal year 2010-2018 strategic workforce plan do assess progress  both in implementing the strategic workforce plan and in meeting the  statutory requirements and, as an attachment to its comments, provided a  matrix—that it developed in response to our draft report—to show  linkages between the two.  Based on the matrix, we agree with DOD’s  assertion that some alignment does exist between the performance  measures and the statutory criteria.  However, the justification that DOD  provided in its matrix for demonstrating these linkages is not always clear.   Further, DOD did not include this analysis in its plan.  We did not state in  our report that the performance measures that DOD developed were  inappropriate in some way. However, our analysis did find that DOD  continues to struggle to meet its statutory reporting requirements.  Therefore, we continue to believe that DOD can enhance its performance  measures by more clearly aligning them to those requirements.
We are sending copies of this report to the Secretary of Defense, the  Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness, and  appropriate congressional committees. In addition, this report will also be  available at no charge on the GAO Web site at http://www.gao.gov.
If you or your staff have any questions regarding this report, please  contact me at (202) 512-3604 or farrellb@gao.gov. Contact points for our  Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on  the last page of this report. GAO staff who made major contributions to  this report are listed in appendix III.
section_title: Appendix I: Scope and Methodology
paragraphs: For all three objectives, we evaluated DOD’s 2010-2018 Strategic  Workforce Plan and supporting documentation. We also interviewed  Department of Defense (DOD) officials responsible for developing the  Strategic Workforce Plan. These include officials from the Strategic  Human Capital Planning Office and the Defense Civilian Personnel  Advisory Service within the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for  Personnel and Readiness, the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense  for Intelligence, and the military departments. We also met with functional  community managers in the information technology, financial  management, logistics, and law enforcement communities to determine  how each of these communities conducted their strategic workforce  planning and how coordination occurred between the various levels of  DOD. We selected these four functional communities because they  represent three of the largest and one of the smallest functional  communities included in the plan. Further, DOD business-systems  modernization (information technology), financial management, and DOD  supply-chain management (logistics) are on GAO’s High-Risk list. To aid  in all aspects of our review, we also met with Office of Personnel  Management (OPM) officials to identify relevant policy or guidance to  federal agencies. Finally, we found the data contained in DOD’s 2010- 2018 plan to be sufficiently reliable for purposes of assessing efforts in  developing and producing civilian strategic workforce plans and providing  context of these efforts.
To determine the extent to which DOD assessed existing and future  critical skills, competencies, and gaps in its civilian workforce, we  reviewed information and data contained in DOD’s 2010-2018 strategic  workforce plan to identify which of the functional communities completed  these assessments, the methods and tools that the functional  communities used to conduct the assessments, and the extent to which  the functional communities reported the results of their assessments. We  obtained and reviewed existing DOD guidance, including guidance  related to any automated systems the department may use to facilitate  these assessments. We also obtained and reviewed OPM guidance on  conducting assessments of the skills, competencies, and gaps of the  federal civilian workforces. This included a review of documents to  ascertain how DOD used OPM’s Workforce Analysis Support System and  Civilian Forecasting System to develop the department’s civilian- workforce forecasts and projections. Finally, to evaluate the timeliness of  DOD’s submissions of its strategic workforce plans, we reviewed GAO’s  prior work on DOD’s previous plans as well as our work on internal  control standards.
To determine the extent to which DOD assessed its workforces to identify  the appropriate mix of military, civilian, and contractor personnel  capabilities, we reviewed information and data contained in DOD’s 2010- 2018 strategic workforce plan to identify which functional communities  assessed their workforce mix and the process those communities used to  carry out their assessments. We also analyzed DOD’s plan to determine  the extent to which the plan included an evaluation of the specific  capabilities of military, civilian, and contractor personnel. Additionally, we  obtained and reviewed DOD guidance on conducting assessments of the  appropriateness of the mix of workforces in the federal government.
To determine the extent to which DOD assessed its progress in  implementing its strategic workforce plan by using results-oriented  performance measures, we reviewed DOD’s 2010-2018 strategic  workforce plan to identify the performance measures DOD chose to  assess its implementation of its plan. We also obtained and reviewed  DOD and OPM guidance on using results-oriented performance  measures and then evaluated DOD’s efforts to apply such guidance. We  evaluated DOD’s results-oriented performance measures and compared  them to the statutory requirements for the plan as identified in the section  115b of Title 10 of the United States Code to determine the extent to  which the measures developed addressed the requirements. We also  evaluated the performance measures using best practices identified in  our previous work to determine their validity and appropriateness.
We conducted this performance audit from July 2011 to September 2012  in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards.  Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain  sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our  findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe that  the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our findings and  conclusions based on our audit objectives.
section_title: Appendix II: Comments from the Department of Defense
section_title: Appendix III: GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments
subsections: section_title: Contact
paragraphs: Brenda S. Farrell, (202) 512-3604 or farrellb@gao.gov.
section_title: Staff Acknowledgments
paragraphs: In addition to the individual named above, Marion Gatling, Assistant  Director; David Moser, Assistant Director; Jerome Brown; Julie Corwin;  Brian Pegram; Richard Powelson, Courtney Reid; Terry L. Richardson;  Norris Smith; Jennifer Weber; and Michael Willems made key  contributions to this report.
section_title: Related GAO Products
paragraphs: Human Capital: Complete Information and More Analysis Needed to  Enhance DOD’s Civilian Senior Leader Strategic Workforce Plan.  GAO-12-990R. Washington, D.C.: September 19, 2012.
DOD Civilian Workforce: Observations on DOD’s Efforts to Plan for  Civilian Workforce Requirements. GAO-12-962T. Washington, D.C.: July  26, 2012.
Defense Acquisition Workforce: Improved Processes, Guidance, and  Planning Needed to Enhance Use of Workforce Funds. GAO-12-747R.  Washington, D.C.: June 20, 2012.
Defense Acquisitions: Further Actions Needed to Improve Accountability  for DOD’s Inventory of Contracted Services. GAO-12-357. Washington,  D.C.: April 6, 2012.
Defense Workforce: DOD Needs to Better Oversee In-sourcing Data and  Align In-sourcing Efforts with Strategic Workforce Plans. GAO-12-319.  Washington, D.C.: February 9, 2012.
DOD Civilian Personnel: Competency Gap Analyses and Other Actions  Needed to Enhance DOD’s Strategic Workforce Plans. GAO-11-827T.  Washington, D.C.: July 14, 2011.
High-Risk Series: An Update. GAO-11-278. Washington, D.C.: February  16, 2011.
Human Capital: Opportunities Exist for DOD to Enhance Its Approach for  Determining Civilian Senior Leader Workforce Needs. GAO-11-136.  Washington, D.C.: November 4, 2010.
Human Capital: Further Actions Needed to Enhance DOD’s Civilian  Strategic Workforce Plan. GAO-10-814R. Washington, D.C.: September  27, 2010.
Human Capital: Opportunities Exist to Build on Recent Progress to  Strengthen DOD’s Civilian Human Capital Strategic Plan. GAO-09-235.  Washington, D.C.: February 10, 2009.
Human Capital: The Department of Defense’s Civilian Human Capital  Strategic Plan Does Not Meet Most Statutory Requirements.  GAO-08-439R. Washington, D.C.: February 6, 2008.
DOD Civilian Personnel: Comprehensive Strategic Workforce Plans  Needed. GAO-04-753. Washington, D.C.: June 30, 2004.
Human Capital: Key Principles for Effective Strategic Workforce Planning.  GAO-04-39. Washington, D.C.: December 11, 2003.
Human Capital: Strategic Approach Should Guide DOD Civilian  Workforce Management. GAO/T-GGD/NSIAD-00-120. Washington, D.C.:  March 9, 2000.