The Office of Personnel Management plans to issue draft regulations Wednesday to allow federal employees to participate in performance evaluations for senior executives.
The regulations would establish three primary criteria for rating executives: employee satisfaction, customer satisfaction and business results. Business results are defined as goals in agencies' long-term strategic plans and annual performance plans under the Government Performance and Results Act.
Agencies will have a fair amount of flexibility in developing their own performance evaluation processes, according to their missions and organizational structures. For example, OPM is proposing to eliminate a requirement that agencies appraise executives every 120 days. Instead, agencies can set their own appraisal cycles, with a minimum appraisal period of 90 days.
Carol Bonosaro, president of the Senior Executives Association, said packaging the performance measures as regulations was unnecessary, but most likely an effort by the administration to "institutionalize and memorialize the reinvention effort and the interest in the Government Performance and Results Act."
"Do you really need a regulation to do this? We [SEA] don't think so," Bonosaro said.
After the public comment period, which lasts for a minimum of thirty days, OPM will issue final regulations. Bonosaro expects the new measures to take effect by this fall.
The Internal Revenue Service and the Education Department's Office of Student Financial Assistance are already using this same type of balanced measure approach to performance management.