The Big Picture

Many federal agencies are tackling strategic workforce planning for the first time this year. So naturally, they're starting with internal employees.

But contractors, grantees and state and local government employees also do the work of the federal government. A complete workforce plan should consider all those groups, workforce planning experts say. "We consider the issue of third-party service delivery to be one of the important factors in determining the skills you need and how you're going to fill those needs," says Steve Altman, a GAO assistant director.

State Department officials have a workforce planning process for deciding where to send 5,800 Foreign Service officers overseas. But their process doesn't consider the skills of the 9,700 foreign nationals on the government's payroll or the 13,000 personal service contractors who do State Department work overseas. In addition, Congress wants the department to coordinate a staffing plan for the 38 federal agencies that have personnel abroad, but little work has been done so far, observers say. Some agencies are taking steps toward developing a full picture of the skilled workers available to them. The Army, for example, has begun compiling an inventory of its contractor workforce that would help workforce planners decide whether work should be performed in-house or by private firms.

Federal Highway Administration executive Joseph Toole is troubled that fewer college students are getting degrees in fields such as engineering that lead to transportation careers. Toole sees that as a problem not just for his agency, but for the transportation industry as a whole. So Toole is working with representatives from the transportation industry and state transportation agencies to develop programs to encourage young people to enter the field. Toole says the Federal Highway Administration has an obligation to ensure that the transportation sector as a whole-not just the agency-has a robust workforce. "We could never deliver our $30 billion transportation program unless we reached out and helped develop the whole workforce out there," Toole says.