96-23781. Agriculture Department; Alternative Personnel Management System; Demonstration Project

[Federal Register Volume 61, Number 182 (Wednesday, September 18, 1996)]
[Notices]
[Page 49178]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 96-23781]


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OFFICE OF PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT


Agriculture Department; Alternative Personnel Management System; 
Demonstration Project

AGENCY: Office of Personnel Management.

ACTION: Notice of amendment of the Department of Agriculture 
demonstration project plan.

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SUMMARY: This action provides for changes in the final project plan 
published March 9, 1990, to modify the demonstration project coverage 
to include term appointments. The project was originally conceived to 
test an alternative to the traditional recruiting and hiring system in 
an anticipated tight labor market as described in Workforce 2000 and 
Civil Service 2000. On March 8, 1996, a Federal Register notice was 
published to modify the list of experiment sites to include comparison 
sites. This change provided the opportunity to test these flexibilities 
in a downsizing environment with a more than adequate high-quality 
labor market even though there are occasional shortages of qualified 
candidates. By amending the project plan to include term appointments, 
a need to operate a parallel examining system for permanent and term 
positions will be eliminated thus avoiding administrative 
inefficiencies and ineffectiveness.

EFFECTIVE DATE: September 18, 1996.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:
Mary Ann Jenkins, [phone], at the Department of Agriculture; 
Joan Jorgenson, [phone], at the Office of Personnel Management.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: On March 9, 1990, OPM published a notice to 
demonstrate an alternative personnel management system at the U.S. 
Department of Agriculture. One of the project innovations is to test a 
candidate assessment method which uses categorical groupings instead of 
numeric score. The demonstration authority replaces the traditional 
system of examining applicants and ranking candidates, instead the 
candidates will be assigned to one of two groups--quality or eligible--
based on job related evaluation criteria. To be placed in the quality 
group, a candidate's background must show: above average educational 
achievement; or, quality experience which is defined as experience 
clearly above and beyond (Operating Manual: Qualification Standards for 
General Schedule Positions) basic qualification requirements, and which 
is directly related to the work of the position to be filled; or, 
evidence of high ability to do the work of the position. Candidates who 
do not meet the quality group criteria but who meet basic qualification 
requirements will be assigned to the eligible group. Within each group, 
preference eligibles will be listed ahead of nonpreference eligibles. 
In addition, for positions other than scientific and professional at 
GS-9 and above, preference eligibles with a compensable service-
connected disability of 10 percent or more who meet basic eligibility 
requirements will be listed at the top of the quality group.
    Selection will be made from among candidates in the quality group. 
When an inadequate number of candidates is in the quality group, all 
qualified candidates will be listed as a single group.
    With the addition of term appointments, project participation will 
still not exceed the statutory limit of 5000 at any given time.

    Dated: September 11, 1996.

Office of Personnel Management.
James B. King,
Director.

Project Plan Modification

    The project plan which appeared in the Federal Register on March 9, 
1990 (55 FR 9062) is hereby modified to include using the candidate 
assessment method for term appointments for the Agricultural Research 
Service and Forest Service.
[FR Doc. 96-23781 Filed 9-17-96; 8:45 am]
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