It was revealed Wednesday that the workforce of the Department of Homeland Security is composed of more contractors than government employees. The talent ratio for the Department and its 20 associated agencies was called out by Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-CT, and Sen. Susan Collins, R-ME, in the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs during budget reviews.
The department estimates it has 200,000 contractors working for it and 188,000 civilian employees (not including uniformed members of the Coast Guard) for a total workforce of almost 400,000, according to information provided by the committee. As reported in the Washington Post, this contract talent reliance is the result of a year of active work in reducing the contingent workforce at the department, which begs the question of what the numbers of independent contractors were before.
According to DHS press secretary Clark Stevens, “Since first taking office, Secretary Napolitano has been strongly committed to decreasing the department’s reliance on contractors and strengthening the federal workforce at DHS. Over the past year, we have been actively converting contractor positions to government positions and will continue to build on these efforts at an even more aggressive pace this year.
While the contract workforce numbers may surprise some, by one count, over 80% of the government’s work is produced by contractors. At the same time, government talent management executives are too often ill-equipped to manage the contract talent workforce effectively, to the point of using contractors to manage contractors. Workforce management on the employee side isn't much better though -- different challenges, such as a demographic tidal wave, beckon. For example, nearly 90% of government senior executives will reach retirement over the next five years, potentially resulting in an exodus of critical leadership. One way to bring that talent back will be to engage retirees as contract labor, bringing them on as Statement of Work Consultants, deepening the workforce trend.
Just one day before the news about DHS’s contract workforce mix became public, on Tuesday, the Center for Human Capital Innovation and a Consortium of organizations, including MBO Partners, launched TMGov.org, the Portal for Talent Management in Government, a site dedicated to research for engineering realistic talent management solutions -- including contract talent management -- for government agencies. Read the TMGov.org press release.
It seems our Federal government has some serious talent management challenges ahead, indeed.
The department estimates it has 200,000 contractors working for it and 188,000 civilian employees (not including uniformed members of the Coast Guard) for a total workforce of almost 400,000, according to information provided by the committee. As reported in the Washington Post, this contract talent reliance is the result of a year of active work in reducing the contingent workforce at the department, which begs the question of what the numbers of independent contractors were before.
According to DHS press secretary Clark Stevens, “Since first taking office, Secretary Napolitano has been strongly committed to decreasing the department’s reliance on contractors and strengthening the federal workforce at DHS. Over the past year, we have been actively converting contractor positions to government positions and will continue to build on these efforts at an even more aggressive pace this year.
While the contract workforce numbers may surprise some, by one count, over 80% of the government’s work is produced by contractors. At the same time, government talent management executives are too often ill-equipped to manage the contract talent workforce effectively, to the point of using contractors to manage contractors. Workforce management on the employee side isn't much better though -- different challenges, such as a demographic tidal wave, beckon. For example, nearly 90% of government senior executives will reach retirement over the next five years, potentially resulting in an exodus of critical leadership. One way to bring that talent back will be to engage retirees as contract labor, bringing them on as Statement of Work Consultants, deepening the workforce trend.
Just one day before the news about DHS’s contract workforce mix became public, on Tuesday, the Center for Human Capital Innovation and a Consortium of organizations, including MBO Partners, launched TMGov.org, the Portal for Talent Management in Government, a site dedicated to research for engineering realistic talent management solutions -- including contract talent management -- for government agencies. Read the TMGov.org press release.
It seems our Federal government has some serious talent management challenges ahead, indeed.
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