The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) issued new guidance to Federal agencies on Wednesday to help them design their remote work policies and programs post-pandemic.
The guidance builds on OPM’s November 2021 guide to telework and remote work, which encouraged Federal agencies “to fully integrate telework into their culture.” Although the new guidance doesn’t offer any hard-and-fast new policy, it provides resources and information to help agencies update their own telework or remote work policies.
“Agencies have transitioned from a pandemic-necessitated maximum telework posture to new hybrid work arrangements that balance remote work, telework, and in-person work to best advance organizational health and performance,” OPM Acting Director Rob Shriver wrote in the guidance.
“When thoughtfully and intentionally implemented, remote work can be a significant benefit to employers,” he added. “This memo provides agencies with additional considerations for evaluating and determining their current and future remote work postures.”
The 8-page document complements the 79-page document from 2021, including with meaningful considerations for agencies as they design or review remote work programs.
Specifically, the guidance reminds agencies that they should have up-to-date, written remote work policies that include clear criteria “for position determination, and employee eligibility and participation in remote work.”
For agency senior leadership, new employees, and early career talent, OPM says remote work arrangements “should be carefully considered” as these employees may benefit more from meaningful in-person work.
For those employees that live in the local commuting area, OPM said that they may benefit more from a telework flexibility – in which they are still expected to report to the office for a certain number of days each period – instead of a remote work arrangement.
“In-office presence of employees often furthers workplace culture and facilitates training and engagement opportunities between newer employees and experienced team members,” the guidance says.
When determining whether to establish largely or fully remote teams, the guidance says agencies should conduct “a rigorous evaluation of organizational health and performance to support mission sustainability and effectiveness.”
“Agencies should generally prioritize consistent remote work eligibility determinations based on work function categories and mission critical occupations, and broader positional or team criteria, rather than individual employee requests and positions,” the guidance notes.
The guidance also advises agencies to conduct a formal assessment of the benefits and costs of remote work, including any impact it may have on the mission needs of the organization.
Finally, the guidance reminds agencies to provide OPM with accurate remote work data for their workforce through the Enterprise Human Resources Integration (EHRI) system.
In fiscal year (FY) 2022, Federal agencies reported that 46 percent of all Federal employees participated in routine or situational telework. In comparison, Shriver said “a relatively small percentage of Federal employees have remote work arrangements” – less than six percent of the Federal workforce was remote in FY2022.
“Data collection is important to understanding agency remote work programs and furthering equity across the agency and broader Federal enterprise, as well as for like occupations,” Shriver concluded.
