Promotion and Internal Placement

Issuing agencies

Abstract

The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) is issuing final regulations to give agencies, in individual hiring processes, the discretion to select and reinstate certain former Federal employees, to fill vacancies at any grade level or with promotion potential for which the individual is qualified, notwithstanding the grade of the position the individual had previously held on a permanent basis in the competitive service. An agency will be able to effectuate such reinstatements non-competitively, pursuant to a job opportunity announcement open to outside candidates, provided the former employee qualifies for the position as posted. The regulations will help agencies to recruit former Federal employees who have developed more enhanced or higher-level skill-sets than they had when they left government to apply for agency vacancies at grade levels appropriate to their current knowledge, skills, and abilities. Previously, an agency could reinstate an individual, without competition, only to a position at a grade level that was no higher than the grade level of a position the individual had held on a permanent basis in the competitive service. Reinstatement to a higher-graded position, or to a position with greater promotion potential, required competition. The intended effect of this hiring authority is to broaden the choices available to agencies when filling vacant positions and to promote a workforce in which individuals who have developed their competencies through extended service in the Federal Government and individuals who have developed their competencies in the private or non-profit sectors can enhance each other's strengths by sharing knowledge and perspectives.