There are no separate budget accounts for human
resources within the Department of the Interior. How much money is committed to human
resources (salary, overtime, benefits, pay raises, awards, and training) is a management
decision with funding coming from normal budget allocations within each organization's
financial plan.
While the Office of Management and Budget has asked that we not manage
our human resources based on Full-Time-Equivolents (FTEs), the Department of the Interior
uses FTE targets projections to describe its estimated staffing needs. These projected FTE
requirements, however, are not controlled and each manager is expected to manage his or
her human resources within allocated funds.
It is therefore incumbent on personnel managers
to use sound position management. Grade "creep", for instance, can cause overall
human resource costs to go up unnecessarily resulting in inefficient and ineffective use of
organizational funds. Likewise, managers and budget offices can use "lapse
rates" and hiring slowdowns to help offset funding deficiencies.
Questions about
how specific human resource costs impact a budget should be directed to the organization's
budget office. |
