Personnel Vetting Reform is Rolling Along

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) and the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) recently published a joint Executive Correspondence (EC) fact sheet called ”Transforming Federal Personnel Vetting: Measures to Expedite Reform and Further Reduce the Federal Government’s Background Investigation Inventory.” The EC outlines measures agencies are to follow in order to remain in compliance with periodic reinvestigation requirements. The EC also identified changes in thresholds for flags on financial delinquencies and traffic violations for investigative service providers and allows them to resolve issue items using a broader spectrum of options.

Additional measures related to Trusted Workforce 2.0 implementation were outlined for agencies to plan and prepare for implementation. These measures included:

• Transition from conducting periodic reinvestigations to Continuous Vetting (CV)
• Apply risk mitigation measures for those who are not enrolled in CV by running periodic checks of specific data sources and criminal history checks
• Streamline and align vetting adjudicative determinations and standardize credentialing guidelines and procedures government-wide

The stated goal for this EC is to transition away from PRs and replace them with a government-wide continuous vetting capability that mitigates security and safety risks by identifying issues and addressing them sooner. It also facilitates in helping employees who need assistance before they get to far down the” rabbit hole”. These changes have been a long time coming and seem to make sense. There is still a way to go before we get to the end state, but at least we are on the move.