United States Government Publishing Office publisher pbl distributor dst United States Government Accountability Office General Government Division author aut Government Organization text government publication eng GAOREPORTS Legislative Agency Publications gao legislative 2010-08-12 U.S. Government Printing Office 1997-07-03 monographic deposited born digital 38 p. GA 1.13:GGD-97-116 https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-GGD-97-116 P0b002ee1803a26a4 f:gg97116 DGPO 2010-08-12 2011-03-24 GAOREPORTS-GGD-97-116 machine generated eng fdlp REPORT GAOREPORTS-GGD-97-116 GGD-97-116 Personnel management Federal employees Telecommuting Productivity Interagency relations National Performance Review EPA Climate Change Action Plan National Telecommuting Initiative Action Plan Letter Report GGD Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the implementation of flexiplace since the completion of the pilot, focusing on: (1) federal efforts to promote flexiplace; (2) federal agencies' policies and the extent to which they permit flexiplace; (3) the extent to which federal employees have used flexiplace, as well as the characteristics of these employees and the work they have done under flexiplace; (4) whether agencies and federal employees' unions have identified any barriers that inhibit flexiplace implementation; and (5) whether agencies believe that flexiplace has caused operational difficulties, including abuse of flexiplace.<p/>GAO noted that: (1) the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), General Services Administration (GSA), and Department of Transportation (DOT) have assumed lead roles in promoting flexiplace; (2) in addition, DOT and GSA provide leadership for an interagency working group formed as part of the National Telecommuting Initiative Action Plan in January 1996; (3) a goal of the plan is to increase the number of federal flexiplace participants by the end of fiscal year 1998 to 60,000 or about 3 percent of the federal civilian workforce, a percentage roughly equivalent to conservative estimates of telecommuting in the private sector; (4) DOT also promotes flexiplace and distributes flexiplace literature to the general public as part of its effort to decrease transportation-associated congestion and pollution; (5) the 21 policies GAO reviewed varied in their coverage, generally applying to personnel within individual departmental and independent agencies, one or more federal regions, or specific Department of Defense locations; (6) because of limitations within these policies, however, about 28,000 of the employees covered by flexiplace policies were, in effect, excluded from flexiplace participation; (7) limitations restricted participation to the medically disabled or members of a certain occupation; (8) in contrast, despite the absence of formal policies at five locations GAO visited, some of the managers there permitted flexiplace; (9) flexiplace use appears to have increased since OPM's 1993 estimate of 3,000 to 4,000 participants; (10) a survey completed in July 1996 by the President's Management Council estimated that there were 9,000 telecommuting participants; (11) agency officials told GAO that most flexiplace participants' occupational categories were professional in nature, such as engineer, attorney, management and program analyst, and computer specialist; (12) according to agency officials, writing, reading, telephoning, and computer work were the most common tasks performed by flexiplace participants; (13) agency officials and union representatives identified management resistance as the greatest barrier to implementing flexiplace programs; (14) they also recognized that some jobs do not lend themselves to flexiplace arrangements and cited other barriers, such as a lack of computers at alternative work sites, the handling of sensitive data, employee reluctance or indifference with re* https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-GGD-97-116/html/GAOREPORTS-GGD-97-116.htm https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-GGD-97-116/pdf/GAOREPORTS-GGD-97-116.pdf GAO/GGD-97-116 https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/GAOREPORTS-GGD-97-116 Letter Report GAO/GGD-97-116; Federal Workforce: Agencies' Policies and Views on Flexiplace in the Federal Government; Personnel management Federal employees Telecommuting Productivity Interagency relations National Performance Review EPA Climate Change Action Plan National Telecommuting Initiative Action Plan Title 5 Chapter 71 5 U.S.C. Chapter 71