National Business Center launches electronic onboarding tool

The Interior Department's National Business Center began on Tuesday a pilot of its Human Resource Management Suite, an electronic onboarding system it developed to smooth the new-hire orientation process across the federal government.

The program will synchronize several systems already in use among agencies to anticipate vacancies far in advance and shepherd selectees and their new employers through the hiring process.

Michael Colburn, chief of the NBC's human resources management systems division, said the agency developed the program in response to requests from customers for better coordination among multiple hiring systems across government. The shared service center serves more than 40 agencies.

"Their itch, if you will, was to see real-time communications between the various HR systems," Colburn said.

The pilot program initially will be limited to the National Business Center. On June 29, it will be expanded to select offices at Interior and the Transportation Department. The NBC expects to make it available to other agencies for a fee by August.

"It's one-stop shopping for managers and for HR specialists to see the status of a vacancy from the planning step all the way through to the point where the person is on board," Colburn said.

The two main features are the Workforce Transformation and Tracking and the Entrance on Duty systems. The tracking feature aims to smooth the hiring process, from job vacancy to a new hire's first day of work, by sharing the employee's information across processing systems and streamlining and coordinating administrative tasks. Entrance on Duty allows selected applicants to fill out employment forms online, including those required for security access levels, as long as they don't require a physical signature. The program will perform real-time updates to systems that contain data on security clearances, personnel histories and payroll.

The Human Resource Management Suite initially was developed by NASA, where it has been in use for the past several years, for its employees. In 2007, the NBC "federalized it," Colburn said, adding features that would make it accessible across agency lines.

Onboarding -- how to quickly prepare for new hires so time isn't lost on the job -- has recently gained attention as an area ripe for reform. The Partnership for Public Service released a report earlier in May that showed the federal government was falling behind the private sector in accommodating new employees.

"Effective onboarding is hardly a panacea for all government's human capital challenges," the report said. "But it is one of the easiest and most cost-effective ways to enhance employee performance and improve retention."

The report cited NASA's program as an example for other agencies to follow.

"It's horrible to come to a new job and then sit there for several days trying to find out what you should be doing," said John Palguta, the Partnership's vice president of policy and research.