USDA Streamlines HR with Automation, Saving Nearly 100,000 Hours Annually

Washington D.C. – The U.S.Department of Agriculture (USDA) has significantly enhanced its human resources operations by implementing 15 new automations over the past year. These advancements build upon the agency’s ongoing efforts in automation, which began in 2018 with a focus on financial management. The latest initiatives aim to reduce the burden of HR processes and improve efficiency across the department. Brian Mohr, USDA’s enterprise automation program manager, highlighted the impact of these changes, noting that the automations are projected to save almost 100,000 hours annually.

The USDA’s journey into automation reflects a broader trend in government agencies seeking to modernize their operations and improve service delivery. By leveraging technology to streamline routine tasks, the USDA aims to free up its workforce to focus on more strategic and complex responsibilities. This approach not only enhances productivity but also contributes to a more engaged and satisfied workforce.

Personnel Action Processing: A Key Automation

One of the most impactful automations developed by the USDA is the Personnel Action Processing bot. This system streamlines the process for employees who need to make changes to their work schedules or duty locations. Previously, these changes required manual processing of Standard Form 52, which involved navigating a customer relationship management (CRM) platform and ultimately required manual data entry into the department-wide personal management system, Empower.

Brian Mohr explained the importance of this automation during an interview on ask the CIO, stating:

“One of the most impactful ones we built has to do with personnel action processing. That is essentially when I need to change my work schedule or I need to change my duty location. I need to do these things that have this well-defined business rules behind them and we put together the Standard Form 52 and that works its way through an agency customer relationship management (CRM) platform. All of the hard work is done on that document. At the end of the day, someone has to pick that document up and actually put that document into our departmentwide personal management system called empower. so what we did is we took 17 different nature of action codes and we built an automation that the entire department can leverage.”

Brian Mohr, USDA’s enterprise automation program manager

The Personnel Action Processing bot automates the checks that were previously performed manually, ensuring that all necessary signatures are in place before finalizing the documents. this not only speeds up the process but also reduces the risk of errors and inconsistencies.

Time Savings and efficiency Gains

The growth of the Personnel Action Processing bot was inspired by an earlier automation built by another agency to manage retention incentives more efficiently. This initial success led the USDA to explore how the automation could be expanded to cover a wider range of personnel actions.

Mohr elaborated on this evolution:

“They built an automation that did this one single nature of action code for retention incentives that came up vrey early on with our conversation with the HR working group we stood up. We started with that one and said, ‘Okay, well, what if we were to just take this one and what else could we do to make this more robust?’ One of the things we did is with the National Finance Center’s HR professionals called the mainframe before we even built this automation, was asked what other nature of actions are similar, using a similar screen and using the similar data elements. We got down to this list of about 17 of them and so that grew into two automations. The first one was about a group of 10 that were all right same screen in Empower and using the same data elements.Maybe one or two of those columns change and then we added seven that were a little bit more complex were you’re maybe bouncing between two screens and you need to collect a little bit more data.”

Brian Mohr,USDA’s enterprise automation program manager

The result is an automation that saves approximately 12 minutes per action. Over the course of a year, this translates to an estimated savings of nearly 100,000 hours, representing a notable boost in efficiency for the USDA’s HR operations.

Streamlining Grant Management with SAM.gov

In addition to personnel actions, the USDA has also automated aspects of grant management. A new automation assists USDA employees in reviewing grant applications by streamlining the process of gathering details from SAM.gov,the System for Award Management.

Previously, grant reviewers had to manually look up entities in SAM.gov one by one.The new automation allows them to input thousands of unique entity identifiers (UEI) and automatically retrieve data via the SAM.gov application programming interface (API).

mohr described the impact of this automation:

“They’re getting grant applications in, as they’re reviewing grants by going to SAM.gov to look up these entities one-by-one, a lot of times.So what we did is we built an automation that,essentially,you can put thousands of unique entity identifiers (UEI) and the automation grabs the SAM.gov application programming interface (API) and returns the data. we just actually launched an updated version where the automation grabs 35 different data fields in about 20 minutes. We’ve seen over 3,000 records be checked, and that data for all those entities come back.”

Brian Mohr, USDA’s enterprise automation program manager

Agriculture grant managers are now using this automation as part of their pre-award process to verify the eligibility of potential grantees. As May, the USDA has checked over 14,000 entities for grant eligibility using this automated system.

Metrics of Success and Future Automations

The USDA’s oversight council has established clear metrics to measure the success of each automation. These metrics focus on quantitative data,such as the time saved per action and the resulting dollar savings. The agency uses the GS-12 rest of the United States salary rate as a baseline for calculating cost savings.

Looking ahead, the USDA is developing several new automations, including one for incident management for field staff. This automation will ingest invoices for items such as chainsaws,port-a-potties,and food,and automatically check for discrepancies in contract numbers and daily rates,reducing the potential for improper payments.

Another upcoming automation will focus on USDA’s environmental permitting documents, streamlining the process of making eligibility determinations and reducing the amount of time employees spend on data entry.

These automations have also facilitated the USDA’s transition to a DevSecOps or agile approach to advancement, allowing the agency to move faster and more efficiently.

Mohr emphasized the importance of collaboration and dialog in this process:

“I think one of the things we realized last year is because we were moving a lot faster than some of the other projects,folks weren’t used to the speed,and we’d get hampered down with things like system access,whether that’s for our developers or for the bots themselves.This year, we’ve actually taken a much more customary approach and really doing a kickoff for every meeting, making sure all the appropriate parties are at the table, making sure the security

USDAS Automation Revolution: Streamlining HR and Saving Millions

Is it true that the USDA has saved nearly 100,000 hours annually by automating its HR processes? And if so, how did they achieve such dramatic efficiency gains?

Yes, that’s absolutely correct. The USDA’s strategic implementation of automation in its human resources (HR) department has resulted in meaningful time savings, estimated at nearly 100,000 hours annually. This wasn’t achieved overnight; it was a phased approach, building on foundational work started in 2018 and focusing on a well-defined automation strategy. Crucially,they didn’t just automate for the sake of it; they identified specific,high-impact processes ripe for optimization.

Targeting High-Impact HR Processes

Can you elaborate on the specific HR processes the USDA automated and the technologies involved?

The USDA focused on automating several key HR processes,and I will highlight two prominent examples. First, their automation of personnel action processing, a previously manual and time-consuming task, substantially reduced processing time for employee schedule and duty location changes.This automation handles the complexities of Standard Form 52, utilizing a robust system that integrates with their existing CRM and the department-wide personal management system, Empower. The automation takes over the tasks including data entry, verification of information and ensuring the chain of authorizations.

Secondly, grant management benefits from automation too.The USDA’s new system streamlines the process of gathering details from SAM.gov (System for award Management). Previously, HR staff would manually search for entities one by one; now, they can input thousands of unique entity identifiers (UEIs) at once, leveraging the SAM.gov API to efficiently retrieve necessary data. This significantly accelerates grant application review and eligibility checks.

Measuring Success and Future Plans

How does the USDA measure the success of their HR automation initiatives, and what are their future plans for expanding this project?

The USDA employs a robust system for measuring the Return on Investment (ROI) of these initiatives using quantifiable key performance indicators (KPIs). This includes tracking the time saved per action,the resulting cost savings (using a standardized GS-12 salary rate as a baseline for comparison) and othre efficiencies gained. A critical element of their success is the collaboration between different workgroups internally, including HR and IT, and the ability to quickly build, test, and deploy automations using a DevSecOps approach.

Looking ahead, the USDA plans to roll out more automations, targeting areas such as incident management, streamlining environmental permitting paperwork, and refining the whole process of automating grant eligibility checks.

Lessons learned and best Practices

What key lessons has the USDA learned during this automation journey, and what advice would you share with other government agencies aiming to streamline their HR operations through similar digital transformation strategies?

The USDA’s experience highlights several best practices for other government agencies. Firstly, start small and build iteratively. They began with a successful single workflow automations before expanding. Secondly, collaborate from day 1. Bringing together HR specialists and IT staff will ensure that the automation truly meets the needs of the users. Third, data-driven decision making is crucial. Use detailed metrics and KPIs to demonstrate quantifiable value and identify betterment areas.

and critically, choose the right processes for automation. Focus on tasks with high volume, well-defined business rules, and significant potential for time savings.

the USDA’s experience demonstrates the significant potential of automation for modernizing government HR operations. By focusing on high-impact processes, using a measured and phased approach, and adopting a culture of collaboration, agencies can achieve significant efficiency gains, reduce operational costs, and free up human resources for more strategic initiatives, leading to higher employee morale and a more improved overall employee experience. We encourage you to share your thoughts and experiences in the comments below – how has your organization approached similar challenges, what strategies have proven effective for you?

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