Stabilization and Reconstruction Staffing - RAND Corporation

16 Stabilization and Reconstruction Staffing: Developing U.S. Civilian PersonnelAccording to the GAO, although the total number of CPA employeesfluctuated, the composition of personnel, on average, remained relativelyconstant: 9••••Approximately 28 percent of the staff members was militarypersonnel.Approximately 13 percent was from other coalition countries.Approximately 26 percent was civilians from numerous U.S. governmentagencies, including the Department of Defense.About 25 percent was contractors and temporary employees hiredunder Section 3161 of Title 5, United States Code (5 USC 3161).These statistics indicate that the U.S. government supplied justover half (26 percent from U.S. government agencies and 25 percentfrom temporary hires) of those actually deployed under its mode ofoperation for Iraq and used other sources to field the rest of its staff,including military manpower and contributions from allies and coalitionpartners. As a percentage of need, the number is actually far lower,considering that at its maximum the CPA was never staffed to its articulatedrequirement. 10To begin to understand why the U.S. government did not recruitthe needed personnel requires a basic understanding of how federalgovernment personnel systems work. Government personnel systemsrespond to documented (i.e., a job description exists) and validated (i.e., aformal determination that the position is needed and properly defined)requirements placed on them by their parent agencies. Specifically, avalidated request that describes a position (e.g., skills required, grade9 U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO), Rebuilding Iraq: Resource, Security, Governance,Essential Services, and Oversight Issues, Report to Congressional Committees, Washington,D.C.: GAO-04-902-R, June 2004.10 These requirements were often not validated, thus putting no demand on the U.S. governmentpersonnel systems. GAO numbers do not add to 100 percent; the report provides noexplanation about the supplier of the residual 8 percent of personnel. Furthermore, as notedpreviously, estimates are that the CPA staff was never above 58 percent of requirements,indicating that the civilian personnel system never produced more than approximately 28percent of the required personnel.