Centralized position classification by the Civil Service Commission will no longer be used as a basis for authorizing executive resources, establishing pay grades for individuals, controlling assignments, or establishing qualifications of individuals. This will:

- Eliminate the existence, in practice, of two personnel systems, one for positions and one for people, which frequently are not in harmony with each other.

- Permit an agency and the Administration to consider the overall leadership needs of the agency or program rather than individual position requirements.

Allow more equitable distribution of executive resources among
agencies.

- Permit the utilization of executives on the basis of broad career qualifications rather than on the basis of narrow professional specialization.

Eliminate grade as a status factor and substitute the prestige
of membership in the Federal Executive Service.

Permit each agency to assign individuals flexibly to whatever
duties are required and appropriate.

In lieu of centralized position classification, the agencies and the Civil Service Commission in collaboration with the Office of Management and Budget will have the responsibility to plan for and relate executive manpower requirements to overall program needs and priorities.

Agencies will annually review their executive manpower needs and
request an authorized number of executives. The Civil Service
Commission will review these requests in collaboration with the
Office of Management and Budget and authorize a number for each agency.
These reviews will consider each agency's total requirements,
not just changes. There will be no assumption that the same
needs continue from year to year.

The annual request of the agencies; the joint review of the Civil
Service Commission and the Office of Management and Budget; and
the Civil Service Commission's final authorizations will be based
on such factors as:

The Commission will annually report the authorizations to the
Congress. The authorizations will become effective 90 days
after the report.

The purpose of this arrangement of request, justification, and review will be to:

- Require that the Civil Service Commission, in conjunction with
the agencies, relate executive manpower requirements to expanding
or contracting needs.

Require that all program changes and legislation be accompanied
by plans for meeting executive manpower requirements.

- Assure that agency executive manpower planning is in consonance with the agency's program and financial plan as approved by Office of Management and Budget in the program review and budget process.

Assure that both within the agencies and government-wide, execu-
tive manpower is more effectively allocated in accordance with
the program priorities established by the President and the Congress.

The new and comprehensive reporting system to the Congress will be provided

to:

Permit the current Administration to improve and make more
meaningful the overview of executive manpower management.

Allow the appropriate Committees of the Congress to offer guidance to the agencies and the Administration through the legislative oversight process.

The Civil Service Commission after collaboration with the Office of Management and Budget will also have authority to adjust the size of the Service authorized any agency for one year for emergency purposes. This authority will be subject to the following controls:

Changes may be made only for special circumstances clearly
unanticipated at the time of the annual authorization.

The Commission must notify the Congress of its use of this
authority and give its reasons.

The Commission may not increase the authorization in any one
year by more than 1% of the total authorization.

Career and Noncareer Categories of Executives

The members of the Federal Executive Service will be in two appoint

ment categories; career and noncareer.

Each category will have a different type of appointment with different conditions of employment.

Noncareer

A noncareer category will be established in the Service to accommodate the agency's need for three different kinds of executives whose employment will likely be of a temporary nature as described below:

Executives whose relationships to the agency head require an
interdependence based on such factors as program philosophy,
political agreement or personal confidence.

Executives who work on relatively short-term projects.

Executives whose employment is more oriented toward their
professions or occupations than to particular employers.
These are the highly mobile people who move freely in and
out of private employment, universities, private practice,
and government in pursuit of their specialized interests
(the so called "in and outers").

Noncareer appointments will be made at the discretion of the agency head and serve at his pleasure.

Such appointments will not be subject to prior approval or review by a qualifications review board (see later discussion).

Agency heads will be given the authority to approve the qualifications of noncareer executives so that they will have the flexibilities they need to:

= Accommodate to a reasonable degree the many staffing
pressures they face.

= Hire a limited number of assistants with political or personal relationships or who agree on program philosophy.

Career

The career category will be composed of executives whose general
employment outlook and expectations are oriented toward Federal
service generally.

The majority will probably come from lower levels of Federal
career employment through the promotion process.

A small number will enter laterally from outside the Federal
career service expecting to make Federal employment a career
in the future.

To make long-term Government service attractive and highly presti-
gious, considerable emphasis will be given to strengthening career
appointments and to establishing an open and public review process
for entry into the Service.

Career appointments will be made strictly on the basis of merit
and fitness.

. Provision will be made for merit entry into the career category
from all sources; i.e., from the ranks of the General Schedule,
from other Federal Government personnel systems, from the noncareer
category, and from outside the Federal service.

All career appointments will be reviewed and approved by a
Qualifications Board prior to appointment (see later dis-
cussion).

Assignments will not be designated as career or noncareer. This wil1 overcome the following difficulties:

It is very difficult to make realistic distinctions between career
and noncareer assignments.

Drawing clear lines between policy development and administra-
tion of policy on an individual position basis frequently
cannot be done realistically.

There are tremendous pressures to exempt positions from the career service despite the real content of the jobs, especially when new positions in new programs are established on a projected

Designation of positions as noncareer has restricted job oppor-
tunities for career executives.

In many agencies, noncareer positions have been grouped at
the top of the executive structure with the career positions
grouped at the lower levels.

Many competent career executives consider assignments to
noncareer positions undesirable because of the complete
loss of security that goes with such assignments.

- Designation of positions as career and noncareer curtails the use of a flexible management structure and the flexible use of people within that structure.

Establishing and Controlling Career and Noncareer Relationships

In lieu of designating an authorized position or list of duties as career or noncareer, each agency will be authorized a ratio of career/noncareer executives.

This will be done to allow an agency to build a management team
that includes:

Executives to provide the continuity and experience needed
by modern Government programs.

Executives in whom management has special confidence because
of a personal or political relationship, or because of the
executive's program philosophy.

Executives with specialized skills for short-term public projects or with only a temporary interest in a Government assignment or program.

The use of the career/noncareer ratio will accommodate a wide
variety of problems now faced by agency heads. It will provide:

A mix of the skills of career professionals and appointed
officials.

An opportunity for agency heads to make reasonable accommodations to requests for appointment of political party constituents, interest group advocates, academics, and professional group members.

A means for the Congress and the Administration to ensure
that the executive staffs of the agencies can be made
responsive to the public will expressed through the political
mandate.