全球智库信息集成服务系统

Different functions require different approaches to developing staffing models

• The most suitable approach for the study functions is a bottom-up workload estimator method, supplemented by business-case analyses in certain areas.
• Workflows in the Applications Development Branch were distinctive because of the influence of agile methodologies for project management, so this area required the examination of alternative methods.

Some methods of determining optimal staffing can be challenging to implement but can provide benefits beyond the staffing results

• Although some bottom-up models rely on difficult-to-validate subjective inputs, the process of developing them produced additional benefits to workforce planners. Even a potentially noisy bottom-up model yields great increases in transparency in the work activities that decisionmakers are resourcing, for instance.

Researchers conducted a study to propose new approaches for determining staffing needs in the U.S. Secret Service's highest-priority administrative, professional, and technical functions. They used objective and subjective, quantitative and qualitative methods to create staffing models. The authors applied a bottom-up approach commonly used for staffing models of administrative work that involved constructing process maps for the major work processes that produce each function's outputs and pairing those maps with estimates of the frequency and duration of each process. These bottom-up inputs let them estimate the total workload to calculate an actionable number of full-time–equivalent employees that will be sufficient to accomplish the function's workload. They also discuss the more subjective approach of business-case analysis, which was occasionally helpful in generating supplemental information or that they used for areas in which the work was too unstructured for the bottom-up approach to yield reliable estimates. This report documents the team's methods, implementation considerations, and lessons learned for future workforce studies.

• Chapter One

  Introduction

• Chapter Two

  Selecting the Right Staffing Model

• Chapter Three

  Considerations for Implementing Our Primary and Secondary Approaches

• Chapter Four

  Alternative Approaches for Information Technology Functions

• Chapter Five

  Lessons Learned for Future Analyses of Staffing Needs