NASA: Progress Made on Strategic Human Capital Management, but Future Program Challenges Remain

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is engaged in efforts to replace the Space Shuttle with the next generation of human space flight systems and implement the President's space exploration policy. To do this, NASA must recruit, develop, and retain certain critical skills in its workforce, guided by its strategic human capital management plan. GAO was asked to examine the extent to which NASA (1) has aligned its human capital planning framework with its strategic mission and programmatic goals and (2) is recruiting, developing, and retaining critically skilled personnel, given future workforce needs. To address these objectives, GAO reviewed NASA's policies, planning, and implementation documents; reviewed budget documents and performance and accountability reports; and interviewed cognizant agency officials. To assess NASA's efforts to recruit, develop, and retain critically skilled personnel, we analyzed demographics data, and critical skills information; NASA's policy, procedures and guidance for recruiting and hiring; and implementation of information systems programs, and processes that support human capital management and planning. We are not making any recommendations in this report.