Intersection of human capital & category management

One of the priorities placed on agencies by the Trump administration’s 2019 budget was to increase efficiency across the board. One way of accomplishing this is through category management. Category management is a relatively new concept that involves breaking down large purchases into smaller categories. For the human capital category, the Office of Personnel Management and the General Services Administration have teamed up to develop strategies. “Within [category management] human capital is really a big category in the common spend.” said Indu Garg, human capital category manager at OPM. “It’s a small category in terms of dollars… but in terms of impact, the federal workforce is really the way we get work done and decisions made.” Garg says that human capital category management can have wide ranging benefits throughout the federal workforce. It can simplify the process for acquiring new human capital on both the “supply” and “demand” sides of government, as well as the back-office functions. “If agencies are looking at any of the back-office functions, like the financial or the I.T., they really need to look at the workforce functions,” Garg said