Federal leadership roles within organizations are categorized as either work leaders or team leaders, each providing different levels of technical and administrative oversight. Effective position management, including proper classification and organizational design, ensures optimal use of personnel resources and supports service delivery goals.
Key Insights
- Work leader roles typically apply to one-grade interval positions, while team leader roles are used for two-grade interval positions, with each leader classified one grade above the highest-level subordinate they oversee.
- The General Schedule Leader Grade Evaluation Guide provides the official framework for evaluating and classifying leader positions based on the type of work and organizational structure.
- A structured position management checklist helps identify inefficiencies such as job fragmentation, unnecessary layering, and underutilization, and is essential when redesigning organizations after structural changes like workforce reductions or realignment of responsibilities.
This lesson is a preview from our Federal Position Management Course and Certified Federal HR Business Partner (cFHRBP) Level III Certificate Program. Enroll in a course for detailed lessons, live instructor support, and project-based training.
Let's look at the work leader positions. And so we have two types of leaders in the federal government. And so we have a work leader and a team leader.
And so the work leader positions provide technical administrative oversight and guidance to team members. Again, leaders work in positions that provide technical and administrative oversight and guidance to team members. Leaders help position management processes by relieving the supervisor of many of the technical and administrative tasks.
That decreases the cost and the benefits, and it improves customer service. Now, there are two types of leaders. I said that before.
The work leader is for one grade interval position. Yes, one grade interval positions. And the team leaders are in two grade interval positions.
And you can find that information on how to classify those types of positions in the general schedule leader grade evaluation guides. Part one is the work leader for one grade interval positions, clerical and technical. And part two is for administrative and professional positions, two grade interval positions.
All right. And so refer to that guide. And so when you identify where there are lead positions necessary, the leader positions are always graded one grade higher than the highest grade of the team.
And so if you have a human resources assistant grades, you have a group of them, a team of them, grades five, six, and seven, the highest level of work being led by the team leader is grade seven. So that human resources assistant would be a grade eight. So the team leader or the work leader would always be one grade higher than the highest level of the positions that they lead on the team.
All right. And so remember, you need to go to the leader, the general schedule leader, and the grade evaluation guide to make those determinations. All right.
We're coming down to the end of module four. And so the last thing, the last couple of things that I want you to look at are in the participant guide, there is a position management checklist. And so we're going to put this all together.
Everything that we've discussed in modules one through four is compiled in this position management checklist. And so it gives you some questions to ask yourself or to ask supervisors as you go through the position management process. As you go through evaluating an organization for its position management effectiveness.
And so you want to be able to use this position management checklist when completing your analysis of that organization. And so this position management checklist is broken down into different parts. There's organizational design, which includes the structure of the organization and the environment of the organization.
Then there is the position management section, which talks about those terms that we look at in the glossary in Appendix A: fragmentation and overlap, job dilution, unnecessary positions, employee utilization, and supervisory responsibility. And then it has a place for other questions. And then there's a section that talks about additional solutions.
You want to go through all of these conditions and all of these solutions when identifying and going through the position management process. All right? You're doing fantastic. You're doing fantastic.
And now I want you to look at exercise four dash seven. This exercise is going to take you a little bit longer to complete. It gives you some organizational information that they want you to do.
You are the director of the HRM division for a medium-sized installation. This division currently has 13 full-time employees, excluding you. The approved positions, all of which are at their full performance working level, include the following.
One deputy at the GS-13 level, three HR specialists at the 12 level, four HR specialists at the 11 level, three HR assistants at the seven level, two HR assistants at the sixth level. And so your installation will be reorganized this summer. And as a result, three human resource division positions will relocate to other offices, and two positions will be abolished.
You will have only eight of your current 13 positions for the next fiscal year. And so until now, your 201 positions have been generalist, concentrating on staffing, classification, and employee relations. After the reorganization, however, employee relations work will increase by one full-time position, and your staffing and classification work will be decreased, but by how much has not yet been determined.
And so it gives you some job analysis for your pre-reorganization. And so you want to look at that information, and you want to be able to answer the questions in your redesign of the HRM division with eight approved FTEs. And so in this redesign, you will, one, design the division with the best mix of duties and responsibilities for each position considering the increase in the employee relations work, decrease in the staffing and classification work, and any symptoms, you want to identify any symptoms of position management problems, unnecessary positions, layering, narrow span of control, missing career letters, or fragmentation.
You want to describe the work that will not get done. And I want you not to consider any redesign that results in the creation of any new full working level positions beyond what is already established. Using the position management checklist as your guide, I want you to restructure this office.
