{"id":435506,"date":"2025-12-09T11:55:32","date_gmt":"2025-12-09T11:55:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/435506\/"},"modified":"2025-12-09T11:55:32","modified_gmt":"2025-12-09T11:55:32","slug":"compromise-ndaa-would-let-dod-promote-civilians-faster-increase-cyber-pay","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/435506\/","title":{"rendered":"Compromise NDAA would let DoD promote civilians faster, increase cyber pay"},"content":{"rendered":"

A compromise version<\/a> of the fiscal 2026 National Defense Authorization Act, released late Sunday, includes several key civilian personnel reforms that could change how the Defense Department hires and manages its civilian workforce.<\/p>\n

Most notably, the draft text includes a provision that would allow the Defense Department to promote employees based on skills and qualifications without requiring them to satisfy minimum time-in-grade requirements before being eligible for promotion.<\/p>\n

Ron Sanders, a former career human capital leader in government, said the provision is emblematic of the long-running debate to allow DoD to secede from the rest of the federal civil service due to the nature of its mission.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is a big deal, and it underscores a bigger issue \u2026 You should be able to promote people, regardless of time served, if they can do the job \u2014 promote them,\u201d Ron Sanders, a former career human capital leader in government, told Federal News Network. \u201cThere have been numerous attempts to carve out more flexibilities for the DoD civilian workforce than the rest of the civil service had.\u201d<\/p>\n

]]><\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m of the mind, and I\u2019m not alone in this, that the federal civil service should be broken up. It should be glued together by a series of standards and principles \u2014 there are some cross cutting government-wide principles that should always remain in effect. But DoD has a different mission than the intel community, and it has a different mission than FBI and the law enforcement and other aspects of Homeland Security. Trying to treat all of that as one-size-fits-all is problematic. And I think you\u2019re seeing a continuation of the debate that DoD is different,\u201d he added.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The time-in-grade requirement is antiquated anyway, Sanders argued, and should be revisited for the rest of the federal civil service.<\/p>\n

The bill would also allow the Defense Department to use skill-based assessments to determine whether applicants are qualified for open positions.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you sum it all up, DoD would basically have its own civilian personnel system, separate and apart from the rest of the federal civil service. I think we\u2019ve gone to the other extreme, and we\u2019ve been living there for decades now, and that is a one-size-fits-all mentality. What\u2019s good for the SEC is good for DoD, and that\u2019s just not true anymore,\u201d Sanders said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In addition, if enacted into law, DoD would be able to share certificates of top candidates for various roles across the department. Certificates would remain valid for at least a year, and they are subject to agency-specific qualification checks.<\/p>\n

This particular provision is not new, Sanders said. \u201cIf you have the applicant\u2019s permission, sharing certificates, to me, is not a big deal, and it should have been done years and years and years ago, if it hasn\u2019t been.\u201d<\/p>\n

Congress is also tightening the department\u2019s ability to make workforce cuts by adding new analysis requirements, reporting mandates and restrictions on conducting reductions-in-force.<\/p>\n

]]><\/p>\n

If passed, the bill would prohibit DoD from reducing its workforce levels or realigning functions if such changes involve more than 50 employees and occur outside the normal programming process, including ad hoc, immediate or unprogrammed workforce changes. The Defense secretary is also required to notify Congress about planned workforce reductions.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it is part of a larger trend, and that is a growing realization that civilian personnel in DoD are important and they should be managed. If something affects 50 or more employees or some small number like that, that\u2019s micromanaging,\u201d Sanders said. \u201cI don\u2019t think that was in intent on the part of Congress to actually worry about 50 employees. I think it was just a failure to fully comprehend the full scope of the DoD civilian workforce, which is just plain huge.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lawmakers are also seeking to centralize and elevate civilian personnel management within each military service by placing it under senior uniformed leaders. If the measure passes, senior leaders who manage military manpower would also oversee the department\u2019s civilian workforce.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think at least part of the reasoning is the necessity of having what I would argue are redundant staffs at the military department headquarters and at the major command level. There\u2019s a pendulum here, and it goes back and forth. But at the end of the day, somebody really does need to take a hard look at the staffs that have emerged and decide whether they\u2019re redundant and whether they could be centralized,\u201d Sanders said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Cyber workforce<\/b><\/p>\n

The legislation also expands which positions DoD can hire using special cyber authorities, as well as significantly increases the maximum pay DoD can offer for cyber talent.<\/p>\n

Under current law, Cyber Excepted Services hiring authorities apply to U.S. Cyber Command, as well as certain cybersecurity and IT operations roles across the services. The 2026 defense policy bill could expand it to positions held in combatant commands, defense agencies, and field activities supporting CYBERCOM. DoD would also expand Cyber Excepted Services to 500 more cyber roles that don\u2019t neatly fit into existing categories but are still vital and hard-to-fill jobs<\/p>\n

The legislation would also give the defense secretary greater pay flexibility for cyber talent, allowing DoD to offer up to 150% of the maximum basic pay authorized for Executive Schedule Level I roles.<\/p>\n

\u201cNeither Homeland Security nor DoD has taken full advantage of the authorities that Congress gave them literally decades ago. In DoD case, I think the mandate, and I read this as a mandate, to put more people under CES is generally a good thing. It just again underscores whether DoD should be treated differently or whether you need a separate set of personnel flexibilities for all cyber ninjas at DoD,\u201d Sanders said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

]]><\/p>\n

Copyright
\n \u00a9\u00a02025 Federal News Network. All rights reserved. This website is not intended for users located within the European Economic Area.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A compromise version of the fiscal 2026 National Defense Authorization Act, released late Sunday, includes several key civilian…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":435507,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[201699,201700,201701,138738,51,149380,201702,50,201703,52],"class_list":{"0":"post-435506","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-cyber-excepted-services","9":"tag-cyber-workforce","10":"tag-cybercom","11":"tag-dod-civilian-workforce","12":"tag-headlines","13":"tag-national-defense-authorization-act","14":"tag-ndaa-2026","15":"tag-news","16":"tag-ron-sanders","17":"tag-top-stories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115689483567005674","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/435506","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=435506"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/435506\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/435507"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=435506"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=435506"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=435506"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}