GAO reviewed the Internal Revenue Service's (IRS) initial efforts to
redeploy employees under the terms of the Redeployment Understanding,
focusing on whether there were lessons to be learned from: (1) IRS'
initial use of these procedures and their impact on IRS' operations; and
(2) the reaction of redeployed employees and their supervisors to
redeployment and the redeployment process.
GAO found that: (1) if IRS develops new redeployment procedures, there
are several lessons to be learned from its initial redeployment
experiences; (2) although redeployment was intended as a way to move
employees out of jobs that would no longer be needed in IRS' modernized
environment, it was initially used to move thousands of employees whose
jobs were not in immediate jeopardy into new or existing positions that
were expected to be needed in the new environment; (3) many jobs vacated
by redeployed employees had to be filled by new employees, who may
subsequently have to redeployed; (4) training requirements increased and
productivity and taxpayer services declined as experienced employees
were replaced by inexperienced employees; (5) although some operational
inefficiencies, such as reduced productivity and increased training, can
be expected as an inherent part of any redeployment process, the
negotiated Redeployment Understanding exacerbated these inefficiencies
because it generally made many IRS employees eligible for redeployment
years before their jobs were expected to be eliminated, and did not
allow IRS to fill jobs with employees who had related experience before
bringing in volunteers from unrelated areas; (6) GAO's interviews of
redeployed employees and supervisors pointed to other lessons that might
be learned from IRS' initial redeployment efforts; and (7) most
employees were generally satisfied with their new jobs, and supervisors
were generally satisfied with their new employees, but many employees
cited concerns about the information IRS provided to explain the
redeployment process, the assistance IRS provided to help employees find
jobs, and the training IRS provided.
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