Chainbridge Solutions Founder and CEO Aarti Smith published a new commentary in Federal News Network examining why federal hiring reform depends on stronger coordination between Human Resources and Personnel Security.
In the article, “Federal Hiring Reform Will Stall at the HR-Personnel Security Handoff,” Smith proposes that agencies should manage hiring and personnel vetting as one trust workflow from position planning through entrance on duty. That approach carries greater urgency as agencies work to rebuild mission capacity following a federal workforce decline of nearly 256,000 employees across 22 major agencies between December 2024 and January 2026. Smith identifies the HR-Personnel Security handoff as a source of avoidable delay when information and context do not move with the candidate.
“The delay is not in any one step. It compounds across each ownership change,” she writes.
Smith calls for Personnel Security to enter the hiring process earlier and for information to move with the candidate across organizational handoffs. She also states that agencies should measure the full candidate journey all the way through to entrance on duty, when a new employee can begin contributing to the mission.
That perspective is grounded in Chainbridge’s more than 16 years supporting federal Personnel Security programs and its work helping enroll tens of thousands of federal employees in Trusted Workforce 2.0.