Army ‘rebalancing’ effort forces civilians to accept reassignments to avoid layoffs

The Army is forcing thousands of civilian employees into new jobs as part of what it calls a service-wide “rebalancing process,” a sweeping effort officials say will help avoid layoffs but requires civilians to accept new assignments within days or risk separation from federal service.

In a March 5 memo titled “Continuing Rebalancing and Optimizing the Civilian Workforce,” David Fitzgerald, deputy undersecretary of the Army, directed commands to match “surplus” civilian employees with vacant roles across the force in order to “minimize involuntary separations.”

Surplus employees are those not assigned to an authorized position in the Army’s fiscal 2027 structure. That excludes reimbursable staff, local nationals and dual-status military technicians. The Army used its enterprise civilian workforce dashboard to identify surplus employees. 

As part of its broader Transformation Initiative, the Army has undergone major organizational changes over the past year, merging major commands and consolidating or closing what it describes as redundant headquarters . The changes have rendered thousands of jobs redundant under the new structure while thousands of positions remain vacant across the force.

According to the memo, the Army must first attempt to fill vacant positions with excess civilian employees before hiring externally. And while civilian employees can appeal these “mandatory, management-directed” reassignments, those who decline the offer will be separated from federal service.

“This program is the Army’s primary method to prevent a Reduction in Force/Adjustment in Force (RIF/AIF). All commands are directed to prioritize placing surplus employees into any viable vacancies. This program is not temporary; it will continue until the workforce imbalance is solved,” a separate memo outlining the command matching process reads.

Army officials outlined a multi-phase plan that directs commands to first match surplus employees to vacant positions within their command, followed by cross-command matching.

The “intra-command” matching phase, which runs from March 20 to April 7, focuses on placing surplus employees into vacant authorized billets within their current command. 

According to the memo, commands have already notified affected employees and are now in the matching phase — they have until the end of this week to notify employees about their match and provide information about Voluntary Early Retirement Authority and Voluntary Separation Incentive Payments options. The service is not offering the deferred resignation program this time — a tool the Defense Department has relied on over the past year to shrink the size of its civilian workforce.

For local reassignments — those within a 50-mile radius — employees have two business days to accept or decline the offer. For non-local reassignments — anything beyond 50 miles — civilians have five business days to decide. 

One Army employee who was notified Thursday that their position was surplus told Federal News Network they have yet to receive a reassignment notice and were told to expect one around April 7 or later, if at all.

Another Army employee told Federal News Network that surplus employees in their organization are waiting to be matched, while those eligible for VERA or VSIP must decide by Friday whether to take a buyout or early retirement or decline and wait to be placed in a vacant role — assuming there is one for them. 

“It’s all strange and happening quickly,” the employee said.

During the cross-command matching phase, scheduled to begin April 7, the Civilian Human Resources Agency will assign remaining surplus employees to positions across the force “based on qualifications and seniority.” Similar to the intra-command phase, employees will receive reassignment notices along with VERA or VSIP offers and have two business days to respond to local assignments and five days for non-local moves.

Employees accepting non-local reassignments will have their relocation costs covered by the gaining command.

Employees who accept a VERA or VSIP offer must separate within 30 days, while reassigned employees must complete local moves within 30 days and non-local moves within 90 days of accepting the reassignment.

To mitigate potential RIF actions, one of the memos states that temporary, reemployed annuitant and term employees will be released if “their positions can resolve surplus situations.” 

Commands can also offer alternatives such as retraining programs or reassignment to a lower-grade position to avoid termination. 

“The morale in my office was just starting to improve as the budget was passed and we could start doing our jobs again, and then we were hit with an announcement of mass reductions in force — almost 30% at my location — hidden by the names of ‘Rebalancing’ and ‘Cross Leveling,’” one Army employee told Federal News Network. 

“For people that have a mortgage, children, a spouse that works a second job, it’s not easy to make the decision to uproot one’s family in 5 days. If we refuse, or don’t respond within those 5 days, we are ‘offered’ a VERA/VSIP, but it’s not voluntary as the ‘V’ implies. This will be used to tell the lie that people chose the VERA/VSIP when in fact we are facing reductions in force (RIF) by another name so they can do an end run around Congress to fire people,” the employee added.

The Army did not respond to Federal News Network’s questions about how many civilians have been identified as surplus, what types of positions have been deemed excess, the total number of vacancies across the service, and what happens if no match is found for employees during the reassignment process.

The Army has reduced its civilian workforce by about 16,000 employees through two rounds of the deferred resignation program, an Army spokesperson told Federal News Network in December.

If you would like to contact this reporter about recent changes in the federal government, please email anastasia.obis@federalnewsnetwork.com or reach out on Signal at (301) 830-2747.

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