- Five overarching goals will define agencies’ hiring strategies for the next couple of years. The Trump administration is calling for skills-based assessments, expanded outreach, transparency and digitization, pooled hiring and data-driven decisions. The Office of Personnel Management’s new strategic recruitment plan for 2026-28 comes as OPM is also pushing for increased hiring of tech talent, as well as younger employees. --Drew Friedman
- The Space Force is launching an outreach program to introduce students in grades 3 through 12 to space careers. Dubbed Guardian Spark, the program seeks to reach classrooms nationwide. Through the program, Guardians can share their experiences, explain the Space Force’s mission and the career opportunities it offers. The inaugural Guardian Spark campaign will run from Nov. 9 through Dec. 20, 2026. The Space Force wants to reach at least 250 classrooms and 7,500 students. Guardians can volunteer to support the program. --Anastasia Obis
- The Social Security Administration says it is making progress toward a more accurate Social Security number database program. The agency says the initiative is the largest in SSA's history. SSA used shared data from the Department of Homeland Security's Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements, or SAVE, service to add missing citizenship information to roughly 25 million records. The improvements are also part of the governmentwide priority to reduce fraud, waste and abuse. The agency also received data from the State Department to update dates of death in 17 million records. Since the beginning of the Trump administration, SSA has corrected nearly 15% of all active SSNs across about 330 million U.S. citizens and nearly 390 million total records. --Sylvia Oakland
- A final rule from the Office of Personnel Management says it’s OK to pay federal employees not to work, if the end goal is reducing headcount. Those final regulations from OPM are a direct reference to the way the Trump administration's deferred resignation program (DRP) operated last year. About 144,000 feds who took the DRP spent weeks or months on paid administrative leave before officially separating from their jobs. The Government Accountability Office estimates that 70% of paid administrative leave spending during 2025 was tied to the DRP, costing more than $6.7 billion. --Drew Friedman
- A Democratic lawmaker is urging the Pentagon’s Military Spouse Commission to expand outreach to Virginia military families, particularly to spouses of junior enlisted service members and those affected by extended deployments. In a letter to Jennifer Hegseth, who leads the commission, Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., asked the panel to provide opportunities for families to engage with the commission directly. Currently, military families can only submit comments ahead of the commission’s scheduled meetings. Warner also requested additional information about the commission’s plans to engage military spouses from diverse backgrounds and incorporate their feedback into its recommendations. --Anastasia Obis
- The Marine Corps is making a military AI tool available to more of its personnel. A new policy expands access to the Maven Smart System across military networks for Marines who are authorized to use it. The system pulls together information from different sources to help commanders get a better picture of the battlefield and make decisions. The expanded access took effect Oct. 1. Now, Marine Corps commands are being asked to name officials to help roll out the system. Maven's use has sparked controversy for its role in a strike on an elementary school in Iran. --Rachel S. Cohen
- The Pentagon is trying to hire civilian workers faster, and artificial intelligence is helping. One official says a pilot program cut the Army’s average hiring time from 161 days to just 47. The Defense Department is also simplifying hiring rules to give managers more flexibility. It wants to offer candidates a job within 30 days of posting a vacancy. Pentagon officials say filling jobs faster is critical to maintaining military readiness. The push to modernize civilian hiring comes as the Pentagon rebuilds its workforce after last year's cuts. --Rachel S. Cohen
- Barry Schindler, acting commissioner at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, says artificial intelligence will help patent examiners complete the patent review process more quickly. The agency's newest tool, called COMPASS, enables reviewers to focus on the patent information and reduces tedious tasks. Schindler says the large backlog of 700,000 applications is the driving reason behind speeding up AI adoption. COMPASS is one of 20 AI-enabled tools USPTO is using to streamline the application review process. Other tools include the Classification Agentic Codification Tool, or Class ACT, and Scout LLM, both introduced earlier this year. --Sylvia Oakland
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