Proposed rule · 2026-13445

Promoting Employee Accountability

The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB or Board) are issuing proposed regulations governing performance-based reduction in grade and removal actions, non-disciplinary separations, and adverse actions, along with the MSPB's review of those actions, and proposing improved and additional training to supervisors. With this rule, OPM seeks to improve the accountability of employees for poor performance and misconduct by streamlining the administrative procedures used by agencies to take performance-based and adverse actions; and MSPB seeks to refocus its penalty review on a totality of the circumstances test rather than a rigid application of prescribed factors. The proposed rule also promotes transparency regarding employee poor performance and misconduct by restricting agencies' ability to engage in settlement agreements that remove official documentation of performance or conduct detrimental to the efficiency of the service.