Civilian employees of the Naval Air Systems Command are taking advantage of a new process for checking into the command. The new processes can be used by other Navy commands whose personnel experience similar difficulties with local check-in.

"We heard a lot of frustration from employees," said Nancy Gray, Total Force Consultant with NAWCAD 7.3.1 and a member of the AIRSpeed process improvement team for this project. "We also heard from supervisors and team leads who were frustrated because their new employees didn’t have computer access and, therefore, couldn’t start working right away."

What the team discovered through their investigation and AIRSpeed analysis was a multi-faceted problem with the check-in process.

The Navy Marine Corps Intranet requires a Department of Defense Common Access Card for computer access. To be authorized to receive a Common Access Card, an employee’s information must be on file with a DoD personnel system called DEERS. According to AIRSpeed project team members, civilian employee information is processed through two systems before it reaches DEERS.

"What we found is that it could take four or five weeks for a civilian employee’s information to be downloaded into DEERS so they could be issued a CAC," explained Karen Brandon, a member of the AIRSpeed team and her Total Force Strategy and Management Department’s NMCI point of contact.

"We couldn’t control the DoD process, but we realized if we changed our local process, we could help our employees and supervisors," she said. According to Brandon and her team members, the new check-in process works this way:

As soon as a prospective civilian employee accepts a NAVAIR offer of employment, a Total Force Consultant (in some commands known as personnel, manpower or human resources) notifies their department’s NMCI point of contact. That point of contact schedules a CAC appointment for the new employee and notifies the competency’s NMCI point of contact.

"Because the employee has a CAC appointment, he or she can be placed on an exceptions list to access email with a user name and password instead of a CAC," Brandon said.

The new employee receives that appointment date and directions to the CAC office as part of a new employee package sent by email.

At least two weeks before the new employee arrives, the competency’s NMCI point of contact must order an NMCI seat for the new employee or find an empty one already within the command. That point of contact also requests an NMCI account for the new employee and requests that the person be placed on the exception list.

"Overall, feedback shows that our new process is cutting down on confusion and improving satisfaction rates," she noted.

The only difficulty the team has encountered with the new process is with new employees cancelling their CAC appointments.

"New employees can stop by the CAC office earlier than their appointment date to see if the system can grant them a CAC yet, but by all means, they should keep their appointments on the schedule unless they have a CAC in their hands," said Brandon. "Otherwise they risk losing system access all together."

However, resolving computer access is only one part of the new check-in process for civilians. The team also found a way to cut check-in time in half.

"The Human Resources Service Center in Philadelphia used to send a hard copy letter and hard copy forms," said Gray. "Sometimes the forms were outdated and employees would have to complete new ones when they arrived or they completed forms that were in the package but didn’t apply to them."

A new employee now receives an offer letter and instructions by email, along with Web site addresses to download only the necessary forms. The documents can be printed and completed prior to arriving for check in. In addition, representatives from all the appropriate offices come to a single location for a new employee orientation.

"It used to take a full day to check in. Now, in one morning, a new employee can walk in, hear from the Office of Counsel, Total Force Strategy and Management Department, and Personnel Security – everyone they need – and walk out with a badge and email access, ready to work," she said.

-USN-