OPM isn’t using its own dashboard for cyber workforce planning

Three years after launching a dashboard to provide agencies with a governmentwide view of the federal cybersecurity workforce, the Office of Personnel Management has stopped using the tool for its own planning, a new report found. 

According to the Government Accountability Office, OPM and five of the six other agencies examined by the congressional watchdog are no longer using the Cyber Workforce Dashboard, which went live in April 2023. The agencies cited “limitations” with the product, “including communications with OPM, access, functionality, and use of data,” per a GAO press release.

The dashboard, which came out of a working group co-chaired by the Office of Management and Budget and the Office of the National Cyber Director, was created to support agencies in cyber workforce planning, helping them make data-driven decisions for current and future requirements. 

Overseen by the Strategic Workforce Planning and Forecasting Methods team under OPM’s Workforce Policy and Innovation group, the dashboard tracked cyber workforce data for all 24 Chief Financial Officers Act agencies, as well as OMB, the Smithsonian Institution, and the National Archives and Records Administration, according to the GAO. 

In conducting its audit from January 2025 to March 2026, the watchdog was told by OPM officials that the human capital agency was not using the dashboard for its own cyber workforce planning purposes.

“OPM officials did not provide reasons as to why the agency did not use it,” the report stated. “However, in their role as Dashboard Administrator, OPM officials cited observed limitations they encountered while managing the Dashboard. These limitations were similar to the types experienced by the six selected agencies.”

Those agencies were the Small Business Administration, the National Science Foundation, the General Services Administration, and the departments of Justice, State and Treasury. The GSA is the only one that still uses the tool. The reasons for the dashboard’s waning use by agencies include limitations on communication, access and functionality.

Some of those issues have been addressed; per the GAO, OPM officials assigned a “data champion” to agencies to help with the communication troubles, and the office addressed an access problem that may have been linked to a technology upgrade.

Nevertheless, fixing some dashboard troubles appears to be an ongoing task, the report suggests.

“As of August 2025, the Dashboard was displaying September 2024 cyber workforce data,” the report noted. “However, after our July 2025 meeting with OPM officials, the agency updated the Dashboard to display March 2025 data. They stated that after the government shutdown ended in November 2025, the agency updated the Dashboard data with September 2025 Hiring Manager Satisfaction Survey data as well as employee accessions and separations data.”

Ultimately, the GAO concluded that the dashboard is “not meeting its intended purpose for selected agencies,” pointing to the fact that none of the six selected agencies are using it for “data-driven decision making on current and future cyber workforce requirements.” OPM disagreed with GAO’s assertion. 

The watchdog recommended that OPM collect and analyze information on agency use of the dashboard, ask for feedback, assess costs and then decide whether to scrap the tool or make improvements to get it back on track.