{"id":80315,"date":"2025-08-13T19:04:13","date_gmt":"2025-08-13T19:04:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/80315\/"},"modified":"2025-08-13T19:04:13","modified_gmt":"2025-08-13T19:04:13","slug":"opm-quietly-ends-its-role-in-five-things-reporting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/80315\/","title":{"rendered":"OPM Quietly Ends Its Role in \u2018Five Things\u2019 Reporting"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\n\t\t\t\t\tThe quiet end stands in sharp contrast to how the program began during the early weeks of the Trump administration as a DOGE initiative mirroring one that then-DOGE leader Elon Musk had employed in the private sector.\t\t\t\t\t Image: GWImages\/Shutterstock.com
\n\t\t\t\tBy: FEDweek Staff<\/a><\/p>\n

OPM has quietly ended its role in the program to have federal employees report on five things they accomplished at work the previous week, an initiative that began as highly controversial but over time had diminished.<\/p>\n

OPM director Scott Kupor made that announcement as a small part of a blog posting<\/a> on recent actions by the agency, saying that \u201cAt the same time, we decided to end the \u201cfive things\u201d email reporting process. Our view is simple: every federal manager has an obligation to track and prioritize what their team is working on \u2013 be that through regular one-on-ones or otherwise.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe five things email was an augment to that, so if managers find it useful to deploy, they of course are free to do so directly. But OPM will no longer maintain a centralized inbox for this practice,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n

The quiet end stands in sharp contrast to how the program began during the early weeks of the Trump administration as a DOGE initiative mirroring one that then-DOGE leader Elon Musk had employed in the private sector. An initial email giving employees two days to provide \u201capprox. 5 bullets of what you accomplished last week\u201d did not explicitly threaten disciplinary action for not responding, but in a posting his X social media platform, DOGE project leader Elon Musk had said that \u201cFailure to respond will be taken as a resignation.\u201d<\/p>\n

That roiled the federal workplace, with agencies including DHS, State and the intelligence community initially telling their employees not to respond. That was due to potential security concerns of employees having to their activities to what was then a new and unknown email address. A second similar email sent shortly after the first clarified that any such information should be excluded.<\/p>\n

The initial resistance by some employees drew criticism and even ridicule from Trump administration officials who called the requirement not burdensome and suggested that some federal employees did not do even five things per week. In a follow-up posting, Musk said the intent was \u201cbasically a check to see if the employee had a pulse and was capable of replying to an email.\u201d<\/p>\n

In response, many employees argued that their concern involved reporting outside of their agency\u2019s chain of command, with some pointing out that they already send weekly or even daily activity reports to their management\u2014many in far more detail.<\/p>\n

After the initial emails, some agencies turned the program into an ongoing weekly requirement, with summary results in turn reported to OPM. However, there has been no central accounting of how widely the practice has been followed since the early months of the year.<\/p>\n

One notable change occurred in May when DoD ended its program of weekly reporting, while asking employees to submit recommendations for how the department could operate more efficiently.<\/p>\n

Several Federal Agencies Disavow Union Contracts, with More Likely to Follow<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2018Only High Performers\u2019 Should Receive Awards, Agencies Told<\/a><\/p>\n

OPM Quietly Ends Its Role in \u2018Five Things\u2019 Reporting<\/a><\/p>\n

COVID Vaccination Data to Be Deleted from Federal Personnel Records<\/a><\/p>\n

Numbers, Impact of Federal Job Cuts Draw Increasing Scrutiny<\/a><\/p>\n

OPM Limits Length of Paid Leave in Reorgs\u2014Starting Next Year<\/a><\/p>\n

See also,<\/p>\n

What to Know About the New Federal Application Process<\/a><\/p>\n

Top 10 Provisions in the Big Beautiful Bill of Interest to Federal Employees<\/a><\/p>\n

A Pre-RIF Checklist for Every Federal Employee, From a Federal Employment Attorney<\/a><\/p>\n

Work Longer or Take the FERS Supplement Now: Which is Better?<\/a><\/p>\n

Doubling Your TSP (C Fund vs G Fund)<\/a><\/p>\n

Primer: Early out, buyout, reduction in force (RIF)<\/a><\/p>\n

2025 Federal Employees Handbook<\/a><\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The quiet end stands in sharp contrast to how the program began during the early weeks of the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":80316,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[28,147,530],"class_list":["post-80315","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-personal-finance","tag-business","tag-personal-finance","tag-personalfinance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80315","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=80315"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80315\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/80316"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=80315"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=80315"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=80315"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}