21 U.S.C. § 379d–3b — Strategic Workforce Plan and report

(a) By September 30, 2023, and then at least every 4 years after that, the Secretary of Health and Human Services must write a plan. It's called the Food and Drug Administration Strategic Workforce Plan. The Secretary must send it to the right congressional committees. The Secretary must also post it on the FDA's website. The plan explains how the FDA will find, hire, train, grow, and keep the workers it needs. It should help different FDA centers work together. It should help the FDA keep up with new science and technology. It should help the FDA develop, review, and regulate medical products. (b) Each FDA center must make its own strategic plan. Centers must update these plans when needed. Each center's plan must be guided by the Strategic Workforce Plan from part (a). (c) Every Strategic Workforce Plan must do five things. First, it must set agency-wide goals for recruiting, hiring, training, developing, and keeping workers. Second, it must list specific actions the Secretary will take to reach those goals in coming years. Third, it must name the challenges and risks the Secretary expects, and explain how the Secretary will handle them. Fourth, it must set up ways to measure progress toward the goals. Fifth, it must describe what the workforce can do now, what gaps exist, and how to fix them. (d) When writing each plan, the Secretary must think about six things. First, how many employees — including senior leaders — can retire soon, what they're expert in, and which center they work for. Second, how often employees leave or how many jobs are empty, broken down by skill type and center, and whether these numbers are changing. Third, results from the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey, and how those results are changing. Fourth, how much different jobs pay — even different specialists in the same field — and how pay affects the FDA's ability to reach its goals. Fifth, which hiring rules the FDA uses to hire people, and how long each one takes. Sixth, any other useful information the Secretary thinks matters. (e) Every plan after the first one must look back. It must show the progress made, measured against the goals set in part (c). It must also say whether the FDA's actions after the last plan actually made it better at reaching its goals. (f) The plan written in fiscal year 2023 has one more job. It must cover how COVID-19 affected FDA hiring and worker retention. It must address other pandemic-related workforce problems too, including how to protect workers during public health emergencies.