Washington, D.C.- The U.S. Office of Personnel Management and representatives from 22 federal agencies recently kicked-off the Human Resources Line of Business' (HR LOB) inaugural joint meeting of the Multi-Agency Executive Strategy Committee (MAESC) and the Human Resources Information Requirements Board.

"I am very pleased to be here to welcome you and the many ideas I know you have to help strengthen the Human Resources Line of Business," said OPM Acting Director Dan G. Blair. "It is because of your hard work that the federal government will become even more responsive to the needs of the American people."

The agenda for the meeting included an update on the HR LOB accomplishments, such as the Business Reference Model and the current efforts underway to select the HR LOB's Shared Service Centers. Remarks and presentations were given by OPM officials including Acting Director Dan Blair; Norm Enger, Director of E-Government Initiatives; Ronald Sanders, Associate Director, Strategic Human Resources Policy; and Marta Perez, Associate Director, Human Capital Leadership and Merit Systems Accountability. Also delivering remarks was Tim Young, Deputy Administrator of E-Gov from the Office of Management and Budget.

The MAESC and the Requirements Board, working together, will promote strategies for HR management improvement across government; review and coordinate agencies' activities; and act as a catalyst and clearinghouse for sharing and disseminating information about good HR management practices. They also will work to establish standards through the development and continued improvement of an HR LOB systems framework and related requirements documents.

OPM formed the MAESC and the Requirements Board to carry on the momentum of an inter-agency task force that defined the vision, goals, and objectives of the HR LOB. Through its efforts, that task force formulated the common solution, target architecture and supporting business case for the HR LOB.