U.S. Office of Personnel Management - Ensuring the Federal Government has an effective civilian workforce

We are sometimes asked why positions that seem to involve the same kind of work in different locations or organizations are classified differently.

Agencies are required to grade positions according to the work done in them; that is, positions are graded based on the content of the work and not on the employee's qualifications.

There are two reasons why positions that seem to involve the same kind of work are classified differently:
Because the positions are actually different. While the tasks might seem to be similar, the complexity of the work, as well as the level of responsibility, authority, level of contacts, purpose of contacts, and so on, could be different and justify different classifications. Classification authority is delegated to agencies, and the classification decision is made by the agency officials on the scene with the most information on the positions in question.

Because one or more of the positions are not classified correctly. OPM classification standards may have been interpreted differently by whomever classified the positions. When OPM learns of such situations, we remind the agency or agencies of their responsibility to classify similar positions consistently.

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