By: Andrew L. Scroggins, Samantha L. Brooks, and Christopher J. DeGroff

Seyfarth Synopsis: The EEOC has officially adopted its Strategic Plan for Fiscal Years 2026–2030, replacing the prior Strategic Plan and establishing the institutional framework that will guide the agency’s enforcement, outreach, and internal operations through the end of the decade. While the Strategic Plan operates at a higher altitude than the recently adopted National Enforcement Plan (NEP) (see our earlier post here) — focusing on institutional capacity and performance metrics rather than specific substantive enforcement targets — it provides critical insight into how the agency intends to allocate resources, measure success, and hold itself accountable.

Said another way, the Strategic Plan is the architectural blueprint; the NEP is the operational playbook. Employers should read the two documents together. The Strategic Plan tells you how the agency will measure itself — and those metrics matter. The NEP tells you where the agency will aim. Together, they paint a comprehensive picture of an agency that is centralizing its operations, tightening its metrics, and aligning itself with Administration priorities.

Here is our detailed breakdown of the Strategic Plan’s three strategic goals, its seventeen performance measures, the key changes from draft to final, and what employers should be watching.

I. The Big Picture: A Three-Goal Institutional Framework

The EEOC’s Strategic Plan is organized around three strategic goals:

  • I: Combat and Prevent Employment Discrimination Through the Strategic Application of the EEOC’s Law Enforcement Authorities.
  • II: Prevent Employment Discrimination and Advance Equal Employment Opportunities Through Outreach and Training.
  • III: Strive for Organizational Excellence Through Our People, Practices, and Technology.

These goals are not new in concept. The EEOC has long organized its strategic planning around enforcement, outreach, and internal operations. But the specific performance measures, targets, and language the agency has chosen reveal where the Commission intends to direct its energy and how it plans to hold itself accountable over the next five years.

Three institutional values undergird the Plan: a Commitment to Equal Employment Opportunity, Accountability, and Integrity. Notably, the Plan describes the EEOC’s obligation to be “impartial” in its investigations and adjudications and commits the agency to “advance the public interest” where unlawful discrimination is found. This language is consistent with the NEP’s emphasis on “evenhanded enforcement” and signals that the agency views impartiality, rather than advocacy for historically disadvantaged groups, as its institutional posture.  Employers who have tangled with the EEOC in systemic or other hotly-contested investigations may be skeptical of the EEOC’s characterization of its role as a “neutral.”  But at least on paper, that is the EEOC’s position, and that might be leveraged in communications with the agency when it takes a more activist stance. 

The Plan also emphasizes a “coordinated, holistic approach to preventing discrimination and enforcing the law,” while acknowledging that “external factors outside of the agency’s control may impact the EEOC’s yearly progress.”

Strategic Goal I: Law Enforcement — Metrics, Systemic Cases, and Federal Sector Oversight

This is the heart of the Plan and reflects the EEOC’s core enforcement mission across the private, state and local government, and federal sectors. The Plan includes seven performance measures under this goal, several of which deserve close employer attention.

A. Targeted, Equitable Relief in 97% of Resolutions

Performance Measure 1 sets a target that 97% of EEOC conciliation agreements and favorable litigation resolutions contain “targeted, equitable relief,” which is defined as non-monetary, non-generic relief that “explicitly addresses the discriminatory employment practices at issue in the case.” Examples include customized training, development of new policies, and external monitoring of employer actions.

The EEOC here confirms that monetary settlements alone will not satisfy the agency. Employers who find themselves in conciliation or litigation with the EEOC should expect the agency to push aggressively for injunctive and structural relief, including policy changes, training mandates, monitoring requirements, and reporting obligations. This has been the trend for some time, but the 97% target formalizes it as an institutional expectation that will persist through FY 2030.

B. A 90% Litigation Win Rate — and the Agency Intends to Keep It

Performance Measure 2 sets a floor of 90% favorable resolution of enforcement lawsuits, including cases resolved by “favorable court orders, consent decrees, and settlement agreements.” The Plan acknowledges that this is “ambitious” given the complexity of priority cases under the NEP, but commits the agency to meeting or exceeding this target each year.

The focus on success rate means the EEOC will be selective about the cases it files. But it also means that when the agency does file suit, it believes it has a strong hand. Employers facing EEOC litigation should take the agency’s case assessment seriously from the outset — the EEOC is not filing cases it expects to lose.

C. The Systemic Program: Refocused on Complex, High-Impact Cases

Performance Measure 3 directs the EEOC’s Systemic Program to focus on “resolving complex systemic matters involving ten or more aggrieved individuals” and to seek “meaningful targeted equitable relief and monetary relief in such matters.” The Plan notes that the Systemic Program has evolved from a 2006 initiative into a full program that prioritizes “pattern or practice, policy, and/or class cases where the alleged discrimination has a broad impact on an industry, profession, company, or geographic area.” The Plan also emphasizes the use of Commissioner Charges, directed investigations, and “the strategic use of empirical data” to identify systemic discrimination.

The ten-employee threshold is notable. It signals that the agency is not interested in small-scale systemic cases and wants to focus its resources on matters with broad impact. The removal of the $1 million monetary floor from the draft to the final Plan may reflect the agency’s desire for greater flexibility, but it is unlikely to signal a retreat from systemic enforcement. If anything, the explicit reference to Commissioner Charges and directed investigations, neither of which requires a charging party, suggests the EEOC intends to initiate systemic investigations on its own initiative, giving it greater latitude to pursue the agency’s announced NEP priorities.

D. Enhanced Conciliation Monitoring

Performance Measure 4 commits the agency to “significant progress toward enhanced monitoring of conciliation agreements,” including “streamlined and standardized procedures, improved tracking and internal reporting mechanisms, and related training for EEOC field staff.”

This is a meaningful development. Historically, conciliation agreement monitoring has been inconsistent across EEOC offices. The Plan signals that the agency intends to build a more robust compliance infrastructure. Employers who have entered into conciliation agreements should assume that the EEOC will be watching more closely and for longer. As we noted in our analysis of the NEP, the agency has already identified breaches of conciliation agreements and consent decrees as an enforcement priority.

E. Federal Sector Oversight: Baseline and Incremental Improvement

Performance Measure 5 establishes baseline compliance measures for cabinet-level federal agencies, focusing on timeliness of EEO complaint processing, approval of disability affirmative action plans, and structural independence of EEO programs. While directed at federal agencies, private employers, and particularly federal contractors, should monitor how federal agency EEO standards evolve, as they may foreshadow expectations for the private sector.

F. Quality Enforcement: The 90% Quality Standard

Performance Measure 6 requires that at least 90% of completed investigations, conciliations, hearings, and federal appeals meet or exceed criteria established in the agency’s Quality Enforcement Practices (QEP) and Federal Sector Quality Practices Plan (FSQP).  The agency will assess prior quality reviews in FY 2026 and track results annually from FY 2027 through FY 2030.

Quality standards for investigations and conciliations can cut both ways. On one hand, higher-quality investigations may produce more reliable findings. On the other, they may also produce more thorough and harder to challenge reasonable cause determinations. Employers should ensure their own responses to EEOC investigations are equally rigorous.

G. Intake Modernization: Faster Processing, Reduced Backlogs

Performance Measure 7 commits the agency to reducing pending intake inventory by 2% per year from the FY 2025 baseline and decreasing intake processing time by 10% by FY 2030 through “technological solutions to improve and expand accessibility to intake services.”

Faster intake means charges will move through the system more quickly. Employers should ensure their internal processes for responding to EEOC charges can keep pace. The days of relying on EEOC backlogs to buy time may be numbered.

Strategic Goal II: Outreach and Training — Expanding the Agency’s Reach

Strategic Goal II reflects the EEOC’s statutory obligation to educate the public and the employer community about employment discrimination laws. To put the agency’s footprint in perspective: in FY 2025, the EEOC provided free training to more than 231,000 individuals at over 2,000 events, fee-based training to nearly 19,700 individuals at over 260 events, and conducted over 450 federal sector outreach and training events reaching more than 23,000 federal employees and EEO professionals. The Plan includes four performance measures designed to expand and sharpen this already-considerable operation.

A. Tracking Whether Outreach Leads to Charges

Performance Measure 8 is perhaps the most significant outreach metric in the Plan. Beginning in FY 2026, the EEOC will implement technological changes to its charge management system to track whether a charging party learned about their right to file a charge from an EEOC outreach or training event.  From FY 2027 through FY 2030, the agency will implement three “innovative outreach strategies” to reach individuals — “particularly vulnerable workers and those in underserved communities” — who are unaware of their rights.

If the agency can demonstrate that outreach events are generating charges, expect outreach funding and activity to increase.

B. Expanding Partnerships and Events

Performance Measure 9 sets specific annual targets for increasing outreach and training events with new agency partners.  The agency will assess its current partnerships and identify industries and geographic areas that would benefit from expanded outreach.

This is a double-edged sword. On one hand, more employer-facing outreach means more opportunities to learn about compliance obligations before problems arise. On the other, the Plan’s emphasis on “broad awareness of agency enforcement efforts” suggests outreach will also serve as a deterrence tool.  Employers should take advantage of EEOC training opportunities, as attendance at EEOC events can build institutional knowledge and demonstrate good faith compliance efforts.

C. Updated Training Materials

Performance Measure 10 commits the agency to reviewing and updating at least two resource documents per year beginning in FY 2027, with a focus on plain language and user-friendly formats.

Updated EEOC guidance documents, even sub-regulatory ones, often signal the agency’s current enforcement thinking. Employers and their counsel should monitor new and revised EEOC publications closely, as they may preview the agency’s litigation theories and compliance expectations.

D. Federal Sector Stakeholder Engagement

Performance Measure 11 establishes a comprehensive stakeholder engagement measurement system for the EEOC’s Education Consortium (EdCon), which has grown to include more than 2,000 registered federal employees. While EdCon is focused on the federal sector, the training content and best practices it promotes often influence private sector expectations as well.

Strategic Goal III: Organizational Excellence — People, Technology, and Budget Discipline

Strategic Goal III addresses the agency’s internal operations. While these measures may appear less directly relevant to employers, several have practical implications that should not be overlooked.

A. Staffing: 95% of Authorized Levels and Faster Hiring

Performance Measure 12 requires the agency to maintain staffing at 95% or more of its FTE baseline, with a focus on mission-critical occupations including investigators, trial attorneys, and ADR mediators. The agency also commits to reducing its time-to-hire below the government-wide benchmark of 80 days. The final Plan adds explicit reference to the agency’s Merit Promotion/Hiring Plan and Attorney Hiring Plan as tools for filling these positions.

A fully staffed EEOC is a more active EEOC. The Plan’s emphasis on filling investigator and trial attorney positions signals that the agency expects to maintain or increase its enforcement tempo. Employers should not assume that budget constraints or staffing shortages will slow the agency’s enforcement activity.

B. Workforce Development and Leadership Pipeline

Performance Measures 13 and 14 focus on building a more capable and better-trained workforce through in-person training and leadership programs. A better-trained EEOC workforce, particularly investigators and trial attorneys, translates into more sophisticated enforcement. Employers should expect EEOC staff to be increasingly well-prepared in their interactions, and should ensure their own counsel and HR teams are equally equipped.

C. Stakeholder Satisfaction and Technology Improvements

Performance Measure 15 commits the agency to conducting post-service feedback surveys with a goal of improving satisfaction scores by 5% annually and introduces quarterly evaluation of satisfaction scores in the final Plan. Performance Measure 16 requires the agency to implement at least two technology-driven operational improvements per year through FY 2030.

The EEOC is investing in modernizing its operations and measuring how stakeholders, including employers, experience the agency’s services. Employers who interact with the EEOC through intake, mediation, or investigation should expect process changes and may have opportunities to provide feedback.

D. Budget Discipline

Performance Measure 17 requires that 90% of program areas meet their respective operating budgets annually and ties budget requests to operational priorities. Budget discipline means the agency is focused on doing more with what it has. Combined with the staffing and technology measures, this suggests an agency that is trying to become leaner and more efficient, rather than one that is pulling back.

The Volume Problem: Why Resources Matter

One data point in the Plan deserves special attention. During FY 2023–2025, the EEOC received an annual average of approximately 86,000 private sector charges, about 19,000 more charges per year compared to the prior three-year period.

This volume increase, which is roughly a 28% jump in private sector charges, is occurring against a backdrop of an agency with approximately 1,700 employees across headquarters and 53 field offices. The Plan’s emphasis on strategic resource allocation, charge prioritization through the Priority Charge Handling Procedures (PCHP), and alignment with the NEP is a direct response to this capacity challenge.

The EEOC cannot investigate every charge with equal intensity. The PCHP and NEP together determine which charges receive priority attention. Employers facing charges that align with NEP priorities – DEI-related discrimination, religious accommodation, national origin discrimination involving visa holders – should expect more aggressive and better-resourced investigations. Charges that fall outside NEP priorities may receive less attention, but employers should not assume they will be ignored.

External Factors: What Could Change the Equation

The Plan also identifies four categories of external factors that could affect implementation:

  • Budgetary Factors: The Plan “assumes no significant funding fluctuations,” but funding cuts would slow implementation.
  • Demographic and Economic Factors: Economic downturns, large-scale layoffs, immigration, and public health threats could trigger surges in charge filings that strain agency capacity.
  • Technological Factors: The “rapid growth of generative AI” will “impact how applicants apply for jobs, how employers screen job applicants, and how the agency performs many of its functions.” Cybersecurity requirements and mobile technology demands will also affect agency infrastructure planning.

For employers, the AI reference is particularly noteworthy. While AI is not a standalone enforcement priority in the NEP, the Strategic Plan identifies generative AI as a significant external factor affecting both employer practices and agency operations. Employers using AI in hiring and employment decisions should not assume the EEOC has lost interest in this area — it may simply be approaching it through different channels.

Implications for Employers

For employers, the Strategic Plan is a “be on the lookout” document. Read together with the NEP, it points to an EEOC that is trying to move faster, monitor resolutions more closely, and focus its resources on higher-impact matters. Employers should consider what that means in practical terms: charges that align with agency priorities may receive more focused attention; resolutions may increasingly include policy, training, monitoring, and reporting components; and agreements to resolve charges and lawsuits may be subject to more consistent follow-up.

The Plan also signals that the EEOC is investing in the infrastructure behind enforcement — staffing, technology, outreach, guidance, and performance tracking. Employers should watch for updated EEOC guidance, annual performance reports, and enforcement activity in areas where outreach, intake modernization, systemic investigations, or AI-related employment practices intersect with their operations. In short, the Strategic Plan is not just an internal agency roadmap; it is a useful preview of where employer-facing pressure points may surface over the next five years.

We will continue to monitor the EEOC’s implementation of both the Strategic Plan and the NEP and will update this space as developments warrant.