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TOPICS
Managers called key to successful performance pay systems
The success of performance-based pay systems ultimately rests with federal managers who will evaluate their employees, a senior official Office of Personnel Management said Tuesday.
Administration officials plan to begin implementing performance-based pay systems in the Defense and Homeland Security departments this year, and hope to extend the arrangements to cover most federal civilian employees.
According to Ronald Sanders, OPM associate director for human resources management, the federal government's personnel system is outdated and must be transformed to defend the country. Sanders spoke at the Federal Managers Association's national convention in Arlington, Va.
Lawmakers allowed Defense and Homeland Security officials to reform their personnel systems and performance pay is only one part of that overhaul. In their current form, the proposed Pentagon reforms would allow most civilian defense employees to continue to join unions, but an alternative system would be established for employees to contract with a union for temporary representation. Some Defense employees -- including accountants, intelligence personnel and attorneys -- would not be allowed to join unions. Additionally, Defense managers would be able to waive collective bargaining during national security emergencies and for personnel changes that they decide are insignificant.
DHS officials have proposed to allow more flexibility in workforce management, lower the standard of proof for disciplinary actions and streamline the appeals process. Federal workers unions have opposed both personnel overhauls, but they have saved the most vitriolic criticism for the Pentagon plan.
One conference participant said many federal civilian employees are concerned that civil servants with personal connections to management will garner the largest pay raises.
Preferential treatment is perhaps the "greatest fear," Sanders said, for employees as the government adopts performance pay principles. He said the federal government would spend "millions on training" to avoid the problem and "we're just going to have to pay a lot of attention to that."
Sanders argued that the current General Schedule pay system also contains examples of favoritism. He acknowledged that federal workers are concerned about bias, but he criticized the American Federation of Government Employees for harping on the danger of preferential treatment in the new system. Federal officials have been meeting with union leaders to gather input on the personnel overhauls, but Sanders implied that unions have been stubborn and unhelpful during efforts to implement performance pay.
"If I hear [AFGE President] John Gage use the word crony one more time, I'm going to leap across the table at him," Sanders said.
A senior Democratic lawmaker speaking at the same conference predicted that the proposed personnel reforms would only hurt federal workers. Rep. Danny Davis, D-Ill., a member of the Government Reform Committee, said that he fears many reforms are designed to replace federal workers with outside contractors -- potentially contractors with ties to the White House.
"If this is how President Bush thanks federal employees for working longer hours, then I say, don't do federal employees any more favors," Davis said.
COMMENTS
- I'v been a fed gov. employee for more than 10 years. I worked (prior)in the private sector for many more. It is very common to hear people in this same boat to say "if the government was a private company, it would have gone out of business long ago!" I have worked for several supervisors/managers and cannot believe the incompetence! How is it possible for an incompetent leader to make things better in an organization? It's not. The only way to make the necessary changes is to "clean house" beginning with managers & supervisors. I agree with the person above who said we need independant and non-biased evaluators(analysts)to start the process. Also, something that works at private companies, is an opinion survey. Ask employees questions like "How well does your boss do his/her job?". Are they competent? What things would help you do a better job? This survey should be done in a non threatening way for the employees. Such as a suggestion or ballot type box. There is definately incompetance throughout the gov. and insubordinates are not exempt. But if the leaders are so incompetant as to not know what a good employee is, you'll never achieve a good workforce without replacing bad managers first. GovExec.com reader Posted July 17, 2005 12:22 PM
- I am inclined to agree that the new system is going to make it easier for bad managers to continue to a bad job of managing. While we are talking about making it easier to manage people and to promote good workers then maybe we need people outside of the departments to make these decisions. We have recently had a supervisor removed for sending a questionable email to some of the women in the department. However the deputy department head has had cases of sexual harassment of employees five times brought against him and his records disappear and he gets four days off without pay Saturday thru Tuesday. These types of incidents happen across the government every day. And a new system is not going to fix it. It will only allow the same things to continue. The system must hold all in the system responsible for what they say and do. Then force the system to make the decision makers take responsibility for what they say and do. The simple fact of the matter is that as long as we allow managers to play favorites and promote cronies to protect themselves from down stream embarrassment then no system will be fair. This also allows people to promote friends children to positions that normally are reserved for employees who have served their dues. Again with the new system as I can see will only make this situation worse. We will still have bad managers making bad decisions, and promoting those they think will protect them and not qualified people who can accomplish the job. As long as human nature is involved then we will never have a good system. I think of the old adage “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Lord Acton (1834 - 1902), 1887” GovExec.com reader Posted April 2, 2004 6:54 AM
- What a funny article. I have more than eleven years of experience defending employees against some lousy, vicious, nasty managers -- and need I say incompetent supervisors who are too busy doing program work to bother themselves with their primary role of managing their decent hard working employees and also helping decent hard working managers and supervisors remove or downgrade their lousy, vicious, nasty employees. :-) It makes me laugh when I read about pie in the sky performance management proposals from people who have never defended an employee at an oral reply on a performance removal action or crafted a PIP or Notice of Removal based on performance. You folks don't know what you are talking about. It is all about the manager being willing and able to deal with a poor performer regardless of the system in place. Making it easier for managers to remove poorly performing employees won't mean they will actually do it because it is easier to ignore the problem when you don't have time, resources, or the psychological and spiritual strength to deal with it. It's not the performance management program that is broken -- it is management supervision across the government that is broken. Today's federal manager doesn't have the time or skills to deal with their "human capital issues" and HR offices are stretched so tight that we don't have the time or resources to do the managers' job for them. Making it easier won't solve the problem. Giving managers' incentives for actually managing will solve the problem. HR Specialist GovExec.com reader Posted March 30, 2004 7:28 AM
