Return to Article: Pentagon stands ground on personnel reforms
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14212
Geez. Would ya'll like a little cheese with that whine? Wah, wah, wah. Wipe the tears and produce. Maybe it will be more like private industry. You have an opportunity to be a little more productive on the job. Get to work, and stop crying! If it wasn't for the unions supporting lazy workers camping out on the job, you wouldn't have this problem. I am too busy working to worry about that crap. I have a few campers who might be looking for another job. Paybacks are hell.
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13284
The embrace of the system Mr. England is talking about is a strangle hold on the necks of the civilian employees in DOD.
By the way folks, when Bush is out of office Mr. England will also be gone. What he says to the press is what keeps his paycheck coming.
We call that "bought and paid for" where I come from.
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13256
The first lesson I learned in my DoD civil service career is this: if you don't get it up front, don't count on it!!! And yet, they keep trying to recruit promising new college graduates at less than market rate by telling a GS-5 or GS-7 that they have the potential to go up to GS-12. Each SF-50 says your next promotion is when you are eligible and at management discretion. However, what they don't say, is if you work for a despotic jerk, which the civil service is full of, or someone in personnel doesn't like you and sits on your paperwork, don't count on getting timely promotions to the next level. The smart ones leave after a few years, even after getting the 12.
Looking back, I don't know why I took a GS-4 position that paid two-thirds what I was making in private industry. I know. Someone whispered in my ear that I would be promoted. I saw lots of people that were not in the boy's club stagnate with nothing but their step increases and COLAs to look forward to. I soon became one of them after I topped out.
So, assuming I'm on the same page as anyone else that has been in the government, why would anybody agree to relinquish an almost sure thing (like step increases and COLAS) for no virtually no guarantees that they will ever see an increase again when the administrative pool hasn't changed?
Signed, Retired and Off the Payroll
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13130
When was the last time Navy Secretary Gordon England was tested for drug usage? No one in his or her right mind will embrace NSPS because DOD doesn't have a clue as to how to manage this system or meet the requirement of continuously training rotating military supervisors.
NSPS is just a way to hold down the expense of civilian salaries, which directly affects retirement annuities when the highest consecutive three years of earnings are averaged. It's a shame that those folks caught in the middle of their pay scale will never see the annuities they thought they would receive at retirement when their step increases are tossed into the crapper.
It wasn't enough that those same CSRS civilians who might also be entitled to Social Security benefits have to watch their Social Security benefits gutted because they are not allowed to fully collect on two or more government pension systems like the military can. Now their CSRS retirement package is also being gutted.
If this is such an excellent system, why doesn't DOD also include the military in NSPS like they did in the TSP? This would eliminate their longevity-based salary increases, and cut their expected retirement incomes, too. The more the merrier on this sinking ship.
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13122
So, despite approximately 78 percent of respondents being against the change, DoD is proceeding. Once again, Rumsfeld is failing to listen to the experts (those of us in the trenches) and is going to do whatever he wants. It isn't a fear of change; most of us old timers have survived more changes in our careers than we can count. It's simply that we don't trust Rumsfeld or this administration to do what's in our best interests, especially when it comes down to being able to provide for our families and plan our retirement futures. 437 pages to say what we already know: Management will have too much power, labor will have too little power, and Rummy will make up the details as we go along, so just suck it up.
9 Years, 10 Months and 3 Days
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13119
England said, "The vast majority of our people will embrace NSPS."
How does he arrive at that conclusion? During the woefully inadequate comment period, judging from the numbers stated in the article, 77.8 percent of comments (yes, that's more than three fourths) expressed "general opposition" to the system (it is not noted whether specific opposition was treated separately). And since then, DoD's refusal or inability to provide any meaningful information to employees eroded trust that was already pretty much nonexistent. Unless there have been drastic, sweeping changes in both the NSPS regulations and DoD's method of communicating them, there is no chance of employees "embracing" the system. Does this statement indicate that England is enthusiastic about the changes made, or that he's completely disconnected from reality?
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13118
Gordon England must've done a lot of drugs as a young man...he's obviously delusional. It's amazing to me that all of these political appointees think they know what us career civil servants will like. It's obvious they have never seen the good old boy/good old girl network at work on the bases I've worked at, as well as the nepotism. He should be required to spend months on a real base and actually talk to those to be affected by this stupid, management friendly system. Lord, I wish I could retire.
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13116
NSPS will be reversed by the next administration, but not before King George and Rummy cause great harm to the current workers in the DoD. The managers are not up to the task of running the current GS system, so how could anyone believe they could handle one which requires actual management skills? What a crock!
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13114
Sounds just like what happened when DHS came up with the "MAX HR" personnel reforms. Employees who took the time to comment during the public comment period were virtually ignored. If employees who have years on the job experience offer useful suggestions and comments, why not consider using them, rather than ignoring them? It might actually help these departments to better accomplish their missions in the years ahead. Unfortunately, the reality is that the so-called managers of these departments think that they know what is best for everyone else, and ignore other opinions. What arrogance!
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