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Return to Article: Air Force contracts out training for new personnel system

• 14894
  

  Yeah, that will work!

  Just like TQM, six sigma, etc., some of the concepts may be OK, but soon as the training is over it's business as usual. Outsourced and online training? They don't even have the guts to meet us face to face. The whole NSPS is a total insult to us who have served our country with honor. Three more years of the unholy trinity, but their damage will last many years to come.

  Yeah that will work!

  Give me a break!! Posted February 15, 2006 11:24 AM
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  As quoted in this article "This could include extra recognition, in place of a requested pay raise. Many of the techniques are drawn from the best seller Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In by Roger Fisher and William Ury (Penguin Books, 1991)"

  I provide the same techniques in my USAF Supervisor's Course. Perhaps I need to boost my cost from a couple of thousand dollars per class to 24 million! I agree with most of the postings, as usual the Air Force has put the cart before the horse in implementing its changes. Sounds like the "good ole boy" system in acquiring contracts is still alive and well in DoD! Verses going for the best value! Retired Vet - Small Business Owner

  GovExec.com reader Posted January 21, 2006 8:57 PM
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  We would be far better off if the $24 million were placed into the pay pool and distributed in the system rather than train these incompetent supervisors who only will reward the people they like and that do not cause them any trouble. The ones that do a good job are overlooked because they have no problems and do what is right, not what is desired by the higher ups with political agendas!

  Taxpayer Posted January 6, 2006 7:20 AM
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  I'm an A&P and I'd rather have a mechanic work slow, follow the manual, and do excellent work than take short cuts to get the job done quickly. You can't just pull your plane over to the nearest cloud for roadside assistance if something goes wrong. Likewise, beware of "trainers" who make suggestions such as teaming an excellent mechanic with a "more efficient" one. Unless these trainers know what the job entails, they can be doing more damage than good with their suggestions. I think the Army has its act together by training internally. The Air Force, as usual, doesn't know what it's doing and is looking for the easy way out.

  GovExec.com reader Posted December 22, 2005 5:32 PM
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  Well, so much for the years-long and often parroted statements and assurances that emanated from the NSPS public relations/marketing/dogma office about their lip service assurances concerning the vital role that training will play in the proposed NSPS. Now enters truth: 8 hours or 1-day of outsourced contractor-provided "training" will equip Air Force managers so they can educate and gain buy-in from staff about the proposed NSPS, a proposed personnel and labor relations system that can legitimately claim at most single digit support among the federal workforce, or at least the federal workforce (staff and management) that are not among the organizational toadies and sycophants who are merely and opportunistically posturing and providing lip service about the so-called support/need/welcome that will await the proposed NSPS. The unvarnished plain truth of the matter is that nearly everyone, or at least nearly everyone who has looked at this proposal objectively and has had ample and requisite federal, and especially DoD workforce experience, and as a result knows how to differentiate between reality and mere theoretical Pollyanna-ish-based hogwash, has concluded that the proposed NSPS, if effected, will stand the merit systems principles and any semblance of genuine meritocracy in the federal workforce on their respective heads.

  Michael J. Smith Posted December 22, 2005 11:27 AM
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  Pathetic. Amusing. Not surprising!

  GovExec.com reader Posted December 22, 2005 10:06 AM
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  It's perfect! Now they don't have to tell any employee anything about the system until the last possible second! Not even supervisors!

  GovExec.com reader Posted December 22, 2005 7:40 AM
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  This represents $24 million of my money that is a total waste! This simply is a cover expenditure designed to have the Air Force say that all supervisors have been trained in the new personnel system. Most of the supervisors are military and will move in less than two years so the training has to be continual to be effective in knowing that all supervisors have been trained. Training is the answer to everything in the services but it never works. There is no accountability for supervisors to manage their people effectively. Managers are expected to produce output not through their people but by themselves. My supervisors provide all kinds of schedules to everyone in the Air Force and DoD and then leave. I get asked about the schedules and that is the first time I even know they exist!

  Management of people working for the Air Force is so very, very basic that it is ineffective and results in a labor force that is never used to its potential, a lack of individual determination other than to get the next grade, and a group that never wants to work on anything because everything is important (which means nothing is important).

  In the financial area the staff is composed of do nothing people who are totally untrained for their positions. They are masters at shifting their work to other areas because they cannot perform. How can you have a high school graduate in charge of financial policy (below the SES level) and ever expect to see anything of value or to pass the red light green light game of government. We need red lights and green lights because of the incompetent nature of those involved that they will not understand words of shades of gray.

  Now we have a new pay system that is pure crap. The only thing this new system does is to make the illegal personnel practices of the past legal in the future! Now the political appointees have a mechanism to make people do as the political appointees desire and no one to tell them they are wrong. This new system eliminates the basis of civil service and makes the entire executive branch politically oriented rather than focusing on the American public or congressional desires.

  Taxpayer Posted December 22, 2005 6:54 AM
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  Can someone tell me why the Air Force had to contract NSPS for supervisors? It sounds like a dramatic waste of money considering our command has gone around and said local civilian personnel will teach the course for everyone and provide the answers to our questions.

  Somewhere in the Pacific Posted December 21, 2005 7:42 PM