Return to Article: Pay reform, recruiting cited as top personnel challenges
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43999
If management is so set on pushing for the NSPS, have all new hires go under this systme or have a choice between the GS or NSPSsystme. Those of us theat are so near retirement, should not have to be forced to go the NSPS system. There is a whole lot of training and bugs that need to worked out. With theis new system, also, is the fact when employees will move onto a new position so as to not miss out on their share of the performance award. I have not seen an improvement in the time it takes to get an employee on board.
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29626
The possibility of grandfathering the GS system versus the implementation of NSPS appears on the surface to be a possibility until one looks further at the primary tenets of the NSPS.
While I'm personally convinced that the prospect of saving money and removing (relatively) automatic pay raises (in the form of step increases) is a major factor in the push for NSPS; I'm equally sure that the personnel controls, deployability, and resizing portions of the new program, including the lessened strength of the union are causing upper management to salivate like Cujo. And it's hard to imagine less strength when there are no strike capabilities.
All these parts of the puzzle give upper management a feeling of dominance over what is currently a non-political entity. If implemented, I foresee the number of firing incidents such as the current DOJ to increase and wherein the SES and political appointee positions in government and civil service have been under the current party controls for decades, the new non-pay portions of NSPS would grant that same party of power even more control. Whereas they served at the convenience and behest of the president, we serve to support and uphold the Constitution.
We must not forget that this is about reigning in a non-partisan, public service that must some times points out the illegalities of a particular party's platform. Those that feel they have a mandate or mission often hold that the end justifies the means. Well, those same means are the doctrines by which we live and do business.
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29482
I agree with the assessment that exisitng employees (>5 years of service) be kept on their existing personnel systems. Perhaps only new hires should go on NSPS. It is ridiculous to force employees with >25 years of faithful service to embrace a system that was designed for a temp workforce. I think NSPS should be isolated to the new hires if at all.
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29407
Has anyone considered the possibility of having BOTH NSPS and the current system? New hires would enter under NSPS. Personnel already on the payroll would have the option of either switching to NSPS or staying with the current system until they leave. It would be like the CSRS/FERS break. It seems like that might work better and be less painful all around.
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29375
The Federal work system is not perfect, but it is better than many and I have worked in a few. Change needs to take place within the people who are involved not the system. The biggest need I see is in the hiring practices. The system looks for college degrees, and expierence. What is missing is character. The system omits character, integrity and depth in the individual for a piece of paper and or years in the system. Our greatest federal worker Abe Lincoln did not have the piece of paper or the expierence.
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29151
One way to address retention is to provide more a more family-friendly work environment in federal agencies: flexibility with work schedules, tele-commuting, on-site childcare, etc. This would help retain many of the 30-somethings like myself who have 5-10 years of government service but are contemplating leaving for some segments of the private sector where it's easier to balance work and family.
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29138
The human capital or nsps as the new personnel ideas are called are actually a return the a system that existed under the GS system that everyone cries about. Step increases are not gaurenteed just as QSI's are not. Manager had the ability to idnetify and reward employees that were outstanding. However, many adopted the attitude that all of their employees could not be outstanding at the same time. The old evaluation system had five ratings, from outstanding to failure, however in their resolve for this was that employees were either acceptable or unacceptable. That made everyone feel good. Good managers and there are very few in my experience take care of all of their people. Others take the good old boy approach and reward only their chosen few whether they deserve it or not.
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28959
There is nothing wrong with the General Schedule, but there is plenty wrong with the Federal position classification/grading system; the recruiting and accessions system; and, the training performance evaluation, disciplining, and termination of employment system. The General Schedule provides employees with something that we should be valuing, "reliability." There's nothing wrong with the pay and benefits package, it's more than adequate. If the Government's CHCO think that we can compete with private industry for the "best and brightest" based on a "pay incentive model," it really doesn't know much about the nature of public service and the kind of employees the Government needs to provide the services required by it's citizens. If CHCO want to improve recruitment and retention, then it should concentrate on cutting the time from requisition to accession from its current average of 6-9 months. While they're at it, they should be investing much more effort into streamling the process for identifying and getting rid of substandard performers, as is done in private industry. Public service does not have to be an extension of the "welfare system," as it seems to have become. No one ever said that "step increases" had to be virtually automatic; QSI certainly aren't. Besides, all the "pay for performance" efforts in the world will be absolute failures if the problems classification, recruitment and discipline aren't fixed first. What really stifles, if not strangles, our CHCO ability to "get real," is the fact that they view everything through the lens of the "beltway." They need to decentralize, which, incidentally, will go a long way to relieving the "beltway" of its nasty traffic gridlock problem. Decentralize. Take advantage of the internet and other high tech systems that didn't exist, back when I entered Government.
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28937
I am glad this report can out about Human Resources Personnel lacking skills and not having a clue about pay, benefits etc. CBP Human Resources is one of the worst.
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28935
At least for employees under FERS, there is a significant reduction of the Social Security benefit for employees whose last 35 years of employment includes work outside the federal government. This powerful disincentive will make it difficult for the federal government to attract talent from private industry.
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28927
Federal Human Capital: The Perfect Storm attempts to shed some light into the thinking of a select group of chief human resource officers (CHRO) concerning how to address key workforce challenges in the federal sector. This one-sided report, while suggesting that "collaboration" is critical to achieving success, omitted an opportunity to gather useful input from democratically-elected representatives of the federal workforce. When the IRS restructured itself per the direction of Congress, labor and management engaged in cooperative processes and traditional bargaining to faclitate significant change. The current administration--through it's "management agenda" and CHCO's--continues to believe that change in human resource systems can only be accopmlished through a one-sided approach. The report issued by the Partnership for Public Service and Grant Thornton should have been called The Continuous Storm--an environment created by individuals in positions of authority who think they have all of the answers. The Continuous Storm has been at great cost to American taxpayer, and the dedicated men and women who seek to serve the public.
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28925
These "human capital chiefs" are far removed from the working folks in the federal government. They get their feed-back from lower lever managers and not from the "troops". If they want "pay for performance" and other personnel changes to work, they're going to have to swallow their pride and actually talk to the folks who are doing the work and their representatives.
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28923
It shouldnt be called pay reform. It should be called the modern version of the carrot & stick method. Thats all pay banding is. Under the current system pay raises are based on time in service, but performance evaluations are at the whim of management. It doesn't matter how good you do, if a supervisor doesn't like you, you will not get a good performance eval. With the pay banding thats proposed, now the supervisor has the power to set how much you can earn also. This is not fair to the employees who actually do the job of keeping the government operating. As far as recruitment is concerned, the process needs to be improved. It is definitely flawed. You can be an expert in a certain field, but if the hiring official wants a friend or certain co-worker to get the job, who has very little qualifications, the expert will not get the job.
Corruption, favoritism, nepotism is alive and well in the federal government and if government is going to improve, to draw in trained, qualified employees, the hiring and pay practices have to be corruption free.
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28918
GT was involved in this study. I was interviewed by someone from the Partnership for Public Service yesterday on the issue of recruitment of a "mature" workforce. Our HR Director referred me for the interview.
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28900
From what I have seen of NSPS already, we are loosing 36 employees for every 40 hired. POOR supervisors and military leadership was 78% of the reasons sited in our survey of why Miltiary Technicians are quiting.
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28890
Good morning I have read your article, but your facts are a tad bit off. There is a way for retired annuitants to be rehired and their pension is not offset, suggest you read the law again.
Have a great day.
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