Is the General Schedule a Pay for Performance System

Commenter RH wrote yesterday that he was frustrated by "All this talk of 'reform' and finding a better system - when the current GS system offers all of those capabilities THAT GO UNUSED by supervisors and managers." It's not the first time I've heard that complaint, and I'm certain it won't be the last. But I think, ultimately, it's less important to ask if the General Schedule system, as written, contains provisions to tie performance to compensation, and much more important to ask why it hasn't been enforced as a pay for performance system.

Psychology is part of it, certainly. John Berry, at our meeting with him on Wednesday, said "It deals with human nature. Parents do not like to discipline their kids. Why do we think managers like to discipline their employees?" And to overcome that natural tendency, it makes sense that managers will need substantially more training than they get now to get comfortable evaluating their employees, and good at doing it. But I'm not sure that's the entirety of the problem. And I think figuring out what happened to the General Schedule system is going to have to be the first step in any meaningful reform of the pay system.