Report shows mixed progress on federal employee job satisfaction

Federal employees are more satisfied with their pay than they were in the late 1980s, but they lack confidence that they will be treated fairly and that managers will make good use of their skills, according to a new report from the Merit Systems Protection Board.

"Gains in pay satisfaction and willingness to recommend federal employment have not been matched by gains in the areas of job satisfaction, skills utilization, or adequacy of training and resources," MSPB leaders wrote in the report, which relied on data from eight merit principles surveys conducted between 1983 and 2007. "Meaningful and fulfilling work should be a hallmark of federal employment… it appears that, from an employee perspective, expertise is frequently underutilized or underdeveloped."

In 1989, 28 percent of federal employees told MSPB that they were happy with their pay, and by 2005 that figure had risen to 60 percent. Satisfaction grew despite the fact that during the 25-year period of the surveys, the percentage of white-collar workers paid under the General Schedule or a similar traditional pay system fell 20 points.

The percentage of federal employees who said they would recommend the government as an employer also rose between 1989 and 2005, from 49 percent to 76 percent. Only 66 percent said they would recommend their specific agency as a place to work, however.

That gap between how federal employees rated their agencies and the government as a whole might stem from some of the negative experiences they reported with managers, balanced against generally positive views of governmentwide pay and benefits.

In 2005, 68 percent of federal workers said their position made good use of their skills and abilities. Only 54 percent said their opinions counted on the job. Sixty-eight percent said they had a high opinion of their manager's technical ability, but only 55 percent said they thought their supervisor had strong management skills.

Also in 2005, 30 percent of survey respondents said they thought their manager dealt effectively with underperformers. Twenty-two percent said they had little or no trust in their manager to rate applicants effectively, 41 percent said they had little or no trust that their managers would set pay appropriately and 45 percent said they had little or no faith in their manager's ability to make good decisions regarding adverse actions.

The report cautioned that employees were far more likely to express distrust of actions they did not understand, and urged agencies to balance the need to protect employee privacy with better efforts to explain the basis for decisions. Survey results from 2000 to 2005 showed that up to 25 percent of employees' job satisfaction was traceable to their relationship with their managers, making it especially important to improve those ties.

"Our research has shown that many new federal employees first learned of their job through a friend or relative, often one currently employed with the organization," the report said. "Thus, employee satisfaction (or dissatisfaction) can have consequences that extend beyond the immediate work unit. Employees' willingness to recommend the federal government or their agency as a place to work can directly affect an agency's recruitment efforts, the quality of the resulting applicant pool and the acceptance of employment offers."