Comment Number: EM-022885
Received: 3/16/2005 10:03:27 PM
Subject: Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, Request for Comment
Title: National Security Personnel System
CFR Citation: 5 CFR Chapter XCIX and Part 9901
No Attachments

Comments:

March 16, 2005 DoD NSPS Comments , DoD NSPS Comments: As a DOD employee with 29 years of service, I find that DOD?s use of the buzz words ?National Security? to take away the rights of dedicated DOD employees and their representatives quite disgusting and shameful. It disgraces the freedoms that our county strives to promote throughout the world. It is quite obvious that these new regulations are meant to take what little hard earned rights that DOD employees and their representatives have now and put all the power in the ?EXCLUSIVE & UNREVIEWABLE DISCRETION? hands of DOD management under the guise of ?National Security? How can the new rules even be properly reviewed and commented on when there are so many unknowns in the document. There are approximately ONE HUNDRED AND THREE (103) significant areas within this document in which DOD is not telling us the specifics like who/what/where/when, or how, a situation or procedure will be handled. Instead of telling employees now, when they and their representatives can comment, DOD has chosen to hide the specifics by stating that the specifics of the actual rules ?WILL?, or ?MAY?, be prescribed in ?IMPLEMENTING ISSUANCES? at a later date and they will decide if they have to discus it with us or our representatives at that time. IS THIS HOW THEN PLAN TO GET IT THOUGH CONGRESSIONAL REVIEW?? I?m amazed at the arrogance of DOD management in thinking that only they are competent enough to deal with so called ?national security issues? as it supposedly relates to DOD employees. Why is it necessary is create a another high paid executive board (appointed lackey?s cleverly called the ?National Security Labor Relations Board)? and their associated staffs at tax payers expense? Employee issues are the exactly the same for all FEDERAL agencies; this bull crap of using national security BUZZ WORDS to create a special board for DOD is a big waste of taxpayer dollars. Leave it to DOD to spend millions of taxpayer dollars to reinvent the wheel. What?s specifically is wrong with using the currently established EXECUTIVE boards (Federal Labor Relations Board and the Merit System Protection Board). Why is it necessary to give DOD veto power over the decisions of the FLRA or MSPB; can any specific cases be cited that show DOD managers make better decisions than they do. This DOD board can be equated to the fox watching the hen house, and it?s the employees who are the ones who will be eaten........ My biggest issue with this whole matter is pay. Pay for performance is a good concept, but I DON?T trust management. There is no way you can control or get rid of manager ?biases? and their fraternization with their subordinates, no matter how much you spend on training, we are all humans, and we all have biases. Also managers appear protect there managers; so how is DOD going to protect employees from poor managers when you are taking are rights away? I see manager bias and fraternization with other employees as a major problem now, and it will only get worse under pay for performance, how are you going to control it? I go to work to do a job and earn my pay, not to be a buddy or (excuse my language) kiss ass with my boss. I have no problem respectfully disagreeing with my boss now, but under pay for performance, that may have to change if I want to ever get a raise or even not loose pay. Is that what DOD wants, yes men/women who only want to please their manager, or do they want employees who can think for themselves and are willing to challenge management when they are wrong. I bet you wont see very many executive secretaries or as they like to call them now ?Administrative Assistants? that wont get a pay raise and bonus every year and most managers will surely get theirs. How is DOD going to make sure the funding to give pay raises and bonuses get down to the lower levels, and not kept in the head-sheds to pay off all highly pay executives who come up with idiotic systems like the one your presenting to us now. There are some problems with the current regulations, but most of the problems stem from lazy managers who don?t do their jobs now; why doesn?t DOD recognize that fact. If the current managers can?t manage employees under the current system, they sure are not going to be able to work under this convoluted regulation that the elite of DOD and OPM have created. The biggest lie in this whole process is that DOD can?t discipline or get rid of per performers. This only happens when DOD managers are NOT DOING THEIR JOB?s, it?s not because of the current rules, it?s because managers either don?t, or will not, follow the regulations. It the same thing automatic pay raises. We have PAY-FOR-PERFORMANCE now -a poor employee only gets that raise if the DOD manager doesn?t do the proper paperwork to stop it. Now those same DOD managers are going to have control over everybody?s pay. I find that this to be a very scary and I?m glad I?m close to retirement age. For every poor performer that is allowed to get a pay raise and/or isn?t gotten rid of, there is a poor performing manager and a manager?s manager responsible. Why hasn?t DOD and OPM recognized this FACT? The NSPS as it is being presented to the public now is a big boondoggle with only one major goal in mind; to break the unions and turn the civilian workforce in to a quasi-military force that DOD management can yank around at will with no recourse. With only DOD?s personally hand selected lackey?s having review authority over the so called ?IMPLEMENTING ISSUANCES? issued under DOD?s ?EXCLUSIVE & UNREVIEWABLE DISCRETION? which will be only used to further the erosion of employees and their representatives rights until they have no rights at all. It appears that DOD wholes all the aces in this game, and even have a couple extra up their sleeve to sock to us later on. DOD CIVILIANS HAVE WORKED HARD TO KEEP THIS COUNTY FREE - WE SHOULDN?T HAVE TO LOOSE OUR RIGHTS IN ORDER TO KEEP OUR JOBS AND PAY UNDER THE GUISE OF NATIONAL SECURITY! DOD and OPM needs to wake up - the Unions have a major role to play, they help keep incompetent management in line - and they don?t harm national security, they enhance it. Sincerely,