| Comment Number: | OL-10501139 |
| Received: | 2/23/2005 5:59:59 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:
My comment is a general concern about changing a civil service system that, although imperfect, has worked for years with limited problems. The current civil service system encourages a cooperative work environment because everyone is paid on the same graduated pay scale, which is not vulnerable to the individual subjective whims of imperfect supervisors. The current system is based on the knowledge that government employees work for the government because of a calling to "do for their country" and be a trustee of the government. Government employees do not work for the government to be excessively reimbursed and become conspicuous consumers. The mind set is different from a private sector employee who is motivated by other incentives, and the environment is different. The civil service work environment is cooperative and based on a free exchange of information to better accomplish the mission. I am concerned that in addition to changing the motivations of government employees to one of largess, we will create a competitive environment that thrives on withholding information, distorting information, overstating projected savings for an initiative, sabotaging, and committing malfeasance all for the gain of an increased salary. The private sector is ripe with these examples, and there is no place for them in civil service. In addition, there will be significant increases in the number of grievances filed, and time spent managing those grievances. I believe the ability to assign civil service employees more flexibly can be achieved without changing the current civil service pay structure and in turn eliminating the positive work environment. Special incentives pay for unique duties can be implemented similar to those used in the military. The proposed effort to completely do away with the civil service grade structure and pay scale is likely to produce poor results for the reasons discussed above. These poor results are predictable; therefore, when the poor results occur, they will not be able to be considered unintended consequences, as unintended consequences are by definition not predictable. If the civil service grade structure and pay scale is eliminated, I predict that a civil service overhaul will occur within 20-30 years to correct the mistakes made by overzealously applying private sector concepts to a work environment not easily understood by private sector employees.