| Comment Number: | OL-10504543 |
| Received: | 3/9/2005 4:34:58 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:
As Head of the Signal Processing Branch (AIR 4.5.14.1), Naval Air Systems Command, Patuxent River, Maryland, I have the following comments regarding the proposed NSPS system: (1) a number of high grade promotions, particularly promotion of GS-13's to GS-14's, have been granted as only temporary promotions by the Promotion Management Board within recent years. Many of these folks are senior level engineers who are running major programs that require many many years of experience; they are essentially irreplaceable in their roles. It is my concern that conversion of these employees back to a GS-13 level would result in severe losses of personnel who are both eligible to retire or who will seek Federal jobs elsewhere at that level. This will be a major problem for acceptance of this new pay system and for morale, in general. (2) The pay pool managers must be chosen at the optimum levels where the supervisors making the performance rating decisions have control over the amount of money available for distribution. For example, within the 4.5 Department, each division should receive a pool of money based on the number of folks, etc; each division should have a pay pool manager (most likely the Division Head). If the pay pool manager resides at a level higher than the division level, then there will be skewed differences in money distribution due to the difference in rating procedures used by each division. Also, pay pool managers at the division level will result in a more fair distribution of the money because the division managers and branch managers know the performance of their employees the best. (3) If we do encounter a poor performer, it is my understanding that we can also decrease their pay by up to 10%. If this is done, can the money saved be added to the pool for application to higher performers? (4) I heard that folks will be moved up to the next step at the time of conversion to NSPS if they were due to get a step increase during that calendar year; not sure if this is true or not. An alternative policy to help increase morale would be to raise everyone one step at the time of conversion; this could be perceived as a more equitable approach with implementation of an entirely new personnel system.