| Comment Number: | OL-10504626 |
| Received: | 3/9/2005 9:19:29 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:
In Section 9901.406, paragraph b, it said that supervisors and managers would communicate performance expectations to the employees. What is not clear from that part is how supervisors should communicate. Is e-mailing the list of performance expectations to employees sufficient to satisfy the requirement of communication? I don’t think so. I think that unless employees ask otherwise, supervisors and managers should make effort to make real communication by having a face-to-face meeting with employees along with the opportunity for the employees to ask questions and to clarify the ambiguous statements of performance expectations. Moreover, if employees have disabilities that require reasonable accommodations, the supervisors and managers must make the accommodations. .................... You may think that it is not necessary to clarify the meaning of communication in the regulations. This is not as easy as it looks. Communication means different things for supervisors, managers, and employees. What supervisor thinks is communication may be different from what employee thinks is communication. .................... As the saying goes, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. If supervisor invests merely one or two hours in face-to-face meeting with employees so that the clear, real communication can occur, many days of misunderstandings and miscommunication during the year can be easily avoided. Certainly, you want to encourage that. You should put it in writing (read: regulations). .................... Some employees, because of past experiences, may not need to have face-to-face meeting and may be satisfied with e-mail or paper describing the performance expectations. In this case, they can waive the requirement to have face-to-face meeting. .................... I should emphasize that some employee need reasonable accommodations due to their disabilities. The supervisors and managers must always provide reasonable accommodations. Your regulations should mention it explicitly. .................... I am very pleased that you take the courage to transform the personnel system. The current personnel system can’t sustain our future. It has to be transformed or we will suffocate and die in our own bureaucracy. I read some of the comments that were submitted to your website. It is very dismaying to see some people vehemently oppose the new personnel system. They should look in the mirror and see that the current personnel system has its own problems. Yet, they don’t give anything to improve or transform the system. They are dinosaur and they should be ashamed of themselves. I hope that you will continue the transformation in spite of their opposition. .................... I also read some other comments. They raise some good questions and you should make effort to answer all of them. One issue that bothers me is favoritism. Some of these comments mentioned the problem of favoritism. It is a recurring problem. I even witnessed it several times during my 20-year career with U.S. Army. I don’t think that any system will be immune to favoritism. So, my question is: How do you prevent favoritism in the new system? One possible way is to have an independent inspector just like inspector general that every major base has. That way, employees may report favoritism to the independent inspector without the fear of being reprised. I don’t know if this will work. In any way, the problem of favoritism can’t be ignored at all. If it is left unchecked, all your efforts in transforming personnel system will be futile. .................... Thank you for giving us the opportunity to make comments. .................... Sincerely, .................... Joseph Pietro Riolo riolo@voicenet.com .................... Public domain notice: I disclaim all copyright in this comment and hereby dedicate the entirety of this comment to the public domain.