Comment Number: OL-10510117
Received: 3/16/2005 4:35:27 AM
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:

I am a career DoD employee with over 20 years' service in DoD and other Federal agencies. I am cautiously optimistic about the proposed National Security Personnel System (NSPS) as I support, in theory, the pay-for-performance concept. Only twice in my career have I received a rating less than outstanding or excellent, yet I feel the current system does not adequately reward high performers. Used judiciously and wisely, the pay bands could potentially offer better rewards to high performers. I also agree, to a certain extent, that the labor-management relations process (5 USC Chap. 71) needs to be modernized. I do not believe that DoD must negotiate with hundreds of local union chapters; instead, national-level negotiations should be sufficient. The current process is highly inefficient in this regard. However, the one thing that bothers me about NSPS is the potential for encouraging favoritism and politics (office, not partisan) in order to get ahead in the new system. There are some good leaders in Federal offices; however, they tend to be outnumbered by the hacks who got promoted because they had friends in the right places. If all Federal supervisors and managers had the wisdom and integrity of, let's say, King Solomon, then I wouldn't be concerned. However, given the chance, many Federal supervisors would love to be like Donald Trump and simply be able to say You're Fired! on a whim. (On the other hand, even The Apprentice displays a certain amount of due process before Mr. Trump gets to say You're Fired! Also, he does seem to observe some fixed rules in order to be fair to all the candidates, even when he might want to discard those rules.) Even good performers like myself feel somewhat threatened by the proposed rules, because we've been there when we've had a hack for a supervisor, and only the civil service rules kept us from being fired or demoted just because the hack did not like you. Of course, we couldn't get promoted, and they could reassign you somewhere else, provided they had the (PCS) money to do so. Due process in the Federal civil service exists for a reason. It's there to prevent, or at least reduce, some of management's excesses brought on by fiscal, social, political or other pressures. In order for government to perform its oversight duties over the private sector (given to it by our society), government itself first has a duty to set some sort of example, hopefully a good one, as an employer. Many would argue that government has been lacking in setting a good example as an employer, even with the civil service protections in effect today. When I've been in favor with the regime in place at the time, life's been good. When I've been out of favor, life has not been so great. It's not that my overall performance changed, but rather, the people evaluating it had. No matter how well intentioned a new personnel system is, it will be only as good as the people who run the system, and many of them will find ways to go around it to do what they want to do. (They already do that now.) I believe that supervisors and managers, including military personnel who supervise civilians, will need a lot of training and guidance to be able to effectively and fairly exercise their increased authority and responsibility given to them by NSPS. I also believe that Congress and the courts will have to provide additional oversight over DoD to ensure that management does not unnecessarily trample employees' rights as DoD rushes to create NSPS.