| Comment Number: | OL-10511464 |
| Received: | 3/16/2005 3:38:22 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:
I am a civil servant with 25 years of service. I am a dedicated and loyal employee and I work very hard to support my country. I have made many sacrifices in my personal life to ensure my job is accomplished. I have been relocated because my previous installation was closed by BRAC. Now, the government that I trusted with my career, is trying to take very important privileges from me by implementing the National Security Personnel System (NSPS). When I was sworn into the civil service, I entered into a contract with the federal government. I was told of the federal government's regulations regarding pay and pay increases, retirement, annual and sick leave, and employee rights. You are now trying to break that contract. If you are going to implement this system, please consider grandfathering those employees currently working under the current civil service plan. New government employees would come to work knowing they will be under the NSPS. But don't punish those of us who have dedicated so much of our lives to our government. As long as supervisors are humans with personalities, your pay for performance system cannot, and will not, ever be fair. I am an excellent worker, but I am still considered an outsider at this installation because I came here on priority placement from a BRAC installation. The fact is that many times performance is based on management or the supervisor's opinion, not on best performance. This is not a problem caused by our current pay system but more by a lack of accountability by our management and supervisors. The new pay system will have little, if any, effect on the good leaders who give good ratings to good performers and bad ratings to bad performers. But it will be a great tool for the poor managers and supervisors. And, it will force workers to compete with one another for pay raises, which will destroy teamwork, increase conflict among employees, and reward short-term outcomes. This system will create a situation in which workers are in conflict with one another and afraid to speak out about harassment, violations of the law, and workplace safety problems. NSPS isn't going to solve the problems, it will only compound them and create more injustice and distrust within the federal workforce. If you really want to improve government, the first step is to improve leadership... not just by holding them accountable, but by holding them to a higher standard. How can I feel secure about my salary in the future? How can I feel secure about my work schedule, my employee rights, or my retirement? How can I feel secure that I'll even have a job? But most of all, how can I feel protected when our country's leaders think NSPS is a good thing???? I totally oppose the implementation of NSPS and I urge you to act to instruct the Secretary of Defense to halt any further development of NSPS unless and until the Pentagon is willing to substantively address the issues raised by DoD workers.