Re: Wrong Again

On the assumption that your comment was not meant to be satirical, here is another point of view. I have worked for the government for more than two decades. Whenever change was introduced, unions and most employees always find reasons to be against it. Not that they are against change, mind you, just that there are always many reasons to leave things the way they are. And one of the most important things not to change, is giving everyone the same pay raise each year regardless of performance. It is undoubtedly a system that would do justice to the former Soviet Union in that everyone is treated the same and introducing a performance factor has instilled fear. Not fear of change, mind you, but there are, as always, many, many reasons it won't work and we should not change the system for these many reasons.

We are kidding ourselves if we think we embrace change. Some do and often do well. Most don't embrace change. Until new people come in, that won't change. The new system needs modifications and requires training and requires a culture change. But, in the final analysis, those that have been here for years or decades are afraid of change. Denying it doesn't alter our culture.

Re: Wrong Again

Dear DOD Manager,

I have been in civil service for 25 years. My father retired out of civil service. Many of my family have or do work for civil service. In the many years of our service we have very rarely seen changes benefit the average worker.

There has been acceptance of change, (can't do much otherwise,) there has been trying to make the best of what we got, but...we do not feel like things get better, only worse.

Unfortunately we all agree that those who manage to make the best of this new system will only be able to do it at the expense of their co-workers.

I have worked with some truly great coworkers. They have consistently put out a lot of difficult and skilled work with ever decreasing resources. There have been problem-children, sure, but by-and-large I am impressed with my teammates. (Yes, I HAVE worked private, and I would have gone back but for being a CSRA.)

Yet, I fear the worst of us will be those who profit under this system.

Re: Wrong Again

The poster must be wrong. When DOD officials testified before Congress on NSPS, they said it would not impact on retirement. They also put out plenty of printed references to that.

The unions said that bonuses don't count in figuring retirement contributions. DOD didn't respond, they just kept saying that NSPS does not affect retirement.

Are you saying someone lied?

Re: Pay for performance

You seem to think that Pay for Performance will end the Good Ole Boy/Girl syndrome yet you provide no details in how it will end. If anything, NSPS provides management with more tools to manipulate the process to reduce pay and retirement benefits across the board. Personally, I think the first line supervisors will try in earnest (At First) to do the right thing, but will quicly become frustrated when their initial assessments are changed at will from higher up in order to stay withing budgets threshholds. Don't think for one minute you are not going to have some financial officer playing with the numbers to make them meet some arbitrary mandate. The Government has plenty of experience in making square boxes fit into round holes. You are already hearing from the powers that be on how great this is while front line managers and employees assail this system at will.

Re: NSPS

It's an election year. The political parties are going to say and make whatever promises to get them elected. I am fairly certain that NSPS will not be on their top priority list if they take office, regardless of party.

Re: Poor Visibility

The 60/40 split Congress wanted over the SECDEF's 50/50 split was in the DoD appropriation bill the President failed to sign into law before it expired (a "pocket veto"). You are exactly correct in stating we (NSPS DoD workers) do not know what our pay is at this point in time. It is all the more important that the President applied the entire difference between his (3%) and Congress (3.5%) to locality pay. This keeps the basic pay down which is what your retirement "high-3 average pay" is computed upon. This is true for both CSRS and FERS covered employees. My advice: put as much as you can into your TSP account and create an asset allocation plan. Rebalance once a year. It get more into your TSP account set up a traditional IRA and put more into that, then roll that into your TSP account as well. You can not beat the expense load of the TSP.