TUESDAY, JUNE 15, 2010


KLMNO


S THE FEDERAL WORKER Survey may reveal how government managers are doing on their don’ts


sure everything is done just right. Not everything turns out that


N


way, but at least the way forward is carefully outlined with reams of regulations.


When it comes to his staff, Sam has a list of things that managers should not do to workers, known as prohibited personnel practices. Now, the Merit Systems Protection Board is launching a broad research project to determine how well those don’ts are honored. John Crum, the MSPB’s policy


and evaluations director, said the board will survey 60,000 federal workers over the summer. Though reports of discrimination have declined, “there are still issues of favoritism that concern federal employees,” Crum said. “We’re not sure it has gotten any better.” The survey will pay particular


attention to whistleblowing. Results won’t be available until early next year, Crum said. The first part of the project is a


report the board has just sent to President Obama and Congress. Titled “Prohibited Personnel Practices: A Study Retrospective,” it summarizes previous MSPB studies on the prohibited practices. “We have noted that the percentage of employees reporting discrimination based on ethnicity/race, sex, age, and religion have declined over time, while an increasing percentage of Federal employees believe that they are being treated fairly,” the MSPB chairwoman, Susan Tsui Grundmann, wrote in a letter with the report. “However, we have also acknowledged that the Federal Government still has work to do to ensure a workplace free of prohibited personnel practices. . . . Many employees believe that personnel decisions are often based on factors other than merit, such as favoritism. There is also a continuing gap between minority and nonminority employees’ perceptions of the prevalence of discrimination and other prohibited personnel practices.” Unlike many of the


government’s rules and 2


JOE DAVIDSON Federal Diary


Top 3 Don’ts 1


Discriminate against an employee or applicant based on race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, marital status, or political affi liation


o matter where you turn, Uncle Sam has a long list of rules designed to make


Solicit or consider any recommendation that is not job-related and based on personal knowledge of the employee or applicant


withdrawing from competition  Give an unauthorized preference or advantage to an employee or applicant  Give employment advantages to relatives  Retaliate against employees or applicants for whistleblowing  Retaliate against employees or applicants for filing an appeal, complaint or grievance  Discriminate based on personal conduct that is not job related;  Violate veterans’ preference requirements  Take or fail to take any personnel action that violates any law, rule or regulation directly concerning the merit system principles Though perceptions of discrimination in the federal workplace are on the decline, the MSPB warns agencies not to get too comfortable. “Differences in perception,” the report says, “do not necessarily reflect differences in the actual incidence of discrimination.” Furthermore, it says, “agencies should not necessarily interpret positive Governmentwide results as endorsements of their own individual cultures and practices.”


Coerce the political activity of any person


3


If the boss class generates distrust and a lack of confidence, “that will greatly complicate efforts to make constructive changes to work processes and personnel practices,” the report warns. Retaliation against


whistleblowers is one area where things apparently are getting worse. After years of a slow decline in the percentage of employees who believe they were discriminated against for engaging in such things as disclosing unlawful activities or refusing to obey an unlawful order, the percentage moved up slightly between 2005 and 2007. “Morale, organizational


regulations, the prohibited practices are pretty clear. As listed in the report, they say officials shall not:  Discriminate against an employee or applicant based on race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, disability, marital status or political affiliation  Solicit or consider any


recommendation that is not job related and based on personal knowledge of the employee or applicant  Coerce the political activity of any person  Deceive or obstruct any person from competing for employment  Influence anyone from


performance, and (ultimately) the public suffer unnecessarily when employees are reluctant to disclose wrongdoing or to seek redress for inequities in the workplace,” the report says. “Work remains to be done,” it concludes, “in creating a workplace where employees can raise concerns . . . without fear of retaliation.”


federaldiary@washpost.com


Changes in leave policies go to opposite-sex partners


Stepparents also among those eligible for illness, funeral benefits


by Ed O’Keefe Federal workers may use sick


leave or funeral leave in cases of ailing or deceased domestic part- ners starting July 14, the Office of Personnel Management said Monday. Unlike other recent changes to


federal personnel policies that ap- ply only to same-sex partners, the new orders also apply to opposite- sex domestic partners. The policy change, published in


Monday’s Federal Register, is part of reforms ordered last year by President Obama when he ex- tended fringe benefits to the same-sex partners of gay federal workers. The fringe benefits were not extended to opposite-sex part- ners because, the administration said, heterosexual couples can ob- tain them through marriage. The change announced Mon-


day adds opposite-sex and same- sex partners, stepparents, step- children, grandparents and grandchildren to the list of rela- tionships that permit a federal worker to take leave. The changes do not apply to the


Family and Medical Leave Act, a law that requires all public and private employers to give up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave to care for newborns or sick relatives. Con- gress would have to change that law.


OPM added stepparents, step- children, grandparents and grandchildren at the request of agencies and workers concerned that the personnel policy did not explicitly list them. Monday’s no- tice in the Federal Register also reminded workers that they can take leave for sick or dying rela- tives who are not explicitly listed in the notice. “The fact that a specific rela- tionship is not expressly included in these definitions is not meant to diminish the familial bond, or to imply that leave may not be used to care for a person with that relationship,” OPM said in the Register. “Although we agree that any of


the suggested relationships may be considered a close association with the employee that is equiv- alent to a family relationship, not every employee’s relationship will have this close association. For example, some employees may have been raised by an aunt, while others may have never had the op- portunity to meet their aunt.” Colleen M. Kelley, president of


the National Treasury Employees Union, hailed the changes, saying that “this action reflects the struc- ture of today’s families. These changes are additional important steps in helping ensure fairness in the federal workplace.” OPM declined to extend the


leave policy to pet owners who want to stay home with sick or dy- ing animals, saying that workers would have to use annual leave or leave without pay in those cir- cumstances. ed.okeefe@washingtonpost.com


Census crew leader dies after being shot in Baltimore Man is first agency


worker killed this year while on the job


by Carol Morello


A Baltimore man who was working for the Census Bureau has died after being shot while dropping off a co-worker — the first killing of a Census worker on the job this year.


Spencer Williams, 22, died Fri- Spytalk JEFF STEIN


6Excerpt from voices.washingtonpost.com/spy-talk/ Buzz on lie detectors is a lie, NSA video says


The National Security Agency wants job applicants to know that its polygraph test is nothing to sweat. The eavesdropping and code-breaking organization has produced a 10-minute video designed to soothe applicants’ anxiety over the notoriously grim experience. “The Truth About the


Polygraph” (publicly available on the Defense Security Service’s training Web site) opens with various applicants — or actors playing them, it’s not clear — describing everything bad they had heard about the test, the implication being that none of it is true. Then a woman who may or


may not be a real polygrapher comes on the screen to say with convincing earnestness, “All the polygraph examiners really try to make a person feel more at ease.” “What I do at the beginning is, I tell them exactly what’s going to


happen,” she continues, leading a relaxed-looking applicant into her office. Says another female


polygrapher, “They will know ahead of time exactly what’s going to happen. There will be no surprises.”


All of which is quite at odds with the experience many test subjects — and polygraphers themselves — have related over the years. Indeed, critics of polygraphs call them “junk science” that can scar rejected job applicants for years. Even the harshest critics of


polygraphs, however, agree that they work as interrogation aids. Just the appearance of the test can motivate a subject to confess. But as a tool to screen out bad apples in a pool of applicants, they say, a polygraph is unreliable. Perversely, some relate, the more squeaky-clean the applicant, the higher


FED FACES Carl Pike


Assistant special agent in charge; Mexico, Central America and Canada section of the Special Operations Division, Drug Enforcement Administration.


Best known for: Leading a 20- state, multiagency strike force that landed a strong blow in Oc- tober against La Fami- lia, the Mexican drug cartel responsible for distributing massive amounts of narcotics in the United States, smuggling cash and weapons back to Mexi- co and killing Mexican law enforcement offi- cials. In the investigation, known as Project Co- ronado, 3,000 law en- forcement officers un- der Pike’s command


arrested more than 1,200 associ- ates of La Familia and seized more than 11


⁄2 tons of metham-


phetamine, $32 million in cash and 400 weapons in what was de- scribed as the largest strike ever against a Mexican drug cartel. Pike and his team were also in- volved in Project Deliverance, an- other major raid against the Mexican cartels that was announced last week.


SAM KITTNER


Agent Carl Pike joined the DEA in 1987.


Government service: After a stint as a tem- porary letter carrier for the U.S. Postal Service and time as a ranger for the Tennessee Depart- ment of Conservation, Pike joined the DEA in 1987 as a special agent.


Biggest challenge: En- suring that law en- forcement officers


across the country had the re- sources and support needed to carry out the nationwide raids and arrests of the Mexican drug cartel members.


Quote: “In Team Coronado, we came to work every day to make a difference, and we did. We may have come from many different backgrounds in federal service, but we shared a strength we found in our families and strong common resolve to give every- thing we had. This attitude . . . is what sets the service to our coun- try apart from any other profes- sion in the world. There is none better. ”


— From the Partnership for Public Service


For more on Pike, go to washingtonpost.com/fedpage. Send your nominations for Federal Faces to fedfaces@washpost.com.


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Homer Simpson makes an appearance in a National Security Agency video that tries to ease job applicants’ anxiety over polygraphs.


likelihood of “failure.” Practiced liars, conversely, breeze through questions about past drug use or other lifestyle issues that trip up others. George Maschke, a former U.S.


military counterterrorism translator who flunked an FBI polygraph and went on to help found an organization opposed to its use in employment screening, calls the NSA video Orwellian. “It’s Orwellian because the truth is the last thing the NSA


wants you to know about the polygraph,” he says. Not to the test subjects


portrayed in the NSA video, who all describe the experience as a walk in the park — “calm, quiet, comfortable,” as one put it. Says another: “Don’t always listen to the stories people tell about polygraphs.”


Read Jeff Stein’s Spytalk blog at voices.washingtonpost.com/ spy-talk/.


day after being shot June 7, ac- cording to Baltimore police. He was found inside his car, resting in the median near an intersec- tion, and had multiple gunshot wounds, police said. Williams was a crew leader re-


on washingtonpost.com


Obama administration officials continue to raise concerns about the government’s “technology gap” with the private sector, suggesting that federal workers have more advanced equipment at home than on the job.


 E-mail your answer to federaleye@washingtonpost.com, and include your full name, home town and the agency for which you work. We might include your response in Friday’s Washington Post.


In Fine Print The nominee for the post of


director of national intelligence has written an incisive critique of the position. Fed Page, A13.


Q. How does your office’s technology compare with your personal technology? Does your agency need an upgrade?


GOP targets paychecks A Republican effort to freeze


federal employees’ pay, and reduce the deficit, draws Democrats’ skepticism. Fed Page, A13.


B3


sponsible for a group of census takers doing follow-up visits to the homes of people who did not mail in their questionnaire by April. Census Bureau spokesman Steven J. Jost said Williams was returning home after driving a co- worker home at the end of the day and was considered to still be on the job. Police and Census officials said the shooting is not believed to be related to the agency’s work. Since follow-up house calls be- gan in late April, there have been 252 incidents in which Census workers have been harmed or threatened, including 11 times when shots were fired at them and 86 times when they were threatened with such weapons as guns, axes and crossbows. morelloc@washpost.com


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