Transcripts For CSPAN3 Hearing Focuses On The Federal Workforce 20170209

Work force. This subcommittee will work to find sense sbl solutions. Federal agencies employ some of the best and brightest individuals this country has to offer. Every day federal Civil Servants protect our communities, keep our airports running safely and smoothly and military running extremely effectively. We are gafl for their diligence. Important work is obstructed by a culture that rewards attendance over initiative, one that does not differentiate between poor performers and those who excel. The high performing often complain that under performing count parts harm work place moral and raise concerns that compensation is not appropriately related to performance. The 2016 federal Employee View Point survey found a mere 22 of employees agreed with this statement. Pay raises depend on how well employees perform their jobs. While the government fails to appropriately compensate employees based on performance managers face additional challenges. Federal managers are frustrated by complicated and time consuming hiring process, something this committee has talked about often. In 2016 it took an average of 100 days to fill an open position in the federal government. In 2015 it took 90 days. The problem is getting worse. Many highly qualified applicants cannot wait over three months to start work. Managers need employees to start work properly to achieve the mission and managers need to hire appropriately to make sure that we are hiring the right people in the right spot. Whenever there is an ongoing structural problem within the system it is our responsibility and duty to address it. It was created in the 1950s as a result of the hoover commission. The last Time Congress accomplished significant reform was Civil Service reform act of 1978. No successful business operates an Employment Model for the 1950s. No Effective Work place runs on a system last updated in the 1970s. Through authorities granted by congress on january 23, 2017 the president issued a memorandum for heads of executive departments and agencies establishing a hiring freeze until incoming director recommends a Long Term Plan to reduce the size of the federal governments work force. President trumps hiring freeze is a similar memoranda issued by past president s. In 1977 president carter and 1981 president reagan issued broad hiring freezes. As the chief executive of the federal government President Trump is responding to widespread frustration voiced by the American People with their government but not necessarily with individual employees. Attrition through hiring freeze may not be the optimal solution for creating efficient federal work force. Absence of notable Reforms Administration has every right to alter the status quo. Congress can either watch as the administration deals with the federal work force through executive actions or find consensus and work with the administration, take up the mantle of legislative reform. To do this this subcommittee plans to have a series of hearings to discuss a broad number of topics. Well invite a wide variety of view points. Todays hearing we start with perspective of federal managers as we look to tackle some of these challenges. It is important to hear from managers and Senior Executives who confront had issues. As experienced managers and executives our witnesses will by able to provide unique perspectives on the difficulties they face when Civil Service as managers. We may still see some of the same challenges. I hope my colleagues will join me in this pursuit and i am confident they will. This is a nonpartisan issue. I am interested to work with every stakeholder to ensure congress develops comprehensive reforms to continue to protect great employees in our federal work force and to make sure they continue to have good due process. I look forward to discussing with all of our Witnesses Today and i am grateful. I will introduce all of them in just a moment after Ranking Member has her opening remarks. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thanks to my colleagues. Not always the sexiest of topics, Public Employment but absolutely critical if we are going to do the best that we can for the people of this country. I think while its inevitable we will discuss today the challenges of the hiring process i think it is important to highlight that we are having this discussion against a back drop of the current hiring freeze in the federal government. While the Public Sector cannot do its job when the Public Sector in north dakota cannot do its job the private sector has a more difficult time doing its job. For making sure the food we eat is safe to answering tax law and ensure veterans are cared for to protecting nation from harm federal employees in my state work every day to make my state and the country better. When we fail to fill needed vacancies unnecessarily the only people we are hurting are ourselves. I want to tell a quick story. During the huge boom of Oil Development in north dakota we had a very difficult time recruiting federal workers, engineers into the agencies that help provide permitting. It was so bad, in fact, that the industry offered up resources to hire and to expand the pay of the current federal employees. I think it was eye opening for many of us who for years might say it is a drag on the economy to realize that the oil industry in my state could not function without a fully staffed federal blm. So across the board cuts and the shrinking of the overall federal work force are not the answer to making the federal government more efficient or more effective. These cuts will also come at the expense of talent, moral and the mission of our work force. None of which we can afford to lose. Managers play a vital role in the culture of an agency and are responsible for giving employees the tools they need to succeed and thrive in the work place. While todays hearing is not focussed on the hiring freeze, its important to keep in mind how a freeze directly and indirectly impacts the ability of managers and employees to do their job effectively and keep moral high. Im looking forward to examining how we can help managers use the tools that are available to them to more efficiently as well as to make them more efficient as well as how we can improve supervisor training. I will be doing all that i can to protect federal workers. I think it is important that we are in continued communication with the administration regarding how they plan to implement initiatives going forward. We have been at this table before, the two of us, talking about the aging of the federal work force, talking about recruiting the best and brightest americans to a job and a career in Public Service. We have been here talking about what tools we need. These are all great challenges in moving our country forward and making our government responsive to the needs of the people. We cant take a step backward. So mr. Chairman, i am grateful for our attention in this congress to the federal work force. I hope that we will be able to see innovations that will lead to Better Outcomes for Public Employees, for public managers and as a result Better Outcomes for the people of our country. Thank you. Thank you. Testimony from our witnesses. Let me introduce all four of them first. Renee johnson is National President for federal management association, an organization she served in various capacities since 2009. She currently is u. S. Navy Customer Engagement branch head in cherry point, north carolina. Bill valdez is president of the Senior Executive association, a former cochair of the National Science and Technology Council of science policy Interagency Working Group from 2005 to 2014. He retired from federal service as career Senior Executive in 2014 after 20 years of service in the department of energy. Robert coursy is former deputy chief of staff for manpower. Prior to 18 years of civilian service he served 28 years on active duty. He retired from federal service in october of 2016. David cox is the veteran in the group, he has been here before. He worked for the department of Veterans Affairs from 1983 to 2006 when he became the secretary treasurer. We appreciate very much for you being here. We appreciate all of your written testimony that you have already submitted. It is very thorough and excellent. That will go into the permanent record. It is custom to swear in all witnesses before they testify. Please raise your right hand. Do you swear the testimony you are about to give before this subcommittee will be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. We use a timing clock which will be a five minute count down for your testimony time. Thank you. I appreciate you allowing me to present the views of the federal Managers Association before you today. I am currently employed at Fleet Readiness Center east as Customer Engagement branch head. I am here today on my own time representing my active and retired members and do not speak on behalf of the navy. The mission is to advocate excellence in Public Service so we are honored to appear today to discuss ways to empower managers as we seek a more efficient and effective federal government. In my written testimony i addressed a number of issues related to recruitment, hiring, Performance Management, termination and other topics. As fmas National President i hear how proud our members are to serve our nation. I am pleased to note there are chapters in Army Ammunition plant in oklahoma providing resources for national security. We also have members insuring americans receive their Social Security checks, collecting taxes to Fund Public Safety measures and protecting the nations food supply, to name just a few of the critical functions provided by federal employees. To begin fma members often describe the current hiring process as too cumbersome. The most recent Defense Authorization bills lends support for direct Hire Authority and fma sees this as potential avenue to hire managers. Also seeks to allow for Salary Adjustments to compete for new wage grade hires. The federal government makes significant investments in these employees and often they leave for private sector before they even finish a year of service. Managers should have options to adjust hiring packages to reflect the unique circumstances in their areas. While fma is opposed to the current hiring freeze instituted by the new administration we are more concerned with the potential proposals for hiring in the long term specifically blind attrition policies. All federal agencies should allow to match hiring actions thought line with mandated. It supports a system that provides incentives. Departments and agencies must have maximum flexibility as we compete with the private sector to attract the best and brightest work force to answer the call of Public Service. Managers must be able to address most misconduct and poor performance. Currently many managers feel it is easier to keep poor performers rather than take steps to document and convince the agency of removal. All employees including managers should be held accountable for executing duties and responsibilities. At the same time fma opposes efforts to reduce or eliminate due process for federal employees. First level supervisors and managers need access to adequately funded training programs. Investments must be made to assist managers to recognize problems early and deal with them at the lowest possible level. Fma calls for introduction of legislation that requires agencies to provide supervisors with interactive training on management topics ranging from mentorship, Career Development to hostile work environments and poor performers. Training should take place within one year of promotion with ongoing training every three years thereafter. Initial and supervisory probationary periods are intended to be an extension of the hiring process. It is a time to evaluate the employee or manager. Some career fields are so complex that it takes more than one year to properly train an entry level employee. In the 2015 Defense Authorization bill congress extended the probationary period for all employees at the department of defense to two years. Extending at other federal agencies would benefit the government and employees by allowing supervisors to make decisions based on the employees performance as fully trained employee not just guess how the employee will perform. I commend subcommittee for holding the hearing early to discuss how to best equip those of us charged with managing the federal workforce and ensure we are equipped to meet the agencys goals. Thank you for affording the opportunity to discuss our organizations views. I ame eager to answer any questions you may have. Thank you for the opportunity to testify before the subcommittee today. The Senior Executives association and members are eager to work with you and the new administration to develop Common Sense Solutions to the challenges that we know confront the Civil Service. The 7,200 career Senior Executives play a vital role in implementing positive change in the government utilizing depth of experience and knowledge will be critical as we develop the Common Sense Solutions we all know are required. My written testimony discusses many of those possible solutions. I am ready to provide more information or answer any questions you might have. I would like to focus my remarks on several broad issues that help inform that discussion namely the answer to three questions. First, are federal leaders currently empowered to manage the workforce . What are constraints on empowerment . What are the most Impactful Solutions we should pursue . The answer to the first question is no. There are two root causes for this lack of empowerment. First, the complexity of Workforce Management processes and rules makes it extremely difficult for federal leaders to be sufficiently empowered navigating the maze of hr rules and regulations while focussing on the primary objective of a federal leader, fulfilling the Agency Mission is a difficult task. Second, federal leaders lack the tools they require to effectively manage their workforce when achieving 21st century missions. Corporate america recognizes it needs to know the composition of the workforce, the best places to hire talent and how to incentivise the workforces. In the federal government the tools that would enable federal leaders to do the same are not available. This leads to the discussion on constraints on empowerment. I would put them into three baskets. The first basket is the complexity of federal Workforce Management. Anyone including federal leaders would be overwhelmed by rules and regulations that are often seemingly contradictory. This is most apparent in the hiring process which forces compromises that can result in the best qualified candidates not being chosen. The second basket is the many routes of appeal or form shopping for employees requesting particular action. Threat of ig complaint can stop a leader cold when dealing with poor performance. Accountability is difficult to impose on a workforce with so many avenues of appeal at their disposal. My experience is that Forum Shopping occurs whether talking about gs 2 or ses. The third basket is absence of functioning risk reward framework. Leaders should encourage taking risks and then should reward those employees appropriately. Risk is devalued and rewards are tied to tenure and general performance. This discourages innovation and rewards average performance. My top three recommendations are tied to these constraints. Please help us by reducing complexity of workforce rules and regulations particularly on hiring. We make several recommendations in my written testimony. Second, lets figure out a way to simplify employee appeals of adverse action. We are fully supportive of Union Grievance processes and believe they have their appropriate place in the federal workforce framework. But a separate process for the resolution of personnel performance issues must be developed. Finally, we desperately need a new risk reward framework particularly tied to annual performance reviews. Federal leaders want to reward and distinguish from routine by an employee. Not everyone deserves to be promoted or get a bonus. It should be earned and recognized. I would like to conclude by thanking the subcommittee for holding todays hearing. The Senior Executives association and our members are deeply grateful for your thought leadership on this issue and we look forward to working with you to restore the notion of Civil Service regarded as world class and worthy of Public Trust Given to it. Every day as you noted millions of federal employees are doing amazing things, magic public lands, defending the homeland, protecting the environment and helping build an innovation economy. You should take great satisfaction in knowing that the work this subcommittee is doing will help all federal employees and leaders accomplish their Vital Missions more effectively and efficiently. Thank you chairman langford, Ranking Member and members of the subcommittee for the opportunity to share my experiences of over 46 years in the air force in both my military capacity and as member of Senior Executive service to assist the committee in finding ways to improve management of the federal workforce. In both my roles i had the honor of working with some of the most professional, dedicated and incredibly humble career civilians. Whatever reforms need to recognize the importance of career civilian workforce in providing necessary continuity during periods of high leadership turn controversy and we hold them in high regard. I will be first to say the civilian system needs major rework. The system has evolved but fundamentally has not changed since inception. What has changed is a very dynamic budget environment, a workforce that is held in disregard and preciossures to reduce workforce. Managers have budget uncertainty dealing with a 90yearold pay system that rewards longevity, archaic hiring practices that dont allow agencies to compete on a level Playing Field with the private sector, the lack of ability to develop and shape their workforces and grievance and complaint processes that drag on for years. On any given day we have approximately 2. 1 million federal employees on board excluding postal which equates to approximately 210 billion per year using an average of about 100,000 per person. For the most part there has never been an analytic foundation to support the level of federal employees. To its credit the d. O. D. Has a requirements driven process with manpower professionals to determine both its military and civilian levels. Most federal agencies do not have that same rigor and are illprepared to defend manpower levels. Most agency heads are blind to true manpower requirements and most have no centralized accounting for manpower and skill levels at every level in their organizations. Fiscal pressures demand that agencies need to justify the size of their workforce. This will require congress to insist that workforce levels are requirements based, that agency heads can defend the manpower levels and that documents support those levels. But Congress Must also help with timely budgets and consider giving agencies a planning target for personnel levels for an additional two years to allow them to make more informed decisions. For over 90 years we have had the general schedule pay system. Locality pay, special pay authorities, expanding the workforces under nongs pay demonstration projects and longevity all make a compelling case to eliminate the general schedule pay system. The time is now to export the Lessons Learned from pay demonstration projects and to move forward with the pay for performance system. There are significant challenges with managing the federal workforce. There is no requirements for agencies to have Human Capital Strategic Plans with the proper analytics to guide. Managers are mired in a hiring process that significantly limits their ability to compete with the private sector and there are limited tools and hiring authority for agency heads to attract and retain the best talent. Congress can help by directing opm to ensure that all agencies have viable Human Capital Strategic Plans. Give agency heads all decision authorities to use direct hires to meet their critical skill needs. Ensure that all agencies have the authority to shape their workforces without opm approval. And require every agency to have a formal civilian training and development program. Congress can also help by providing dedicated and importantly training moneys in the agency budgets. Any trainings that give agency heads more authority to manage their workforce and empower them with the proper tools will pay great dividends in giving managers more time to be managers. I offer my service to do whatever i can to help the Committee Bring real positive change to the federal workforce. Our country and our federal employees deserve no less. I look forward to your questions. Mr. Cox. Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member and members of the subcommittee thank you for the opportunity to testify today. One of the most useful ways to frame policy questions that aim to address real or perceived problems is to ask what is needed, new laws or more effective enforcement of existing laws . On a question of whether current laws give federal managers adequate authority to manage the federal workforce or whether the new laws are needed to expand their authority the answer is clear, no new laws are needed. America has the very best Civil Service in the world. This is something we should all be proud of and should celebrate. Virtually all studies of federal employee performance find that the vast majority perform well. It is just a small percentage, probably less than one percent, that are problem employees. Yet the focus is so frequently on that minority rather than on the 99 plus percent who are doing a great job every daycaring for the American People. Since the late 19th century our federal Civil Service has been a professional apolitical Civil Service. Today we call it merit based system and it is no overstatement to say it is a cornerstone of our democracy. It ensures that Technical Expertise is what matters in obtaining and keeping a federal job, not allegiance to any Political Party or person. All of us benefit from a professional Civil Service. Veterans at the Medical Center need to be sure their doctors and nurses are highly qualified for their jobs. Mechanics at air force base need to know avionics, not politics. The American Public deserves those hired because of their skills not their connections. While Agency Career employees remain accountable to politically appointed officials our merit based system makes sure that actions against career employees require evidence to back up allegations and due process including Third Party Review by neutral decision makers. When an employee receives notice of an adverse action be it suspension, demotion or termination the body that hears any appeal, note, that is a body focussed on the protection of merit system, not the employee and it is not only fast and efficient, it upholds Agency Management decisions in 80 to 90 of the cases. There is a popular perception that is too hard to fire a federal employee. Gaos careful study points out that these are cases of management failure. When managements are either unwilling or otherwise fail to use the already substantial tools available to them the answer is not to weaken the merit system by reducing the process. The answer is to train and support and discipline managers so that they do their part to uphold and protect the merit system. Please lets not throw out the baby with the bath water just to indulge federal managers who wont or cant do their jobs. History is full of examples of Public Service corrupted by politically based employment decisions. That is the reason we urge you to reject calls to weaken the meritbased Civil Service. Federal hiring and firing must remain meritbased and subject to Third Party Review. Performance management improvements such as the new beginnings approach recently undertaken in d. O. D. Are always welcomed and we look forward to working with lawmakers and Agency Managers to make this new program a success. We also support better training of both supervisors and employees so that clear expectations are established, performance metrics are clear, appropriate steps are taken to either fix performance problems or remove the small number of poor performers in the workforce. This concludes my statement and i look forward to answering and talking with any questions of the committee. We have a tradition that we defer our questions to the end. With that recognize senator carper for questions. Senator harris was here first. She got here before the gavel but at the gavel you were the Senior Member that was here. Step up. Harry truman used to say the only thing new in the world is the history we forgot or never learned. Remain as firmly in my mind as my colleagues know i call my former colleagues on their birthday. They spent enormous amount of time in this room in the last decade dealing with many of the same issues. We thank you for being here today. We thank you for your testimony. We thank you for your service. I want those of you who made the call over several years talk to us about what they focus on. What was accomplished and maybe where they fell short and what we need to do today as a result. Mr. Cox, you are pretty young so you may not remember these guys. Things that certainly i believe we need to do is what was accomplished under their leadership . Where did they fall short and that we need to take action. I saw great concern from both of those leaders to have federal employee managers particularly trained. Where do i believe we fell short . I think some of my colleagues would agree with me, particularly my brother right here, that agencies dont fence off money for manager training. We have had short budgets so therefore training takes a back seat over and over. I have found in my career the best technician becomes the manager but then that doesnt necessarily give them management skills. The agency needs to spend time helping that person to become a manager, giving them training, mentoring them so that they can encourage develop employees, manage good performers and recognize the good performers and also take appropriate proper actions on poor performers. I want to say it very openly from afge, we do not want bad employees working for the federal government. You can hold it right there. That is a good place to hold it. Thank you for those words. You dont have to agree with him. We had raving fans back years ago for the federal workforce and the emphasis was on developing the federal workforce. I want you to walk us back to what they worked out. They were very proud of what was accomplished. You have been in a leadership position for some time. What did they accomplish and what did they not accomplish . We need to focus on today. I apologize. I cant get into those specifics. Thank you. In general i think the focus on pay for performance and making the federal agencies make federal employees more accountable was an admirable move on the parts of the two senators. I dont think that they were fully successful and that the work of this subcommittee could be focussed on those two areas with high degree of success. Thank you. Supporting the agencies demanding the resources that they need i think is very important, something that needs to be supported with the budget requirements that are submitted from the agencies and should be supported by Congress Whenever the budget is approved. Without having those resources in the agencies it makes it very difficult for us to meet the mission demands of the agencies. A long time ago a cartoon strip where quoted as saying we have met the enemy and it is us. I think we are by virtue of not providing predictability and certainty with respect to budgets are relying on continuing resolutions which is expensive and wasteful. We will be reminded next week when they put out their high risk list. To talk to us very briefly about i will just say if you agree that that is a problem say yes. Thank you. Thanks so much. So it is my understanding thatnist last couple of weeks about 1,000 state Department Employees signed on to the descent to basically show disagreement with the ban. Following that White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer said those who disagree with the Administration Policy should, quote, get with the program or they should go. Can each of you tell me your perspective on that statement and in particular what are the rights and the responsibilities of federal employees to be able to freely descent and point out whatever they believe is not in the best interest of the agency they work in or in the best interest of our country . And what are the protections available to them . I will start with you. I feel like as a federal employee we are there to support the mission of the agency and the intent of the duties that have been presented to us. Whenever we are presented with restrictions that make it difficult i do feel like that we should be allowed to express those concerns. But it is also important that we still try to accomplish the mission with those restrictions, as well. We cannot stop the mission because of the restrictions. We have to be able to overcome those and try to find ways of working around them. Do you agree with the importance of having the channel and that ability for those employees of the state department using the example that i have offered to be able to express their opinions . Yes, maam. Thank you. First i wish every agency had a disint channel. In my experience different agencies would set up employee suggestion boxes and those were used in the same manner to provide descent or comments or existing administration actions. Just as going in position i think we should all understand that all federal employees swear an oath to uphold the constitution and that they exercise those powers under the direction of the president of the united states. And if an employee feels, if a Civil Servant believes what he or she is being asked to do is unconstitutional, unethical, criminal or against existing regulations, then, yes, they have an obligation to speak up within authorized channels within the agency to express those views. You can do that through the ig, through whistle blower process. But it is not within the prerogative of federal employees to not execute an order from the president that is constitutional, that is within regulations and that is perceived by the administration to go to further the mission of the agency. But you agree that they should be able to express without fear of being fired . Within existing Agency Infrastructure and mechanisms. Are you aware of any federal agency that prohibits an employee from expressing their descent . And if they do on pain of being fired . No. So i dont know how to say it any better than mr. Valdez. State department has a unique system in terms of being able to have that network to get to the Senior Leaders in state department. Above all day in and day out the federal employee is supposed to concentrate on what their job is. We are supposed to not be political in anything that we do. And with anything that would detract from that focus i would say is not productive. Again, there are mechanisms in place to express concern with policies and procedures and members know how to use those processes. I believe all of our contracts that afg has with any agency says employees have the First Amendment rights to voice their concerns and raise those issues and certainly there are whistle blower protections. Afg always tells membership they are being asked to do something unless it is illegal to obey and grieve, go through that mechanism i would never encourage an employee to be insubordinant but as federal employees we have First Amendment rights to agree or disagree and to be an apolitical workforce in that nature. Thank you. Thank you, mr. Chair and Ranking Member and good morning to our panel and thank you all very much for your testimony and for your work and for the employees you represent and speak for. I wanted to start to talk about budget and predictability a little bit. In your testimony you talk about budget predictability and importance for management in Government Employment as an issue more broadly. I recently joined in introducing a bipartisan bill that allows for biannual at the budget level. I would love your thoughts about whether this would provide the kind of predictability you are looking for as well as from a management and personnel angle what challenges would biannual budgeting pose for you . We tried biannual budget several years ago. What i remember is the congress was not willing to work that second year which would have been wonderful because of the amount of time that is consumed in putting a budget together. You dont have a 2 million person workforce and you dont get your budget until six months into the fiscal year and then you are working on finalizing that next years budget and you dont even have a budget for the current year. Anything we can do to put more predictability in the budget process, to give managers flexibility and at least look into that next year. In my testimony i recommended two years out and at least a planning level for the workforce so they can make decisions in the current year based on a known level in those other years, a very good example is an agency that works to be very efficient and they save manpower resources. Only for that, then, to draw the next line for reductions. You cant have an incentivised managers to look for efficiencies unless they have some predictability that they are going to have that workforce level in the future. And my thinking, too, has been that if you spend, if you do the biannual budget then you can use the second year to measure and assess and work with agencies in planning the next budget as opposed to constantly being in this cycle. I also cycle. I have another question for you, mr. Kor si, you recommend that opm conduct exit surveys and other strategy, and i am curious what is happening now . I get into the air force which is my data point, and we recognize the importance, because a lot of the organizations do the exit survey, and it is also very important to survey the folks of why are you staying with us. So we initiated that two years ago and what you will find is that one of the major reasons that people are leaving you is lead ership. Also one of the major reasons that people are staying with you is leadership, so it gets to the point of training the managers to make sure they are come e pe and mentoring programs to targeting folks that are no kidding the talent that we want to keep. We have done it in the air fo e force. Okay. Thank you. I have about a minute and a half left, and maybe i will ask a general question for the four of you if you can comment on it briefly. We have obviously moved into the age where technical literacy and data and the technology is particularly important, and we are good Cyber Security hygiene on e on behalf of all of the employees is important, and can you comment on the particular challenge and any ideas of how recruiting and improving the data and recruiting people who are good at and improving the Data Literacy in Cyber Security . I think that clearly you are goinging to have to be out at the best schools and universities offering competitive salaries. And also, appropriating the money for the latest technology opms, Computer System which almost as outdated as a shwin b schwinn bicycle has become. And we have so many technical problems that the managers need the hiring information and the wherewithal to give hiring commitments to people, and in order for them to be in cyberis the focus right now, but it is well beyond cyber and it is giving the directing managers the authority for the skills that they determine that they need. Thank you. Id agree com completely thae chairman pointed out it takes 100 days to bring somebody on new, and this is the average. Okay. And when you are into the highly technical fields, you will find that it exceeds that average, because of the difficulty of bringing them on. And so we need to have a toptobottom reviewf of how the age agencies are a allowed to hire people, and provide them with the mechanisms that are enabling them to bring on the brightest. Thank you. Certainly agree with mr. Cox when he was speaking about thele systems that we used within the federal government. I think that updated systems for our employees to work with would make it much easier to bring new employees on, using the systems that they have been trained on in the private sector as well as in school would benefit the government as a whole. Thank you, and i am sorry for going over my time. You are fine, and reminder to the members that we will do a second round of questioning and the second surround open without a clock, so if there is interaction that we need to have, you are a able to have on, that and i know that senator carper could not stay based on the time constraints, and so, we will al allow you to do this. And i want to thank you. And ted cochran was a sen for twor year two years as you are call, and he became Senate President when joe biden had to step down. A thanking people within the agencies for the work they did, and i took the idea in the last congress and focused on one department, which is the department of Homeland Security which we have a lot of jurisdiction over, and they had the worst morale of any major agency in the government, and so with the outputt, we had a terrific leadership team, and so it is basically like Cheddar Cheese or the swiss cheese, because there were so many vacancies there, and we made it clear that we a appreciated the work they were doing. And so on the individual and the collective basis. The other thing is that i lis n listened to npr on the train coming in from delaware and they were reporting on the top of the news story, what people like about their work. There was an International Survey all over the world what they liked. Ta like getting paid, benefits and some people like the folks they work with, and they like the environment in which they work, and you know what most people liked about the work . The fact that they knew what they were doing was important and that they were making progress. One of the requirements for us is to look at ourselves in the mirror and say, what can we do on this side of the dias to ensure that the federal employees are empowered to make that progress. Thank you so much for your leadership. Quick comment, and i want to defer to senator highcamp about questioning. But you will find the wide support for buy yiennial budget. And we need a more predictable way to do that and so we need to get to the majority to get that moved. Along with that senator portman and i would call in what some called the Government Shutdown prevention act, and it is to the point where where we have no longer the eclipse of the shutdown, but pushes the congress to get the budget done, and puts in the criteria to accomplish, that and it does not help us to have unpredictable budgeting and budgeting cliffs all of the time. We need some predictable system but the right pressure points, we will be able to get that accomplish ed in accomplished in the days ahead. Thank you, senator hydecamp . Yes, and many of us come from a areas where you have buy annual budgeting, and that is a much more humane and predictable system. I wanted to start out with you, mr. Valdez. As you heard in my opening statement, im concerned about the hiring freeze and the morality and the probably some of that, too, but the morale and the kind of the disruption that that unsecertainty creates with the working force. I know that in your testimony that you have said that you believe that the hiring freeze will have a Chilling Effect on the ability of the federal government to attract and recruit the talent that it needs. You know. As you can see from my oepg statement, we had a situation where where people saw what happens when you dont have people in federal positions. And so i want to ask you, how does the freeze and the negative publicity surrounding impact the agencys need to meet the mission both here and in the states and what message does a hiring freeze send to the managers and the employees about the value of the work about mr. Carpers point . Well, you have raised a number of issue, but in terms of the Chilling Effect, people like certainty in their employee, and that is what we are referring to is that if you cant, and if you think that the federal government is not a place where you can find reasonable employment and have a secure job, then that does have a Chilling Effect, and particularly on the individuals who are coming into the federal government. I wanted to make this point that frequently the vacancies that we have are going to be highly sought after and highly technical, and so you will have three people, and now someone leave leaves and those two know that there is no way they can fill that gap, and they get frustrated and now theyre bearing the brunt, and they can find employment elsewhere. I mean, it is a meat ax to something that we should be look looking at something strategically, and i have a concern about what that means for highly sought after empl employees and basically people seeing Public Service as a career. Ms. Johnson in addition to Immediate Impact of the hiring freeze, i am also concerned about the Long Term Plan that was alluded to in the executive order. You have said that fma steadfastly opposes any blind arbitrary plan to cut the federal workforce, and what are the dangers of arbitrarily making these cuts to the workforce and what is the long term impact of that pronouncement . Yes, maam. I look at the arbitrary cuts across the federal government as being detrimental to the agencies as any company and there are areas that we cut the budget and the personnel within those agencies, but to do a blanket across the board cut of all federal agencies is going to be detrimental thom being able to move forward with the mission that they have been provided, and putting people in those positions that have to take on the duties of others as their counterparts leave that puts additional pressure on them, and impacts the moral of the agencies. And isnt it likely that those people who can leave when they do and it is hard to fill that position, it is going to have a cascading effect . Oh, absolutely. And probably in thoser a yas where it is cyberer or a whole lot of competition in the private sector for that kind of talent and skillset, but even if i can say, you know, if you are going to take 20 people in housekeeping to make up the beds and you only have 10, you wont stay in business very long as a hotel if you cant hire to replace the people who are going to be making up the beds and cleaning up the rooms, and so maybe it is a context that can be appreciated in a different category. I have to back out for a little bit here and i will be back and i will defer my time albeit very small amounts to the chairman, and i will be returning. That is going to be leaving me completely unsupervised here in the hearing. There are cameras here. Always accountability. Let me run through several things, because there are quite a few issues that have come up, and i want to thank all four of you for your written statements, and they are very thorough and practical. That is helpful to the committee, because as we are trying to work through thing, and mr. Cox as you have mentioned before, it may not be a legislative solution, but it may be a training issue. And so that the task off this committee is not just forming new ledge slashgs but it is oversight for existing authorities, and so i want to walk through a couple of things on that. I mentioned in the opening statement, the 100 days now on average that it takes to go through the hiring process, and that it was 90 days last year, and now it is 100, and so that this problem is accelerating when it needs to get better. We have had hearings on the usa jobs and the process of doing the application, and the security and let me ask just for the managers and mr. Cox if you want to jump in as well on this. There are 105 hiring authorities that currently exist. 105 of them. Now, 90 of the hires are done with just 20 of those hiring awe hor tis, but 105 and most of you mention that we needed direct hiring authority as well for certain things. My question is not reor thele cal, and there are 105 hiring authorities and what is being missed at this point, and what is slowing down the process, and what i repetitively hear is that the hiring part is most important, and you dont have as many issues with firing and oversight if you have good hire, and getting a good list and working with the hr to have everyone know what you are looking for and getting that in place, and going through the process that we get the right person in the beginning. And so my interest is open to anyone who wants to jump in this, and what am i missing and where can this be fixed. Mr. Koursy. The leadership of the air force worked with Tinker Air Force base to put the whole hiring process on the table. They peeled back every process. The 80 days in a lot of ways is a misnomer, because the clock starts when the manager actually puts a hiring demand on the system. And what does not happen is that if you had good Human Capital planning, and workforce planning, managers are able to predict months in advance in terms of the skills that they need. The real test is how long does it take from the time that the manager decides that they need a replacement to the time that the individual shows up. That is much more than the 80 days. So take a guess, what is that . I would say, guess is pr probably in the 150 plus. From the time they identify that. So as part of that major relook at it, and i dont know how many individual processes, but well over 100, that it took a year to peel that back, and now we are in the process of starting to implement those air forcewide disseminated, because a lot of the the onus is on the manager to get out in front, and knowing what new workloads are coming in the future, and putting the demand on the system for either the new workload or when they know that they have populations that have communicated that they are going to be leaving the workforce. So that up front piece is important on the manager side of the house. How do we fix that . That is one of the key issues to try to get the managers to know that they are predicting what they need, and then getting specific on the e criteria for this task, this is the skillset that is needed. If you make it real open, they need to be a nice person, and well dress and professional, you have a huge pull and you may or may not get the qualified person. If the manager is specific in what they need as far as criteria, it will help to narrow the process to work through, and is that correct or not correct. Yes, sir, senator, you are correct. And how can we get to the point of the managers learning how the predict in advance and very specific in what they need, so that when we get to the end of it, we will get a better output. One of my recommendations is that you have to require that the organizations have a Human Capital strategy and Strategic Plan which forces them to look at the current workforce and to come down the pike and to require them to use analytics to get smarter on the front end of this so that they can get the right talent. And do we have a good example of that and a agency that is doing it well that we can look at, as a model, because it is a common mode. Senator, look at the recommendations that came out of what the air force and air force Materiel Command were able to do during that period of time and we know that opm went in and took a look at what the air force is doing, and there is great info, and effort and leadership involved and they had to brief themselves myself, and the lead commander on a regular basis as the progress, and now we are in the process of rolling it out. I dont lock into the 80 day, but all i am looking at is from the time that i put a demand on the system or knowledge of what we need to the time we get a warm body, and in past hearings, you have heard about what it takes for suitability checks. For example as part of the improving the process of coming out of that review at Tinker Air Force base and within the afmc they used to bring the individual to in process and work on the Security Papers and go home. Work on the medical, and then they would go home, and now they only do it in one process once they get the individual on board, and now you are trying to encourage the commanders to take a little risk and bring the individual on board before the suitability check plays out, and then you have a caveat in there if it is not successful, then you dont have employment with the air force, but get in front of the time it takes and take the short risk, but it is all part of it. It is managers with the opm and the process and all of it has to work together. Have any would certainly agree that what is happening in Tinker Air Force base, and the relationship of the afg and the management and the cooperation of the air force and everyone is trying to make it work, and they have a tremendous amount of people coming on board, and the lead sustainment facility for the air force and set the example for it. So that is a great example, and im pleased that you are able to say that if we look at anything governmentwide, look at Tinker Air Force base, and we can continue to work with tinker to pull the ideas out of what is happening in the hiring process, but at the end of the day, as i have chatted with several folks around the state, and when you have somebody who is warehouse or forklifter for instance and i hear it all of the time from mcalester from the Ammunition Depot there, and they are trying to hire on a Forklift Operator and that same person goes to apply at five other places around mcalester that day, and then they also apply at the Army Ammunition depot, and four months later, they will get a call back from the Ammunition Depot, and they have been employed by somebody else for 3 1 2 months at that point. So it is too slow in the process, and we are missing a lot of Great Potential employees based on the slowness of the process. Senator, if we opened up the window or i should say the authorities for the hiring officials to have more direct hiring authority, even a Forklift Operatort an installation could be critical for other things to happen at the installation, and give the hiring manager direct authority when they determine that the skill is critical and bypass some of the other processes to allow you to do exactly what you are saying, on the spot, job offers, and individual can commit at that time. When you are moving munitions, that forklift op operator is essential and pretty important in the process. Over the senator portman. Thank u yox chairman langford and i wanted to come to the hearing partly to support what sten or the langford is doing which is to look at the tough issues of management within the federal government. And we dont do it enough in my view here in terms of the oversight. So i thank him for that. We have a great panel here, and my questions may have asked and answered earlier and i apologize if i am asking about topics already addressed. I have three basic questions. One in regard to hiring, one of the prfrustrations with the offe of management and budget is the hiring. And we just dont have the speed of hiring that is, you nknow, te real world speed and therefore people take other opportunities even when they are willing to forego the higher salary to be many Public Service. And so furtherance on that is helpful. And then separation, and if someone is not providing how do you get the person out of the way of those who are performing, and this is a problem in terms of the morale, and i certainly found it when i was with the omb and some of the specific statutes have tried to deal with this on the irs side and omb side, but any thoughts that you have on that when somebody is not performing and going through the proper procedures, how do you you assure that person is giving the opportunity to leave so that others can take the positions, and feel if they are performing well, their performanceing being valued, and the third one to the broad issue of performance measur measures, and you will recall the p. A. R. T. Scores not without controversy to measure the performance of the agencies and the personnel, and part of it is to look at how people were motivated an empowered and whether it is working. We have a new administration, and opportunity to look at how to encourage better management and federal agencies, and what do you think of that . If we could just quickly start on the issue of hiring. Again, maybe that is something that we have had discuss canned and i like the idea mr. Corsi for you the cut back on the l layers of bureaucracy, but any other quick thoughts on that . Well, i would like to speak on that for the budgeting for hiring, and that is something that is very critical that we have that budget in place, and we have talked about the possibly a twoyear budget plan that allows the agencies to know what they will be funded for. At cherry point, we get the workload from other d. O. D. Agencies, and when they do not know what their funding levels are going to be, it is difficult for them to give us the forecast on what workload they will be sending into us. With the staff being very trade driven and getting that right skillset in those positions when we are not funded or do not know what the funding is going to be up front, it takes we cant bring someone in off of the street, and put them in the sheet medal world and say, go forward and make an aircraft. We need someone that can be in there and can be trained and so that we have the adequate staffing for those positions. So i think that having the budget in place early instead of waiting until half of the year is has gone by, and then trying to bring in additional supports that now the customer has been able to fund, it is difficult with the trying to flex our work staff to accommodate that the workload. Thinking about this, and you are competing with the private sector, and they have ups and down, and the private sector, and some of the companies that you deal with and contract with, but they have a more predictable budget, and in other words, that they make a decision, and they may end up not being in the black for the whole year because of that. And then they may have to make adjustments typically after the fact, but in the meantime, they know what the budget is going to be for the year. Having a couple of years in those companies have much longer period of time to train people or to get them up or so on would be a disadvantage. Yes, and that would help with us the succession planning, and knowing which positions were critical, and that we needed to make sure that we were able to hire people or have people in the positions for potential retir retirees because of the aging workforce and with our limited budget, and not being able to bring in new employees to have them trained up oftentimes restricts the ability to be able to seamlessly move forward when we lose. And how about the separation issue. Do you want to talk about that quickly . Well, id be happy to. In my testimony, i talked about Forum Shopping, and that is the most effective way that we could deal with this issue which is having a single avenue of appeal for performance issues. Currently, there are multiple avenue avenues of appeal or they can drag out separations, you know, by appealing to, you know, Union Grievances or eeo processes or the ig and the complaints. And so i think that we could speed up the system that way. I dont think that anybody at this table feels that we, you know, should keep bad performers on, and we were all interested in, you know, expedite ing ting removal of employees who should be removed for performance. Id like to return to the hiring issue for one second. I think that part of what we are talking about here is a systemic issue in the federal government. No corporation in the world would have a Human Resources office that does not serve as the principle adviser to its operating units on issues like hiring. On issues like separation. Unfortunately, i think that what has happened with opm, they have delegated much of the authorities that they have to the agencies on the transaction issues and how you hire, et cetera. But there was not a concurrent upgrading of the opm to serve as that corporate adviser for the federal government. Let me give you a specific ex example. I was heading up a hr shop, and my senior managements asked me to come up with an lytics plana plan, and just what you were talking about, and so i was not an expert in that area, and neither was opm, and if you think about it, they should be. They should be providing to the agencies advice of how to manage the workforces and make it easier for them to do it. And i have before me the title v, the u. S. Code that governing pes nepersonnel in the federal government, and i have three volumes of the guidance on this, and no federal manager can possibly understand all of this, a and so when you are mentioning, mr. Chairman, 105 hiring authorities, and that is the first time that i have heard that number, and then when i was in the federal government i probably knew of 5 or 10 of them. And so if i were trained as a g manager by opm as to what is available to me, it would make a much more effective federal government i think. And then in terms of the performance measures, im a big fan of p. A. R. T. And the agency i worked was the first p. A. R. T. Ed, and it was a refreshing exercise, but we should build on the experience in a way to incentivize agencies and personnel to relook at how they view risk and reward within the system. Omb just sent out information about revised circular a123 and talk ed about the enterprise risk management. That is the fundamentally different way of viewing how you trun f run the federal government. You want to encourage risk and reward, and this is the same with the Performance Management for employees, because you want to encourage the risk and the rewards for those high flying innovative employees. Thank you. My time has expire and if there is any more i think that mr. Cox is going to burst if he could not comment on that. Senator portman, i agree, and in looking at with removing poor performers, the probationary period, i dont think is adequately looked at a and reviewed by managers. High number of federal employees the one year period . High, high numbers have a twoyear period, and now in all of d. O. D. , it is two year, and most of the title 38 and the v. A. Are two years. So id say that we are moving pretty much to way over 50 of the federal government and if not 70 in a twoyear probationary period. There needs to be strong Management Training, and there needs to be on going dialogue, and interacting with employees, and evaluating the performance. I supervise and manage employees myself in aag, and i know that within six months whether they are going to make it or not. That period, many times people do not Pay Attention to that. I think that is a very, very valuable thing. Valuable, because . Because in the probationary period, it is thank you very much, go away. And even the career employees. It is a 30day notice. From i notify you today 30 days from today, you can be removed off of the rolls, and you are not paid. Now, the grievance process may go on, and you may be able to forum shop, but you can only choose one for um, and once you have elected it, that is it. You cant keep jumping from one system to the next. Again, if people continue on the rolls for a long period of time, i look to the management colleagues, because the law is very, very clear, 30 days, you are out that door, and that is your problem. And back to the long time of hiring. The issues of the investigation, and the security clearance, and opm has contracted all of that o out. The 1984 from the day i asked for an application to go to work at the v. A. As a registered nurse, i fill ed it out, and wa interviewed and was selected and went through a security clearance and had a physical, and gave notice of my other job, and was on the job in less than 28 days. That is because you are such an extraordinary human being. And they were doing a fair number, and to be honest, the security and the background and the suitability, and we dont want people who are not suitable working in the government, and our environment has created that, but still, yet, i agree with what my colleagues have said that many times, you can bring the people on, and if you are going to get bad information, there is a probationary period, and you can let them go. I appreciate that. And in the clearance process, we passed legislation to not only just expedite it, but put some resources against it because of the backlogs and this is a huge issue of the hiring process. And i a ap preeppreciate the ap process that you talked about. Because we want to have a sense that some people believe that it does not matter, but it is an important part of empowering people. Thank you, senator portman. Can i read a truly bold, and i like bold statements that mr. Cox wrotet in the written testimony that i would love for us to have a conversation on that, and mr. Cox without embarrassing you, i want to quote you. When poor performers are not dealt with, it is never because the civil laws or procedures are too difficult to navigate, but rather because some managers do not want to take the time and the effort to document poor performance and remove and demote poor performers or because they lack the knowledge, skills and ability to do that. I would love to have a conversation about this, because i have heard this back and forth. And senator . If i could build on that, because i think that one of the areas that i completely agree with mr. Cox is in management supervision. So you will get the absolute best floor nurse, and you promote her to a el role where he or she is going to be doing scheduli scheduling. Maybe not even interested in it, but in order to move up the pay ranks tashgs that a promotion that you will do it. And we dont say, heres the bundle of supervisory training that we are going to be giving you Management Training to see if this is something that you can do, and in fact, maybe the best nurse manager would be somebody who is not a very good nurse. So that is one of the challenges. And included with this issue, id like to throw in the bill that i have introduced which is the supervisory bill, and i want to introduce it again in the 5 115th. And so to senator langfords point, how much of the quality supervisory training take care of a lot of the problems that we are talking about today rather than simply, you know, arbitrary, you know, now we are going to be reducing, you know, probationary times and the easy fixes that dont really fix anythi anything. Senator, i would agree with mr. Cox on the issue of the manager, but you have to understand that the managers are torn many different ways day in, day out. The Human Capital experts on the employee relations, and we have hugely reduced the staffs with reductions over the last 15 years. In the air force i would say 50 reduction on our Personnel Management side of the house. Because with all of the budget challenges and the mission and the support side, those staffs have taken a disproportionate hit. Managers day in, day out are weighing in the value of pursuing the disciplinary action of knowing the commitment on their part that it is going to take to complete it, but they are turning a blind eye. The managers do not have the time equal to the duties. Even with the oneyear probationary period, it is very difficult to take everything that is required in that time peri period. And so with that 70 of the workforce well, i would say that sipnc i retired in october, they dont know what the experience has been i want to say that i have managed, you know, by this town not a big workforce but i have run big organizations in north dakota with Property Rights to the jobs and you had to go through the process, and never would have taken me two years to know that i didnt need somebody in the workforce. So to suggest that this is the end all, and beall, it is problematic to me, because maybe this spern a wonderful person with the right supervisory skills and could emerge as one of the best employee s ths that have, but if you dont have attention, focus by the managers of developing the skillsets of who they are, i dont see any amount of time, and you know, and what is the old idiom that, you know, work expands for the time that you have given to fill it. You know, two years, 15 months, i dont know, it does not seem to me that is the fix to the problem that we have that we have Public Employees who stay on the rolls too long in an illfitting position, and managers who dont know how to inspire and train employees to be good employees. So, i completely agree with you, and i complete li ly agreeh mr. Cox. And the senator langford, and completely agree with him. Yes. Everybody. Im in complete agreement. One thing that happened to me as a new ses is that i denied an employee a promotion. That employee then filed a grievance on me for age discrimination. It took me six months to resolve that. The end result was that, you know, i denied her the promotion. But it was weary and very time consuming. After that, i became the manager of the departments eeo shop. What i found there was that there was a lot of Forum Shopping. People came in and adverse personnel action against them, and they would be seeking a way to redress that, and you know, address it through the employment, and you know, the eeo process. A lot of this gets to, and i really support your notion of the supervisory training, because it is certainly needed. Managers do need to know what their rights are, and in my testimony, we talk about it a lot, and we also talk about the agency culture, you know. It is now coming to the point with a lot of the agencies, and i will speak mostly about the department of energy where it is considered to be too much trouble to deal with the poor performers, and that you, you know, as bob said, you know, you have so many constraints on the time that you just want to make these things go away. Can i ask for the clarification because of the paperwork requirement, the number of hearings, because you have mentioned ate couple of time, and one of things that has come up often is that if the managers document and during the evaluations show the lower evaluation, and have the meetings with someone saying, hey, you are not performing and i will put this in the file, and we need you to perform better, then that dismissal will go fast, but if the managers are not putting the pap ework in the file or the meetings, this is a lot more complicated right or wrong . Well, with the proper documentation, the employees can go Forum Shopping. You rated the performance versely, because you are discriminated against them for example or that you were favoring other employees and not them. So that is going to go into the separate processes, and gets you involved in a number of forums, but i think that the real issue that we are talking about here is that you need to change the culture of the agency, and that can be done with the supervisory training, but you also need to make it clear to, you know, managers and supervise ers that they do have a responsibility po the taxpayer that they will be dealing with the poor per for formers and take that as part of the everyday job. Is that part of the supervisor or the managers yearly evaluation of how they handle it . How are they, when they are evaluated, because i asked opm for evaluation, and i have a copy of the ses Performance Management system executive agreement in the annual evaluation. There is a section in it as i go through it that the it takes about leading people. But it has a long list of all of the things that are in the criteria, and one line of it is holds employees accountable for appropriate level of performance and conduct, and seeks employee performance and Diverse Workforce to reflect the nation of skills, and needs to accomplish the organization of skills but it is a long list of thing s in it, and so my question is if managers are held into account, is this considered important for their evaluation to know that it is important in the way they manage and evalu e evaluate. In my experience, no. Any opinion mr. Corsi or johnson . In my opinion, does it not. Ms. Johnson . I know that within our agency, we have requirements in t the performance that we are graded on to say that sit is a truly a reflection of the way that we are graded at the end, i dont know that if that is completely true. It is one of the things they look at, and say, that most people live up to what they know that they are being scored on. My daughter studies on the things the most that will be on the test. We all do. If i notate end of the year, there is going to be a test of hiring and how i put together the criteria for that and documented the issues both good and bad and how i encouraged the employees in the training, and how i helped to facilitate a workforce and if i know that is a major part of the evaluation, i would accomplish that, because it is part tof the evaluation, and i would recommend, and we have not talked about this yet, but that we get the opportunity to go to work with opm on how everyone is evaluate and the key criteria of that. Senator. I am thinking back to the days of working in the va Medical Center, and there were various units that always had people wanting to go work on that unit number one, because it was a great nurse manager. The care for the veterans was superb, and the ratings that the veterans gave was great and everybody seemed happy and give and take mode of always getting the scheduling done and the work done, and if there was someone who was slacking, the group would immediately take care of it. Then there would be a unit where nobody wanted to go to work, and it was a disastrous all of the way through, and it usually had to do with the management skills. I suspect that some of my colleagues here probably have managed units where the they are always trying to get the people to go to work and other places where the people are begging, and moving me to that section. I would welcome that opportunity for for afg and congress and the Association Managers for some ous to do some type of studies in the workplace. There is things that motivate people, and what is it that creates good managers, and makes people want to go work with that group and perform well, and i find good leaders always seem to attract good employees, and that even makes them a better leader, and so i dont have all of that pulled together, and not quite the researcher, but i have seen this happen well in organizations. Thank you. Ms. Johnson . Yes. And it will add to what mr. Cox has mentioned. I think that often tootimes wit the federal government we bring people in on the technical side, and they are very good at that, and as senator hydecamp had mentioned we move them into the management, and they may not have the management skillsets to be successful in managing, but they feel like that is the only way that they can continue to progress the career is by going into the management field. So having that dual track that i know that you support to track to have an opportunity to bring in the managers with the soft skills and to have the management skills that can be successful in managing the workforce. And they no how to manage a workforce is very important, and providing adequate training for new managers whenever they come into the workforce, and not only for dealing with the processes, but ensuring that they have that soft skill as well. To be able to successfully manage employees is very important. Yes, mr. Valdez. I u wou i would encourage to think more about that, and we are highly supportive of building a leadership pipeline within the federal government, and leadership of leading people is fundamentally different than managing an organization. And so we are supportive of developing leaders down at the gs9 or the gs11 level in providing them with the skills that they require as they move up the management ranks to be able to effectively lead organizations and get to the point where mr. Cox was saying that they are a preferred employer. Currently, there is no such thing in the federal government. Are you familiar with my bill . No. It would be great if you would look at it, and make any suggestions that your organization wants to make. I totally agree. I think that you can take that great nurse and during the period of time provide leadership, and have them understand the dynamics of the group, and actually move them into the management way if you build leaders. I could not agree with you more. I think that our challenge right now is that we looked for the easy, you know, the easy fix. None of this is easy and growing leadership and management skills, because it is two sides of the same, you know, coin. It is not easy, but people have to see that there is some b benefit in their career to take that on, and lets talk about the senior nurse or in my case, i will give you a personal example, and one of my first jobs working in the Legal Section of the Tax Department in my state. The man who head ed that up, th general counsel probably one of the best attorneys in the state of north dakota and probably one of the best attorneys that i have ever worked with, and i have worked with great attorney s, but he was not exactly a good manager. You know, but i learned so much from him that it gave me the confidence to move forward. We should reward him and rather than putting the management responsibility, we should reward him for being a mentor in place for building the capacity and building the leadership. You know, i understand that there has to be a hierarchy, but the best organizations have an invisible hierarchy, and unified consistent purpose in what they are doing, and people know everybodys role, and what their responsibilities are, and they come to a point of achievement together. So that is not easy all of the time when you are trying to take, you know, my dads army, and you know, dont ask questions, just march in that, but it is not the army anymore and i would not be successful to recruit to that model anymore. So we have to get a wway from t old ideas and the thinking of hierarchy, and start to think of leadership and management. I would totally welcome any input that you v and we have not introduced it yet, but i would be curious. And let me give you one further input while i have the chance. Training budgets have been sl h slashed throughout the federal government, and usual will i one of the first things that go. I think that one of the things that you should consider when you are thinking about this training is giving the agencies funding and finding ways to carve out dead gated line item funding for this kind of training, because it does not exist, and it is the first thing that is cut. I would say that you wont find disagreement with us on that, and you and i both know that training is often farmed out to some outside group and they come in and the employees sometimes find it helpful, but sometimes they dont. Sometimes the way they end up doing training ends up on the waste list, and what are we paying for that for, and make sure that the training is effective. We are not just saying, that we are supposed to do training on a budget, and this is a nearby contractor and we can do it and check the box that the training was done, when nobody saw that it was useful at the end of it. And i have another appointment to rush off to, and i wanted to also ask that a stimt of the national treasurys Employment Union be entered into the record. Without objection. So we are okay. And so i look forward to the continuing discussion, and i want to thank senator langford for making the federal workforce a major priority of the committee. We started it last congress and we will continue, and so dont feel that this is the one chance, because we want to hear from you, and im always amazed when we get into the discussions how no matter the perspective, we come down to the same thing, and so that means that there is an answer. So if we make the investment of time on the oversight side of the dias to listen to what you are all challenged with that we can make real progress, and maybe we can have fewer employees if we have happier and more productive employees and less turnover. So there is a way to do this without withoutic breaking any budgets. Yes. And we will be here for six minutes or so and try top wrap it up. So if people are wondering if we are going to 7 00 p. M. , no, we wont. We will be about six minutes, and that is fine, because i totally understand. One thing is that we are building a bucket for Nick Mulvaney when he comes in to lead, and our conversations have been, and it is not a Budget Office but a Management Office as well, and we fully expect the management side to be aggressive in trying to fix some of the broken systems there. And it is something that beth culvert worked very hard on with the opm and faced the frustrations as well, and we will anticipate a new opm director, and step in to finish some of the work that has been start and get done. That is part of the oversight, and one of the bungtings and the other bucket is legislative in the way or overly complicated or needs to be fixed with the process system. So as you have ideas with these things, we are welcome, and the oversight ways and things that wed need to engage is on the legislative side. And another thing that we need to get input, because it is new, and mr. Cox, you mentioned nilt the testimony which is the d. O. D. Process of new beginnings in trying to work towards a meritbased and addressing in some ways the gs system to say, is there a better way to do this . This is a fivehour conversation to cram into five minutes, but it is new, and rolled out, and part of it for us is the of sight part of it, and part of it, and the larger part of the question is what concerns you and what excites you about that process of the new beinninginni being rolled out. What insight do you have . Mr. Cox . What excites me is that it is a joint cooperative partnership between the labor and management and working through it together. Figuring out how to best recognize and take care of the good employees and also pfor th managers to i listen to input of the unions of how to measure and to evaluate Performance Management. It is working good from the top to where it is the rubber meeting the road between the front line supervisor and a Front Line Group of employees, that there is not as much attention that the level of train training and working together with the pentagon and the various levels of the d. O. D. In the written testimony the you made an interesting statement saying that the man e managers need courage which i thought that it was interesting statement to make. Which is to address the issues there, and confront those and not be passive in how i took it. And also to step in and affirm. Most of the workforce feels that the promotions are on merit, but i did not mention in a similar study that 37 of the federal employees are affirmed for positive things in the workplace, so a vast majority of them dont feel verbally affirmed for taking on and doing a good job which is by far most of them are. So that affirmation process is also something to look at. And mr. Corsi . Very positive with the new beginnings working with the union, and we went from pass fail to three tiers to recognize outstanding performance, and the biggest challenge is to require the manager to have more face to face discussions with the member, and talking about performance and, pecktations. And feedback and more dialogue, a ped so there are no surprises in the evaluation process. If you can now tie new beginnings to a system like the demonstration projects out there right now which are all pay for performance, you have the Evaluation System to go with the pay system which can be a winwin situation. Okay. Great. You said it correctly at the beginning when you said that we have a 20th or maybe 19th century, you nknow workforce structure nor 21st century missions. And so the Senior Executive association is fully engaged and ready to work with you and anybody else, to get modernization of the workforce. We are supportive of the new beginnings, but we would like to see a wholesale top to bottom review of the general schedule, and also frankly of the Senior Executive service. What is the current role in and purpose within the federal government to today. Let me throw out the unfair question to you. How long does new beginnings need to be out there to get a good feel for what is working and not working before it transitions into the gsa. Is that five years or three years or other demonstration programs out there much longer . Here is what i hear and whew i bring it up. People consistently saying that we need to address the gs system, and then right behind it they say, it is the most painful experience that the federal government has taken on and i would never ever touch it if i were you, but we need to do it, so the question is how do you get a good read for it to know that this works well. The management, the afg and even says it is a good functioning system, and now try to multiply it to outside senator, three to. Because they have phased it in, and once everybody is transitioned, it will take some years beyond that to look at the assessments to see if there have been adjustments. Ms. Johnson. The new beginnings, and it is positive to have the additional conversations with the employees to understand what their goals are, and oftentimes, there is a conversation at the beginning of the grading not give the employees the opportunity to understand how theyre performing during that period, so that they can make improvements, give the management the opportunity to give suggestions to the employees on how they can improve their performance and also to recognize theyre good performance during that period instead of waiting till the end of the grading period to even recognize good performance. And as far as how long we need to look at the system, i do feel like that there were some good opportunities with snps whenever that was rolled out. I think there were areas that it needed some improvement, but i think instead of trying to make that system better, we ended that system and went back to the gs system which is very old and does not lend itself to recognize our good employees and be able to adjust within that system to for hiring practices and so i think i dont know that i can put a time frame on it but i do think we need to make sure that we are looking at the system and making sure that weve utilized all of the opportunity for a new system before we just say its not going to work. Okay. Theres a tremendous amount we can still talk about as i mentioned before, several of you put things in your written testimony that we never even got to today. Those are a part of the record. Theyre not being ignored. We just we could be here a very long time talking through those issues. I do appreciate both your written statements and your oral statements and the conversation we can have. And so we look forward to working with mick mulvaney, to be able to help share some ideas with him as well. So before we adjourn, i do need to announce that we hope to have a hearing on thursday, march the 9th to discuss the use of data around the regulatory process. I will conclude todays hearing. I do want to say thank you to you before we conclude for all the work and preparation that you did on this. The hearing record will remain open for 15 days until the close of business on february the 24th for the submission of statements and questions for the record. This hearing is adjourned. Elsewhere on capitol hill today the senate will swearin Alabama Attorney general to fill the senate seat vacated by jeff sessions. Writing hell serve until an election is held to fill the remaineder of sessions terms. The election will be held in 2018 but its not clear yet whether it will fall on election day or earlier in the year. Read more at the hill. Com. Coming up this afternoon cspan3 will bring the use of future toward policy toward russia and ukraine. Thats live at 3 00 p. M. Eastern over on our companion network c span. This weekend on American History tv, on cspan3. Saturday morning at 10 eastern, formal law clerks of Supreme Court Justice Marshal examine his legacy and opinions on landmark cases. Why was he the most important lawyer of the 20th century, it was because he did more justice for more people than any other lawyer did. And to feel as though you had been picked somehow, you had won this lottery so that you got to spend a year with this incredible man, was a very, very special thing. Then at 8 00 on lectures in history a 1964 black Voter Registration project in mississippi. In 1963 the Voter Education project discontinued funding for mississippi and you know this because ann moody talks about it in coming of age, the checks stopped coming. They had the fewest results of any state in the Voter Registration project. Black voting went from 5. 3 to 6. 7 . Thats it. Thats what they got for two years of beatings and arrests. Sunday afternoon at 4 00 on real america, the 1982 pbs documentary the regulators, focusing on pollution regulation in the national parks. Congressman paul rodgers an author of the monumental 1970 Clean Air Act was now revising that law. All though a great deal had been accomplished in cleaning up the nations air, the anderson slides were alarming evidence that the parks were still unprotected. And at 6 30 historians talk about the movement and groups that were part of the Counter Culture in the 1960s and 70s. Our more the kind of people i think we should be interested in as scholars and what i want to talk about here is not so much the Counter Culture as spec ta ankle or a series of iconic events or six or eight celebrity figures but as a project. As a way in which a group of people try to do something in realtime. Announcer for our complete American History tv schedule, go to cspan. Org. Now utility officials from primarily rural states discuss infrastructure funding needs and modernization efforts with lawmakers on capitol hill. They testify before the Senate Environment and public works committee, state