That’s My Story

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By Dan Gephart, July 18, 2018

I’m married to a talented and successful children’s book author. She tells stories for a living. I’m proud of the work she does because she tells the stories of people from whom we don’t often hear. And her stories evoke empathy, which is sorely lacking in our world today.

But published authors aren’t the only ones who tell stories. We all have stories.

In these hyper-partisan times, opposing stories can quickly subsume a federal workplace in conflict.

The stories we carry don’t come in chapters or wrapped in fancy book covers. And they don’t end when you turn the last page. The stories are buried on top of each other deep within us and they shade the way we address everything and everyone. We think our stories are 100 percent truth. But the real truth is that even the most accurate stories we tell have a decent percentage that belongs on the fiction shelves.

Whether you are a supervisor, an HR professional, or an EEO practitioner, you need to understand your own stories, as you navigate those of your employees. We may not agree with the stories we hear, but we need to listen. That’s not to say that every story we hear needs to be validated and acted upon. But you don’t get to truth by shouting over someone.

I find the work of agency investigators to be fascinating. They are looking for answers in some of the most emotionally draining and intellectually challenging situations, whether they are investigating simple misconduct or harassment.

In one of our recent on-site trainings, Meghan Droste presented agency officials a thorough dive into the administrative investigation process. Reviewing the materials recently, the section on interviewing stood out. It was great information for investigators, but something that can benefit everyone. Meghan laid out clearly the difference between interrogations and interviews.

  • While interrogations aim for a confession, interviews seek to gather information.
  • An interrogation is structured. Interviews are free-flowing.
  • And here’s the big one: Interrogations are more speaking than listening. Meghan put the ratio at 95 talking to 5 percent listening. Interviews, on the other hand, are all about listening. The ratio is flipped the other way.

If we approach our discussions with our colleagues, peers, subordinates, and supervisors more as interviews, and less as interrogations, we might be able to better understand each other’s stories.

Anyway, that’s my story. And I’m sticking to it. Gephart@FELTG.com

Why Do We Hide This Stuff?

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By William Wiley, July 18, 2018

Here’s the beginning of a story that recently ran on the first page of the Style section of the Washington Post:

The Washington Post has dismissed a reporter for inadequately attributing material and closely parroting sentences from other publications in articles based on outside news sources. The reporter, [Jane Doe], 26, was let go last week before completing the newsroom’s mandatory nine-month probationary period for new employees. The Post’s editors found that she used without proper attribution reporting by at least a dozen other news organizations in articles she wrote since being hired in October.

The article goes on from here, describing the misconduct in detail as well as giving a bit of history about the (now former) employee’s resume.

Are you blown away by this? Isn’t it illegal or something to disclose the details of an individual’s termination? In fact, we’ve even Jane Doe-ed her real name here in our newsletter. We sure don’t want to reveal names in the federal government.

Well, maybe we should.

Most members of the public, as well as a lot of federal employees themselves, believe that a federal employee cannot be fired. Both Congress and the White House keep trying to make it easier to hold employees accountable for their performance and conduct by loosening the rules. We are on the verge of losing our civil service protections altogether if a couple of outlier Congressional bills become law, bills that would make the federal civil service “employment at will.”

In reality, hundreds of individuals are fired from federal agencies every month. Some are in unions while others do not have the extra protections that unions bargain for their members. Some are probationers, and some are tenured career employees. At least that’s what OPM statistics tell us, statistics that are consistent with MSPB’s annual report of appeals. But how would anyone know that if they were not an insider in the system, familiar with OPM and MSPB reports, or a reader of our beloved FELTG Newsletter?

You’re probably thinking that there must be a federal law that prohibits the disclosure of such information. Why would we make such a big deal out of it if there weren’t? Well, I’ve been looking for 40 years for a law or regulation that would prohibit the disclosure of the identity of and circumstances surrounding terminated civil servants, and I can’t find one. In fact, of the few cases that touch on the subject, the federal courts have come down on the side of mandating the disclosure of such information when it is requested under the Freedom of Information Act, at least for the more senior employees of an agency. When we’re talking about government employees, the balance between the individual’s rights to privacy, and the rights of the public to know about misconduct and unacceptable performance, the public’s need for information usually gets the judicial nod.

The Privacy Act often is referenced as the authority for not releasing information about employee malfeasance. However, that law allows for the release of information for a “routine use.” If OPM government-wide or an agency in its own Federal Register announcement would state that the release of discipline and conduct information by name was a routine use for collecting the record, that would seem to satisfy the legal requirements for privacy.

The salary and cash awards of federal employees are already a matter of public record, available on the web. There’s a relatively mundane need for the public to know that information. We can certainly make a good argument that knowing who has engaged in misconduct harming the government so much that they had to be fired serves a greater public good. Bar association discipline records are available for public review by the name of the offending attorney. Keeping the names of misbehaving federal employees secret enables that person to move on to other positions in which he can repeat his harmful ways. If a federal employee was fired for violent behavior, wouldn’t it serve a public good to make the public aware of who that person is? How about being fired for sexual harassment?

President Trump, through his recent Executive Order, has mandated the centralized collection of a lot of information about civil servants who are disciplined. For the sake of the public as well as for the sake of the federal employees who do good work and who obey the rules, perhaps it’s time that government agencies publicized their discipline and removal actions. If you’re a Big Coward, remove the names, but at least start to get the word out to the broad media that bad employees are fired from their government positions every day for good reasons. Maybe that will reduce the pressure that’s starting to build to do away with the idea of a protected civil service altogether. Wiley@FELTG.com

Let’s Embrace Change

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By Dan Gephart, July 9, 2018

Hello FELTG Nation!

Do you mind if we talk about change?

As I write this, I’m gazing at a For Sale sign that looks oddly out of place on my sun burnt front lawn. This concrete box I sit in has sheltered numerous Gephart humans and four-legged creatures since the new millennium. I’m not just leaving this house, though. I’ll be fleeing the Sunshine State, which has been home since my two adult sons were toddlers, or as we affectionately call them here “gator brunch.”

And that’s not even the biggest change. This week I started a new job for the first time in more than 23 years. Twenty-three years! That was so long ago, Al Gore was still reinventing government and smashing ashtrays.

But I don’t need to tell you about change.

You live with change every day.

I know. As the former long-time program chair of a certain federal training conference that I will not name (rhymes with FDR), I saw how change, along with fear of the unknown, drives people to training sessions.

Change leads to overcrowded classes about transgender employees. It packs rooms of HR professionals trying to figure out how to stop sexual harassment claims. It leaves people willfully standing for three-hour workshops to hear the latest guidance on how to handle reasonable accommodation requests for telework.

And I haven’t even mentioned the concern and confusion surrounding the president’s recent civil service-related Executive Orders or plans to reorganize the federal government.

Change can be stressful, unpredictable, and downright scary.

But change can also be, and often is, good.

Agencies should be more inclusive to all employees, and that means educating yourself about transgender workplace issues. We must hold accountable those managers and employees who practice harassment of any type. You’d better know what to do when an employee asks you for a reasonable accommodation.

These new executive orders, at least the ones dealing with performance, actually provide a great opportunity to more efficiently handle poor performers.

And if you think requests for telework are going to decrease anytime soon, I have some Florida swampland to sell you. No, really, I do. It’s a three-bedroom in a nice family neighborhood. Competitively priced. Give me a call.

Embrace that fear of the unknown. Lean into it. As someone much smarter than I said: Change is the only constant in life.

Change has landed me here at FELTG. This is a dream come true. I couldn’t be happier and more excited to work with Bill Wiley and Deb Hopkins, and the uber-talented group of FELTG instructors, including legends Barbara Haga and Ernie Hadley. These fine people work tirelessly to improve the quality and efficiency of the federal workplace. I don’t use the word tirelessly lightly. I’ve seen their schedules.

I also appreciate the chance to continue working with all of you – the faithful civil servants who loyally serve the taxpayers despite sometimes undesirable working conditions and constantly shifting political agendas, all the while ducking the uninformed insults regularly hurled your way.

Let’s step into this change together. It may be challenging, but nobody said we couldn’t have fun while navigating it. Gephart@FELTG.com