U.S. Office of Personnel Management
           Office of Merit Systems Oversight and Effectiveness
           


  
                       Report of a Special Study
                                
                                
                                
                                
                           POOR PERFORMERS 
                                 IN
                             GOVERNMENT:
                                 A
                              Quest for
                            the True Story




















                                                    January 1999





                          TABLE OF CONTENTS


                                 

   I.  Executive summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1

  II.  Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .3

 III.  Employee sample . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .5

  IV.  Personnel action sample. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .19

   V.  The non-federal environment. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .27

  VI.  Conclusions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .31

 VII.  Recommendations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .35
                                
                                
                                
                                
                                




















                      I.  EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

As part of its Fiscal Year 1998 oversight program, the Office of 
Personnel Management (OPM) examined the pervasive suspicion that 
there are too many poor performers in the Federal government.  To 
do this, we identified a random sample of employees and 
interviewed their supervisors about the performance of all 
employees in the work unit, about the causes of poor performance, 
what was done to address the problem, and what results had been 
achieved.  In a separate interview sample, we contacted 
supervisors who had successfully taken a formal personnel action 
against a poor performer, to record their experiences and the 
lessons they learned.  Finally, we looked at the private sector 
and the non-Federal public sector for points of comparison.

Our key findings and conclusions are summarized as follows.

*    Our best estimate of the proportion of poor performers in the 
     Federal workforce is 3.7 percent.  While there are no good 
     benchmarks in the private or non-Federal public sectors for 
     comparing this finding, it is lower than the "common wisdom" 
     would lead us to believe.  We do not believe it reflects a 
     serious performance problem in the Federal government.

*    As a whole, the supervisors of poor performers have not 
     surrendered to cynicism or despair.  Many report that they 
     are actively pursuing a solution through formal and informal 
     means.

*    Supervisors report success with rehabilitating a substantial 
     number of workers who were poor performers at one time.

*    The legal protections available to employees in non-Federal 
     public and private organizations are often similar to the 
     Federal system, and the trend seems to be toward increasing 
     these protections.  Federal supervisors and managers may be 
     yearning in vain for a dramatic easing of their burdens and 
     responsibilities in this regard.

*    The workforce's misperception of the facts revealed by this 
     study is substantial and could be diverting our attention 
     from other important issues and from developing a realistic 
     approach to addressing poor performance.

*    Supervisors who have pursued formal performance-based 
     personnel actions describe the experience in intensely 
     emotional terms.  The effort they put forth to overcome real 
     and perceived obstacles may be characterized as "heroic."  Of 
     particular concern is their frequent perception that top 
     management did not welcome their efforts.






*    Supervisors typically receive a general orientation to poor
     performance regulations and procedures during their initial 
     supervisory training.  Supervisors are unanimous in saying 
     this approach is nearly useless.  They want and need "just in 
     time" training and counseling, including ready resource 
     materials.  OPM's CD-ROM guide, Addressing and Resolving Poor 
     Performance, is just what the doctor ordered.   









                      II.  INTRODUCTION
                                 
                   The truth is out there. 
                     -  Slogan from the TV series,  "The X-Files"

There is a prevailing perception about public service employment:  
poor performance is a big problem.  Moreover, civil service 
employees are among the first to speak up about the situation.  In 
questionnaire after questionnaire, civil service employees express 
disdain for a management team that they say cannot or will not 
remove from their midst co-workers who are not carrying their 
share of the load.  In a 1997 report entitled Adherence to the 
Merit Principles in the Workplace, the Merit System Protection 
Board reported that, among the 9,700 Federal employees it 
surveyed, the issue of handling poor performance was the deepest 
area of concern.  Nearly half of the respondents said that 
agencies had a major problem correcting poor performance, and even 
more said the same thing about the firing of poor performers.  

{... the full text of the following paragraph includes a GRAPHIC 
which cannot be rendered in this ASCII format....}
OPM's own Merit System Principles Questionnaire (MSPQ) 
consistently finds that most employees do not believe corrective 
action is taken when employees do not meet performance 
expectations.  An even smaller percentage believe that poor 
performance is successfully corrected or that employees will be 
removed or leave the organization for inadequate performance.

Civil service supervisors join this chorus of complaint.  In a 
1995 Merit Systems Protection Board report entitled Removing Poor 
Performers in the Federal Service, supervisors indicated that:  
they frequently receive inadequate or confusing advice and 
assistance on performance matters; the procedures for dealing with 
poor performance are too complicated, time consuming, or onerous; 
they do not get higher level management support; and they perceive 
their decisions will be reversed or that they will be falsely 
accused of discrimination in their actions.  Many supervisors also 
report there is little negative cost to them for taking no action. 

The complaints are not new.  In a 1978 report entitled A
Management Concern: How to Deal with the Nonproductive Federal 
Employee, the General Accounting Office found that:

         Supervisors and managers perceive firing as a difficult 
         chore which often lacks top-level management support.  

         People at all levels fear reprisals from employees who 
         may file adverse action appeals, discrimination 
         complaints, and lawsuits...Removal procedures are 
         complex, especially the detail and specificity required 
         in stating reasons for removal; the process is also 
         lengthy and time consuming.  Supervisors and managers 
         instead tend to use an informal system of working around, 
         isolating, reassigning, sending to long-term training, or 
         even promoting unsatisfactory employees.




The Congress responded to these concerns by passing the Civil
Service Reform Act of 1978, which instituted a new set of 
processes for setting performance expectations and for dealing 
with those who fail to meet those expectations.  Twenty years 
later, the National Performance Review (now the National 
Partnership for Reinventing Government) surveyed the results of 
the Government's reformed processes and found them still sorely 
lacking.  In the 1993 report Creating Government that Works Better 
and Costs Less, Vice President Gore called for initiatives to 
"reduce by half the time required to terminate Federal managers 
and employees for cause," to "develop a culture that supports 
supervisors' efforts to deal with poor performers," and  to 
"improve supervisors' knowledge and skills in dealing with poor 
performers."   

While there can be no doubt that dealing with poor performance is 
an issue in the Federal civil service, there is an insidious 
corollary to this idea, an implication that is not often spoken 
openly but which is inescapable:  there are too many poor 
performers in the Government.  If you don't floss your teeth for 
twenty years, the tartar will build up.  This unsettling notion 
that the Government is harboring an ever-increasing number of poor 
performers tarnishes the whole institution, fueling the negative 
attitudes of a public predisposed to criticize it.

As part of its Fiscal Year 1998 oversight program, OPM examined 
the foundation for the suspicion that the Government has too many 
poor performers.  To do this, we identified a random sample of 
employees and interviewed their supervisors.  For those employees 
identified as "poor performers," we asked the supervisor what 
caused the employee's poor performance, what was done to address 
the problem, and what had been achieved as a result.  In a 
separate interview sample, we contacted supervisors who had 
successfully taken a formal action to deal with a poor performer, 
to obtain descriptions of their experiences, and to record the 
lessons they learned.  Finally, we looked at the private sector 
and the non-Federal public sector for points of comparison.  The 
stated criticism that it is "too difficult" and the implied 
criticism there are "too many" suggest that these problems are 
less prevalent outside the Federal government.  We wanted to test 
this hypothesis and find out if it might be true. 
 






                     III.  EMPLOYEE SAMPLE

       By a small sample, we may judge of the whole piece.
                                - Miguel de Cervantes            

METHODOLOGY

In the past, OPM successfully conducted Governmentwide 
classification surveys using random sampling and telephone 
interviews.  We decided that a similar random sample/ telephone 
interview methodology could be used to answer our question about 
"how many" poor performers there are.

As a first step, we drew a random list of 200 employees from the 
Central Personnel Data File (CPDF).  Data for September 1997 was 
used.  We then contacted the servicing personnel office to locate 
the name and phone number of the listed employee's supervisor.  
However, when we finally contacted that supervisor, we completely 
disregarded the named employee and interviewed the supervisor 
about the performance of all the employees under his or her 
immediate supervision.  It was the aggregate of all the employees 
in all these supervisors' work groups that became our random 
sample.

This technique is called "cluster sampling," a generally accepted 
statistical sampling method that is used when a list of the entire 
population is not readily available or for administrative 
convenience.  In cluster sampling, members of the population are 
not chosen directly.  Rather, population members are sampled by 
randomly choosing easily identifiable groups (i.e., "clusters") of 
these members.  In our methodology, the employees in a particular 
work unit were randomly identified by selecting the name of one 
unit member at random from CPDF.  

Estimates derived from a cluster sample are computed in special 
ways to reflect the indirect method of sampling.  In general, 
cluster sampling introduces a greater degree of sampling 
variability than simple random sampling.  In most cases, this 
increased variability, which would be reflected in wider 
confidence intervals, is not enough to prevent the use of cluster 
sampling.  For example, in this study, the effect of cluster 
sampling was to add 0.2 percent to each end of our confidence 
interval for the percentage of poor performers.

This method appealed to us because it allowed us to mitigate some 
of the obvious sensitivity and privacy issues (the employees in 
the "clusters" supervised were never identified by name) and 
because it produced a fairly large sample (a total of 3,114 
employees were included in the units supervised by interviewees).  
We considered drawing a sample of civil service supervisors from 
CPDF and constructing our clusters more directly, but this method 
would not have allowed us to reach the military supervisors of 
civilian employees, a common situation in the Department of 
Defense.






One challenge we faced in planning our interviews was to define 
the term "poor performer."  Accepting the conventional wisdom that 
too few are identified through the official performance appraisal 
system, we felt it would be self-defeating to ask supervisors to 
use that system's definitions:  to do so might be perceived as a 
challenge to a supervisor's integrity, or it might simply 
duplicate the results of the allegedly-flawed appraisal system.  
We wanted a broad, common-sense definition of poor performance, 
and settled on a three-category scheme: "good performer," "okay 
performer," and "poor performer."  With the "good" and "okay" 
categories, we described a range extending from "outstanding" and 
"solid" to "meeting minimum performance objectives."  The "poor 
performer" was described to the interviewee this way:

       These are employees with whom you are seriously 
       disappointed. You have little confidence that they will do 
       their jobs right.  You often have to redo their work, or 
       you may have had to severely modify their assignments to 
       give them only work that they can do, which is much less 
       than you would otherwise want them to do. They are just not 
       pulling their weight.
   
By orienting our interviewees toward these new definitions and 
descriptions of behavior, we hoped to focus the discussion on 
practical, "real world" concepts of worker performance.  Our sole 
purpose was to identify as clearly as possible those employees 
whose performance falls below the line between the "okay" and 
"poor" categories.

In developing our performance definitions and interview 
procedures, it became clear that, while employee performance was 
the subject of our interviews, the subject of our study was 
supervisory performance.  If supervisors' perceptions or behaviors 
were a cause for the Government's alleged inability to deal with 
poor workers, we could not always rely on supervisors to 
accurately rate performance, even in our three common sense 
categories.

To solve this problem, we developed a "bottom up" interview 
strategy.  In our interview script, the interviewer reads the 
three category descriptions to the supervisor.  Then, the 
interviewer says:

     "Now, put our discussion of the three categories aside for a
     minute. Let's think  about your immediate workforce--just the 
     ones who report directly to you.  In your mind's eye, rank 
     them from top to bottom in terms of their performance.  OK, 
     let's talk about the person whom you would rank at the 
     bottom.  Describe his/her performance in your own words."  






Our interviewers encouraged the supervisor to talk expansively
about the employee's performance. Their goal was to get enough 
information to make an independent determination as to whether the 
employee at the bottom of the rank order was actually a "poor 
performer."  The interviewer asked for and recorded examples of
the employee's behavior.  While the interviewer was to avoid
prompting at first, the script suggested questions derived from 
the category definitions. 

     "How much confidence do you have in this employee?  How often 
     do you have to re-do this employee's work?  Have you severely 
     restructured his/her assignments down to a much lower level 
     than you have a right to expect?  Have you ever considered 
     trying to get rid of this employee?  If you think about it, 
     would you want to get rid of this employee if you could?"

If the employee was deemed by the interviewer to be a "poor 
performer" (or if the interviewer was unable to make this 
determination on the spot), additional questions were asked about 
the employee's position and type of work, tenure with the 
Government and the supervisor, how the poor performance came 
about, efforts made to deal with the performance problem, and 
reasons why the efforts were unsuccessful.

After completing the interview about the employee on the bottom of 
the supervisor's list, we then inquired about the next employee in 
the ranking and repeated this process until satisfied that there 
were no more poor performers to discuss.  In theory, this approach 
enabled us to independently judge the performance of the employees 
in our sample.  In practice, the process was collaborative.  Most 
supervisors appeared quite capable and willing to distinguish the 
performance of their employees along the dimensions set out in our 
category definitions.  In all cases, our interviewers recorded 
work examples and situation descriptions in sufficient detail to 
allow us to support and review a determination that an employee in 
the sample met our definition of a "poor performer." 


In all of the interviews, we went at least one step beyond the 
discussion of current poor performers and asked if the work unit 
included any "rehabilitated" poor performers.  "Rehabilitated poor 
performer" is our term; we actually asked: 


     "Let's talk for a minute about your  Okay-Plus' performers.  
     Are there any who used to be poor performers?"

We then proceeded to ask questions similar to those that we asked 
about current poor performers:  the circumstances causing the 
employee's poor performance; the corrective action attempted; and 
the results.  However, in these cases, we were talking about 
success, and we were pleased to find a substantial occurrence of 
success in the work units sampled.






If a supervisor had no or only a few current employees to discuss,
we asked about "performers in days gone by," those who were either 
poor performers or those who had been "rehabilitated."  Here, we 
departed from the rigors of predictive sampling in an effort to 
find out something about the dynamics of reality and perception.  
Do poor performers stay forever?  Supervisors lament 
the effort required to deal with poor performers, but do they 
nevertheless put forth that effort?  If so, what form did those 
efforts take, and what degree of success did they have?

Finally, we asked the supervisors in our sample for their opinion
on the usefulness of the regulations, tools, and systems available 
for dealing with poor performers and for any suggestions they 
might have on improvements.  


RESULTS

General 

We conducted our interviews in March and April of 1998.  A total 
of 200 supervisors were interviewed, who directly supervised 3,114 
employees.  Of those supervised, 429 were supervisors themselves 
(14 percent of the total).  Twelve of the supervisors interviewed 
were in the military (6 percent).  The supervisors interviewed had 
an average of 22 years of Federal civilian or military service and 
an average of 12 years experience in supervising Federal civilian 
employees.  

Most of the supervisors reported that they had received training 
in improving employee performance and in taking corrective 
personnel actions.  However, many noted that the training was not 
timely they did not get it when they really needed it and that it 
was usually only a part of a broader supervisory training package.  
Several said that the training was too abstract and did not deal 
with such realities as health, reasonable accommodation, 
discipline, leave, and family-friendly issues.  Further, it did 
not provide the step-by-step tools needed to monitor and counsel 
employees on their performance, make appropriate documentation, 
and effect the proper formal personnel actions.  As one supervisor 
put it, "Management courses do not adequately address these 
technical aspects; instead, they deal with the  warm and fuzzy' 
topics like leadership styles, and seem to think that everything 
else will take care of itself."

                                





             Table 1.  The Supervisors Interviewed
                                
                                
Number interviewed                                           200
Civilian                                                     188
Military                                                      12
Average years of Federal civilian/military service            22
Average years supervising Federal civilian employees          12
Number of employees directly supervised                    3,114
Average number of employees supervised                        16
Employees directly supervised who are supervisors            429
Received training on how to improve performance               9.5%
Received training on taking corrective personnel actions      6.5%
                                
                                

Current Poor Performers 

   How Many Are There?
{... the full text of the following paragraph includes a GRAPHIC 
which cannot be rendered in this ASCII format....}
Based upon the work done in this study, we estimate the number of 
poor performers in the Federal government is 3.7 percent.  From a 
statistical standpoint, we are 95 percent confident that the 
percentage of poor performers is no lower than 2.8 percent and no 
larger than 4.6 percent.  The average length of service in the 
poor performer group was 14 years. Less than 1 percent were 
reported to be serving either a probationary or trial period; 10 
percent were supervisors. 
 

What Was Their Problem?

In describing the poor performance of these employees, the 
supervisors gave these examples:  low productivity; poor 
quality/frequent errors; incomplete work products; failure to meet 
deadlines; backlogged work; customer complaints of inadequate or 
discourteous service; and failure to keep the supervisor informed 
of work progress and problems.  However, when the supervisors 
discussed the background to these situations, several common 
trends emerged concerning other issues associated with poor 
performance. The most prevalent were health, attendance and leave, 
and behavioral or conduct issues.  

One supervisor illustrated these mixed-issue situations very well 
by describing an employee who was reassigned to his work unit 
through a reorganization.  The employee had a chronic illness and 
was often absent from work.  This made learning the new job 
difficult and resulted in numerous errors and incomplete work.  
This also placed strain on the supervisor to monitor the work more 
closely and on other employees to make the corrections or handle 
additional workload.  Whenever the supervisor counseled the 
employee on her performance, she would then be absent for several 
days and claiming that it was due to illness.




There were also instances where the employee's actual work was
acceptable, but there were overriding conduct issues that caused 
the supervisor to consider this employee a poor performer.  These 
situations involved such things as being absent from the work site 
without authorization, substance abuse, disruptive or 
confrontational behavior with co-workers, or various illegal 
activities.  The supervisors said that dealing effectively with 
these mixed situations was often challenging because the rules and 
procedures did not fit neatly.


Table 2 shows the distribution of problems related to poor
performance. 


               Table 2.  Poor Performance Estimate
                         Current Employees


                                   Governmentwide   95% Confidence
Issue                              Estimate         Interval
---------------------------        ------------     ------------
All poor performers                   3.7%            2.8%--4.6%
Performance only                      1.8%            1.2%--2.5%
Performance and attendance            0.8%                *
Performance & conduct                 0.6%                *
Performance and health                0.4%                *
Conduct only                          0.1%                *

*  Due to the nature of the variance estimation in cluster 
samples, accurate confidence interval estimates are not available 
for very small percentages.


    How Did the Performance Problem Come About?

Supervisors were asked how the employee's poor performance came 
about.  Most supervisors told us that the employee came under 
his/her supervision with performance problems.  One supervisor who 
was new to an organization described three of her employees as not 
performing work of the quality and quantity expected at their 
grade level. Her efforts to address these failings were hampered 
when she found out the employees had received excellent 
performance ratings over the past ten years under previous 
supervisors.






Table 3 lists the factors to which supervisors attributed the poor
performance.

                                
             Table 3.  Origin of Poor Performance 
                       Current Employees
                                
                                                       Percent in
  Reason Reported                                      Group
----------------------------------------               -----------
Employee came as a poor performer                        60.8%
Employee developed a poor attitude or work habits        53.3%
Wrong match of the person and the job                    25.0%
Employee has health problems                             18.3%
Employee's position or job assignment changed            13.3%
Other                                                     9.2%

Note:  More than one option may apply to an individual employee.




   What Have You Tried To Do About It, and How Did It Work?
                                
The performance management regulations state that employees should 
be provided assistance whenever performance is below the fully 
successful level and that appropriate action should be taken when 
performance is unacceptable (5 CFR 430.207).  Several options are 
available to supervisors seeking to improve employee performance 
or in proceeding with a performance-based personnel action.  Our 
interviews revealed that the more formal options, such as rating 
the employee below fully successful, developing a performance 
improvement plan, or initiating a performance-based action were 
rarely used. While supervisors reported using personal counseling 
much more than other options, it was rated as only "somewhat 
useful" in just over one-third of the cases in our sample.  

When supervisors reported that they had taken no formal action, 
they cited as reasons: lack of higher management support, dislike 
for a tedious and time-consuming process, and fear of grievances 
or other actions.  One supervisor said that, within his agency, 
the culture is not to "rock the boat" by giving a less-than-fully-
successful performance rating, let alone proposing to demote or 
terminate an employee for poor performance.  Others stated that 
the unwritten policy was to avoid any situation that could lead to 
an appeal or law suit.  
                                





Table 4 provides a summary of the interventions supervisors used
and how they viewed the usefulness of these options when they were 
used.
                                
        Table 4.  Usefulness of Performance Interventions
                     Current Poor Performers

                                                     Some-
                                              No     what   Very
Performance Intervention                 Used Effect Useful Useful
----------------------------------       ---- -----  ------ -----
Provided personal guidance                85.0% 61.8% 38.2%   0
Provided additional training or 
   education                              40.8% 69.4% 30.6%   0
Changed work assignments                  37.5% 71.1% 26.7%  2.2%
Assigned mentors or advisors              29.2% 57.1% 42.9%   0
Developed a performance improvement plan  15.8% 68.4% 26.3%  5.3%
Rated the employee less than fully 
   successful                             14.2% 88.2% 11.8%   0
Initiated action to reassign, demote, or 
   remove                                  7.5% 77.8% 11.1% 11.1%
                              
                             


    What Kind of Help Is Available to You?
                                
Supervisors were also asked about the usefulness of certain 
resources when dealing with poor performers.  Only half of the 
supervisors felt that the current performance management 
regulations, policy, or guidance were helpful to them, and only 5 
percent rated these resources as "very helpful."  The same pattern
was found with the reported usefulness of performance standards.  

Examples were given where performance standards were written so
poorly that it was almost impossible to use them effectively.  
Some of these standards were imposed nationwide or had been 
negotiated with the union and thus could not be altered by the 
immediate supervisor.  Several supervisors indicated their agency 
had recently gone to a pass/fail rating system.  Many of them felt 
that the criteria for receiving a passing rating under these new 
systems were too broad to support a formal action. 
                                
The personnel office staff were rated as "very helpful" by a 
little over a third of the supervisors.  Another third rated this 
resource as "somewhat helpful."  Consultation with other 
supervisors was used by more than half of these supervisors, and 
this was seen as useful by most of them.
                                





          Table 5.  Value of Resources to Supervisors
             in Dealing with Current Poor Performers
                              
                                                   Some-
                                           Not     what    Very
Resource                              Used Helpful Helpful Helpful
-------------------------------       ---- -----   -----   -------
Servicing personnel office staff      83.3% 23.0%  38.0%    39.0%
Employee's performance standards/plan 81.7% 36.7%  57.1%    6.1%
Regulations, policy, or guidance      73.3% 33.0%  60.2%    6.8%
Other supervisors                     62.5% 13.3%  70.7%    16.0%
Other resources                       18.3% 27.3%  50.0%    22.8%


   What Percent are Being "Worked On?"

During the interviews, supervisors indicated that they were still 
seeking to improve the performance of 40 percent of those 
employees identified as current poor performers.  They said they 
were not actively working on the remainder for a variety of 
reasons: some poor performers were expected to retire soon; some 
had health problems that precluded immediate corrective action; 
and some posed problems that (in the supervisor's eyes) seemed 
impervious to corrective action (i.e., the supervisor had given 
up).  The latter reports usually included stories of failed 
attempts and frustrated efforts to work with "the system." 


Rehabilitated Poor Performers

    How Many Are There?

Based upon the number of "rehabilitated" poor performers 
identified in our interviews, the estimate for this category 
Governmentwide is 1.5 percent. None of the rehabilitated poor 
performers was reported to be serving a probationary or trial 
period at the time of their poor performance. Of this group, 12.5 
percent were supervisors.  The average length of service for 
rehabilitated poor performers was 14 years.

As with current poor performers, the supervisors' descriptions of
rehabilitated poor performers were often mixed with issues related 
to their health, attendance and leave, and conduct (see Table 6). 
For example, an employee, whose work quality was otherwise 
acceptable, procrastinated.   He was frequently away from the work 
area, spent a lot of time gossiping, and distracted other 
employees from completing their work.






          Table 6.  Issues Associated with Poor Performance
                    Rehabilitated Poor Performers
                         (Percent)

                              Governmentwide    95%
Issue                         Estimate          Confidence Interval
------------------------      --------------    -----------------
All poor performers             1.5%              0.7%--2.2%
Performance only                0.9%              0.3%--1.6%
Performance & conduct           0.3%                  *
Performance and health          0.1%                  *
Performance and attendance      0.1%                  *
Conduct only                      0                   *

* Due to the nature of the variance estimation in cluster samples, 
  accurate confidence interval estimates are not available for 
  very small ercentages.


Most of the rehabilitated poor performers reported in this survey 
appeared to have developed  problems while on their current job 
(See Table 7).  One supervisor described the situation as a 
performance "slump."  However, a high percentage arrived in the 
current supervisor's organization carrying substantial "baggage" 
from a previous work situation. For some, this baggage consisted 
of poor skills and/or work habits that had not been addressed by 
their previous supervisors.  For others, it was anger, resentment, 
confusion and/or bruised self-confidence from having been affected 
by a reorganization or reduction in force.  

              Table 7.  Origin of Poor Performance
                  Rehabilitated Poor Performers
                                
                                
                                                     Percent in 
Reason                                               Reported Group
---------------------------------------------        -----------
Employee developed a poor attitude or work habits      62.5%
Employee came as a poor performer                      43.8%
Other                                                  18.8%
Employee has health problems                           12.5%
Employee's position or job assignment changed           9.4%
Wrong match of the person and the job                   3.1%

Note:  More than one option may apply to an individual employee.






A comparison of the origins of poor performance for current
employees (Table 3) and rehabilitated employees (Table 7) shows 
some interesting differences.  The percentage of rehabilitated 
poor performers who came into their current organizations with 
performance problems is noticeably less than the current poor 
performer group.  Conversely, a higher percentage of rehabilitated 
performers' problems originated on the current supervisors' watch 
than was the case with the current poor performers.  A much lower 
percentage of rehabilitated performers were identified as a "wrong 
match" for their positions, and a lower percentage of 
rehabilitated performers were identified as having health 
problems. These differences may indicate that the performance or 
behavioral problems among the rehabilitated group were not as 
great or as deeply rooted as those among the current poor 
performers and, therefore, may have been more susceptible to 
improvement.  It is also possible that the supervisors themselves 
contributed to the problems, recognized this fact, 
and were able to correct their own behavior.  
                                
     What Have You Tried To Do About It, and How Did It Work?

Whatever the reasons may have been, the supervisors of 
rehabilitated poor performers tried to resolve their employees' 
performance problems and succeeded.  Finding the solutions, 
however, meant getting to the causes of the problem performance.  
Primarily through discussion with the employees, these supervisors 
were usually successful in getting to the causes.  Common causes 
were:  personal/family problems; untreated substance abuse; 
health/medication problems; inadequate technical training, and 
poor time management skills. 
                                
As with the current poor performers, these supervisors used 
personal guidance most often in seeking to improve the employees' 
performance.  A noted difference in this group, however, is the 
reported usefulness of this intervention as well as the results.  
Of the supervisors using personal guidance, 65 percent indicated 
it was "very useful," and another 27 percent reported it as 
"somewhat useful" in correcting performance problems.  
                                
Although these supervisors relied somewhat less on providing 
additional training, changing work assignments, and providing 
mentors, they found these interventions to be much more useful 
than did those supervising current poor performers.  The more 
formal options were rarely used by these supervisors, but, when 
they were used, there was greater success than with the current 
poor performer group.  Whereas the supervisors of current poor 
performers never considered performance ratings or performance 
improvement plans to be "very useful," this group of supervisors 
rated these options as useful more often than not.

Table 8 provides a summary of the interventions supervisors used 
and how they viewed the usefulness of these interventions when 
they were used.






         Table 8.  Usefulness of Performance Interventions
                    Rehabilitated Poor Performers

                                                     Some-
                                              No     what   Very
Performance Intervention                Used  Effect Useful Useful
-------------------------------------   ----- ------ ------ ------
Provided personal guidance              81.3%  7.7%   26.9%  65.4%
Provided additional training or 
education                               31.3% 20.0%   30.0%  50.0%
Assigned mentors or advisors            31.3%   0     40.0%  60.0%
Changed work assignments                28.1%   0     22.2%  77.8%
Rated the employee less than fully 
successful                              21.9% 42.9%   14.3%  42.9%
Developed a performance improvement 
plan                                    18.8% 33.3%     0    66.7%
Initiated action to reassign, demote, 
or remove                                 0     0       0      0

The relative usefulness of the various performance interventions 
suggests once again that the performance deviations of the 
rehabilitated group overall were not as extensive or as deeply 
ingrained as those of the current poor performers.  Since a large 
majority developed their problems in the presence of the current 
supervisor, the problems may have been more quickly detected and 
easier to address.

Several supervisors of rehabilitated poor performers gave credit 
to the Employee Assistance Programs (EAP) for playing a major role 
in helping employees to resolve the problems which impacted on 
performance.  This was especially the case when substance abuse or 
family problems were known or suspected as contributing factors.  
                                
A few supervisors mentioned that "last chance" agreements produced 
the desired changes in poor performers who had managed to resist 
other corrective tactics.  These formal agreements got the 
employees' attention because they provided the visual confirmation 
that only two options remained, and one of them was removal.  
Sometimes those agreements included requirements to participate in 
EAP programs or undergo substance abuse treatment.  For a few 
others, only a less-than-satisfactory performance rating was able 
to get the employee's attention.  Confronted with the reality of 
the official performance rating, these employees finally improved 
their performance.  
                                





One supervisor described an employee who arrived in his
organization as a result of a downgrade through reduction in 
force.  The employee was quite distraught over his demotion from a 
long-time position in program management to one involving program 
operations.  He ignored his new responsibilities and persisted in 
functioning as though nothing had changed.  For example, without 
informing management, he intercepted a speaking invitation 
intended for the program director, responded to it, and actually 
gave the speech himself as though officially representing the 
director.  It took some very candid counseling and a less-than-
fully-successful performance rating before the employee finally 
accepted the responsibilities of his new position and began 
functioning appropriately.

Two supervisors reported that, in their team-based organization,
peer pressure helped their efforts to convince problem employees 
of their performance or behavior deficiencies.  Just knowing that 
their co-workers agreed with the supervisor's assessment was 
enough to bring about a change.  

The supervisors were also asked how useful they found certain 
official resources in rehabilitating poor performers.  The most 
notable difference between these successful supervisors and the 
supervisors of current poor performers was that the successful 
supervisors named the personnel office as their most valuable 
resource (84 percent rated personnel office consultation as "very 
helpful").   In addition, the successful supervisors very often 
volunteered high compliments about the assistance provided by the 
personnel office staff.

Table 9 shows how the supervisors of rehabilitated poor performers 
evaluated the various resources for dealing with poor performance.

          Table 9.  Value of Resources to Supervisors
          in Dealing with Rehabilitated Poor Performers

                                                   Some-
                                           Not     what    Very 
Resource                              Used Helpful Helpful Helpful
-------------------------------       ---- ------- ------- -------
Employee's performance standards/plan 84.4% 22.2%   55.6%   22.2%
Servicing personnel office staff      81.3%  3.8%   11.5%   84.6%
Regulations, policy, or guidance      68.8% 22.7%   63.6%   13.6%
Other supervisors                     62.5%  5.0%   60.0%   35.0%
Other resources                       12.5%   0     25.0%   75.0%
                                
                                
                                





           Former Employees Who Were Poor Performers
                                
Supervisors were asked about their experience in dealing with poor 
performers who were no longer under their direct supervision.  In 
the 200 interviews conducted, 108 supervisors reported at least 
one experience.  At the time of the poor performance, 12 percent 
of these former employees were reported to have been serving 
either a probationary or trial period, and almost 15 percent were 
supervisors.  Nearly half of these employees were considered poor 
performers based solely on performance, with no other issues 
present.  In the remaining half, conduct was cited as the most 
prevalent related issue, followed by attendance, and then health.

Supervisors were asked how the former employee's poor performance 
came about.  As was found with the current and rehabilitated poor 
performers, the supervisors indicated that the employees typically 
came into the organization or under this supervisor as a poor 
performer.  The next most prevalent origin was the development of 
poor attitudes or work habits.

Of the interventions available for improving employee performance,
supervisors once again indicated they most often used personal 
guidance.  However, over half indicated this effort had "no 
effect" and only 8 percent found it "very useful." 

We inquired into what happened with these former employees.  In 
almost a quarter of the cases, management actually took action to 
remove or reassign the employee, and, in 16 percent of the cases, 
the poor performer was rehabilitated.  A large share (39 percent) 
left after "prompting" from the supervisor (one supervisor said 
that the employee "felt the footsteps getting closer").  The 
remaining employees (20 percent) left the organization totally on 
their own volition or are, in fact, still working for the 
organization under a different supervisor.    

The results of this part of our survey confirm a commonly-held 
opinion that many poor performers move themselves out of a poor 
performance situation without formal action.







                      IV.  PERSONNEL ACTION SAMPLE

                   "Ask the man who owns one!"
                              - Ad from the Packard Motor Company

PURPOSE

This portion of the study involved telephone interviews with 
supervisors and managers who have personally initiated 
performance-based actions.  We wanted first-hand information about 
these individuals and their experiences with these much-maligned 
and infrequently-used processes.  The specific questions we asked 
were:

   What led you to initiate the action?
   What prior knowledge or concerns did you have about the
   process?
   What kind of support did you expect, and what kind did you get?
   What impediments did you encounter?
   What consequences have you, your subordinates, and your
   organization experienced?
   What would you do if the situation arose again, and why?
   What suggestions do you have for improving the process?

METHODOLOGY

For Fiscal Year 1997, we found very few actions in the CPDF which 
were recorded only as performance-based removals or reductions, 
and the number of actions with "mixed" codes (performance and 
conduct) was only slightly larger.  Therefore, we did not attempt 
to select a random sample from this small population.  Rather, we 
started at the top of the list of actions and contacted the 
associated personnel offices for names and telephone numbers of 
supervisors and managers we could interview.  When we contacted 
the personnel offices, we also asked the person with whom we spoke 
if he or she personally knew of any supervisor or manager who had 
taken a personnel action based on poor performance and, if so, 
might we have that person's name and telephone number.  This two-
pronged approach turned out to be very effective. 

Using this approach, eight interviewers who were specially trained 
and dedicated to this part of the study, conducted a total of 42 
interviews.  Interviews took place by telephone in April and May 
of 1998.  All interviewers used a structured, open-ended interview 
format to reduce the variance of responses due to interviewer 
variability. 





RESULTS

Because of the nature of the issues and the relatively small 
number of interviews con-ducted, we have chosen to present the 
information in summary fashion, organized into what we believe are 
common themes and useful categories. 


General

The information in this part of the study comes from the first-
hand accounts of people who initiated and completed a personnel 
action to address poor performance.  The information is not 
hearsay.  It reflects, for the most part, intensely emotional 
experiences etched in the memories of the participants.  Our 
interviewees were anything but reticent.  They often went into 
considerable detail, and their responses indicated considerable 
thought devoted to the experience.

The 42 supervisors interviewed were from 12 different agencies, 
located in 14 states and the District of Columbia.  The grades of 
the employees against whom the supervisors took action ranged from 
GS-4 to GS-13.  We did not learn the grades of ten employees due 
to their supervisors' wish to assure the anonymity of the 
employees.  The interviewees work in widely divergent agencies and 
organizational cultures.  However, their responses were remarkably 
consistent.

Reasons for Taking the Action

All supervisors stated that the trigger for the process which 
ultimately led to the action was that the employees did not 
perform at their current grade level.  Very few interviewees were 
more specific than that.  A few added that the employee was 
disruptive in some way.  Where numerical performance standards 
were used, as in the Internal Revenue Service's Total Performance 
System or the Veterans Health Administration, more specific 
performance inadequacies were mentioned. 

Five interviewees said they took action because the employees 
lacked the knowledge, skills, or abilities required for their 
jobs, e.g., communication skills, current technical knowledge.  
Three stated that the employee did not even perform adequately at 
the lowest grade level in the career ladder.  Another three stated 
that the employee could not do the work at the journeyman level 
and that they had no need for "permanent apprentices." 

Several comments indicated a link between poor performance and 
conduct issues, some with indications of possible emotional 
disturbance.  Some examples:

   The employee gave incorrect responses to inquiries and did not 
   return calls.  She    stated "If it's important, they'll call 
   back."





   The employee did not give the briefings and presentations he
   was assigned to do.  He shifted assignments without approval 
   and claimed others' work as his own.

   The employee wandered around and annoyed co-workers.

   The employee was hostile to a new supervisor and manifested it 
   by refusing to perform adequately, by attempting to get co-   
   workers to resist the supervisor, and by denigrating the agency 
   to its customers.

   The employee could not have a coherent conversation, would 
   forget what she was doing in the midst of the task, came to 
   work only partly dressed, and was unable to do simple tasks.  

It is interesting to note that the supervisors often considered 
conduct issues, such as insubordination, to be performance 
problems.  This blending of behaviors in areas covered by 
different regulations and processes is similar to what was 
portrayed by supervisors in the employee sample (Part III of this 
report). 

Support for the Supervisor

To determine the level of assistance provided to the supervisor 
who initiated a performance-based action, we asked the following 
questions:  

   What kind of assistance or support did you get in the course of
   taking the personnel action?
   Was there any assistance you would have liked but did not get?
   Were there any impediments encountered in the course of taking
   the action?


The responses fell into three categories:

   Lack of support from upper management.  Most of the
   interviewees indicated that upper management "support" ranged 
   from indifference to active opposition.  In some organizations, 
   upper management has let it be known that it will not support 
   any actions based on poor performance, or will only do so if 
   the employee does not file a formal grievance.  Some 
   supervisors believe that upper management will not support them 
   against any charges the employee chooses to make.

   Varying quality in technical guidance.  The interviewees
   generally reported more support from personnelists than from 
   upper management, and several praised the quality of the 
   support they received.  However, some said the assistance they 
   received was untimely, inaccurate, or incomplete.   






   Commitment of resources.  Interviewees found the investment of
   time and energy required over an extremely long period to be 
   daunting.  This was compounded by the stress resulting from the 
   employee's counter-charges, grievances, accusations, appeals, 
   general hostility and attempts to subvert the supervisor.  One 
   described the documentation required as "horrendous."


Consequences of the Action

To determine the consequences experienced by our interviewees, we 
asked the following questions.

   What effect did taking the action have on you personally?
   What effect did taking the action have on your subordinates?
   Were there any effects on your organization as a whole as a
   result of the action?  

The supervisors interviewed mentioned negative consequences far 
more frequently than the positive.  Although we did not gather 
information about the relative intensity and duration of those 
consequences, the sheer preponderance of negatives may explain the 
rarity of the action. 

Negative Consequences

The negative consequences described fell in three main areas: 
effects on the supervisor's performance and relations with other 
employees; effects on the supervisor's emotional and physical 
condition; and effects on the group's performance and relations 
with the supervisor.  The following comments are typical. 

  Supervisor's Performance and Relations with Other Employees

   Because of the amount of time I had to spend on the action, my 
   performance suffered and I received a rating of  needs 
   improvement.'

   Because the action was kept confidential and I had to spend a 
   lot of time on it, my other employees thought I was not doing 
   my job.

   After removing the poor performer, I was told I couldn't fill 
   the job.  So I exchanged a poor performer for no performer at 
   all.






   The employee managed to intentionally damage the reputation of
   the organization with our customers in the period between 
   initiating the action and removal of the employee.

   The employee maligned me to everyone she could.

   You open yourself to charges of discrimination and harassment.  
   If there is an opportunity, someone is going to use it against 
   you.  The accuser becomes the accused.


  Supervisor's Emotional/Physical Condition

       I felt guilty about depriving him of a job.   

       I faced constant hostility and resistance from the employee 
       and his friends.   This persisted over the lengthy period 
       it took to complete the action.

       I felt that I was not being fair to the other employees 
       because I was not able to give them enough attention or 
       direction.

       It affected my blood pressure. 

       I felt I failed because I was unable to train and motivate 
       the employee up to standard.

       The employee was very threatening.  I feared for my safety.

   Group Performance and Relations with Supervisor

       Everyone got very legalistic.  For  example, they were 
       asking things like "Exactly what time do you want the 
       report?"

       It stifled creativity of the entire group because we had to 
       institute 
       the same formal monitoring done on the poor performer on 
       everybody else in the group.

       The removal action was not successful.  This led to a 
       general feeling in the group that it doesn't matter if you 
       perform or not.

       The employee became disruptive at staff meetings and 
       stirred up arguments.  

       Other employees became cynical as the process dragged on 
       and nothing happened to the poor performer.  When the 
       employee did even less, they had to pick up the slack.






Positive Consequences

Positive consequences were fewer and mentioned less frequently.

   It increased my credibility with the other employees.

   The better employees supported my taking the action; they were
   tired of supporting her, but would not "rat" on a fellow 
   employee.

   It sent a message to other employees that poor performance was
   not acceptable.

   It restored our faith in the system; poor performers are "not
   getting away with it."

   I felt personal satisfaction that I had done my job and done
   the right thing.

The last of these positive consequences, the feeling of having
done the right thing, was mentioned by virtually all of the 
supervisors, either as a consequence of taking the action or as 
the motivation for taking it again, if necessary.

Supervisory Resolve

A sense of moral imperative appears to be a primary force 
impelling supervisors to take a performance-based action despite 
the negative consequences.  When we asked if they would do it 
again, a number of interviewees simply said "yes," "definitely," 
or "absolutely."  Only one of the 42 interviewees had 
reservations, saying:  "Not at my age.  I might if I
were younger."

When asked if they would do anything differently, most said "no," 
but about one-quarter said they would start the process earlier 
and not keep hoping the employee would improve spontaneously.  
Five stated they would be more organized on their documentation, 
one reported being a little too cautious about taking the action 
for fear of a discrimination complaint, one would have maintained 
closer contact with the legal office, and one regretted not 
reviewing personnel records before accepting a transferee.

Suggestions by Interviewees for Improving the System

Virtually all supervisors had suggestions for improving the system 
or complaints about specific aspects of it.  Some of the 
complaints imply suggestions.  A number of suggestions or 
complaints may derive from misunderstandings of or confusion about 
laws, regulations, agency policies, negotiated agreements, and 
local management policies. They fell into several common areas 
that we have seen before.  






   Performance Standards.  Several supervisors suggested
   developing more objective and defensible performance standards.  
   As with the supervisors in the employee sample, these 
   supervisors were particularly critical of "standardized" 
   performance plans developed outside their control.  They 
   said that better standards would increase the confidence of the 
   supervisor in both the correctness of the action and its legal 
   defensibility.  

   Probationary Period.  There were recommendations to increase
   the length of the initial probationary period to two or three 
   years, provide a probationary period following each promotion, 
   and, for positions in which there is no use for a permanent 
   employee below the full-performance level, establish the "up or 
   out" rule. 

   Lesser Penalties.  There were a number of suggestions related
   to promoting more use of alternative penalties for poor 
   performance, such as withholding of a within-grade increase.  
   These penalties can provide early warning to the employee that 
   poor performance is not acceptable and that the supervisor 
   intends to do something about it. 
   
   Support for Supervisors.  The interviewees suggested improved
   support in a number of areas:  supportive attitudes and actions 
   from upper management; more knowledgeable personnelists to 
   guide them through the complexities of the process; printed and 
   electronic information, including model letters and forms; and 
   training in the process for the supervisors themselves.
    
   The Process.  Recommendations included:  simplify it; shorten
   it; reduce the number of avenues for appeal or consolidate them 
   so that the same lengthy appeal cannot be made consecutively in 
   different venues; and shorten the time periods for performance 
   improvement plans and responses to charges.    

                            


                                 






                 V.  THE NON-FEDERAL ENVIRONMENT

                    "Bumstead, you're fired!"
                       - Mr. Dithers, in the comic strip "Blondie"        

PURPOSE

In this phase of the study, we set out to develop a frame of 
reference.  Based on our random sample, we estimate that 3.7 
percent of Federal workers are poor performers.  While zero would 
be ideal, what is a reasonable expectation?  Is 3.7 percent too 
many?  To best answer this question, we set out to learn what is 
known about poor performance norms in the non-Federal workforce.  

POOR PERFORMERS IN THE NON-FEDERAL WORKFORCE

As of this writing, we do not know how many poor performers there 
are in the non-Federal workforce, and we do not think anybody else 
does, either.  After searching extensively for reports of studies 
and surveys, we have concluded that nobody has attempted a study 
like ours in the public or private sectors.  We suspect the reason 
is simply that non-Federal employees have not fallen prey to the 
criticism aimed at the Federal sector, and, therefore, there has 
been no need to study the situation.

We thought we could look at statistics about those fired from 
employment for a general indicator of the scope of the performance 
problem and the level of effort devoted to addressing it.  Most 
readers will expect, as we did, that the Department of Labor has 
such figures.  They do not.  The Bureau of Labor Statistics 
interviews the members of a sample of households each month to 
determine who is unemployed and the reason for unemployment.  
However, their definitions of "job losers" and "job leavers" do 
not distinguish between those fired for cause and those laid off 
for purely business reasons.

The Bureau of National Affairs, a private organization, conducts 
quarterly surveys of human resources executives and reports 
monthly turnover rates in the U.S. that hover around one percent.  
We also found references in business literature to annual 
"dismissal" rates in the United States, Europe, and Japan of about 
four percent.  While the figures are so general as to provide 
little concrete foundation for a conclusion, one could argue that, 
if the four percent figure includes layoffs and performance-based 
dismissals, the latter number does not reflect an effort much more 
vigorous than what occurs in the Federal sector.  Comparable CPDF 
statistics for the Federal workforce for the last three full 
fiscal years hover around three percent.
  





This line of speculation led us to look beyond the statistics.
Perceptions of the Federal system based on comparisons with the 
private sector may not take into account the extent to which poor 
performance may also be a problem in the private sector, and the 
range of legal and administrative appeals available to non-Federal 
employees.  While no one to our knowledge has systematically 
tested Federal workers on the accuracy of their perceptions of 
employment practices in the non-Federal sector, a Federal manager
whose only exposure to private sector personnel practices is the 
cartoon image of an enraged Mr. Dithers shouting "Bumstead, you're 
fired!!" at a hapless Dagwood might well be expected to have a 
distorted view of the relative ease with which private sector 
managers deal with poor performers. 

LEGAL PROTECTIONS FOR PRIVATE SECTOR EMPLOYEES 

Our research disclosed that private sector managers have their own 
set of employee protections to keep in mind.   Some of these 
protections flow from Federal laws that are not applicable to 
civil service employees, such as the Immigration Reform and 
Control Act of 1986, the Employment Retirement Income Security Act 
of 1974, and the Vietnam Era Veterans' Readjustment Assistance Act 
of 1974.  Each of these laws provides at least one cause of court 
action for private sector employees that cannot be brought against 
a Federal agency.  

In addition to Federal laws, there are redress mechanisms 
available to private sector employees under state statutes and 
civil law that do not apply to Federal employees at all. An 
allegation of "wrongful discharge" is perhaps the most important 
avenue of redress available to private sector employees, and it is 
an expensive process for the employer.  A national survey of 260 
wrongful discharge cases between January 1986 and October 1988 
found that, in the 166 cases won by employees, the average jury 
award was $602,303, and the median award was $158,800.  A 1988 
RAND study estimated that the average cost of defending a wrongful 
discharge case is $80,073, and the median cost is $65,000.

Each of the 50 states has its own body of case law defining the 
grounds on which a former employee can sue an employer for 
wrongful discharge.  These grounds vary widely.  At one end of the 
spectrum, five states still hold to the doctrine of "employment-
at-will" with minimal exceptions.  This doctrine holds, in the 
words of a 1884 Tennessee decision, that "all may dismiss their 
employee(s) at will, be they many or few, for good cause, for no 
cause, or even for cause morally wrong without being thereby 
guilty of legal wrong."






At the middle of the spectrum, case law puts some limits on the
employment-at-will doctrine.  Typical exceptions to this doctrine 
are: (1) public policy, (2) implied contract, (3) good faith and 
fair dealing, and (4) various damage claims, such as intentional 
infliction of emotional distress.  However, the standards for a 
successful damage claim are infrequently met, and many states 
allow employers a defense to the implied contract and good faith 
and fair dealing exceptions by recognizing express disclaimers, 
such as an agreement to forego litigation as a condition of 
employment.  

The public policy exceptions offer the most numerous and widest 
variety of possible wrongful discharge suits.  State case law 
definitions of "public policy" are typically open-ended.  For 
example, in 1959, a California court declared that anything that 
contravenes "good morals or any established interests of society" 
constitutes action against public policy.  In 1981, an Illinois 
court defined public policy as "that which is right and just and
collectively affects the state's citizenry."  And, in Oregon in
1975, a court declared that an employer can be held at fault for
dismissing an employee "for a socially undesirable motive."

At the far end of the spectrum of possible grounds for wrongful 
discharge suits is the 1987 statute adopted by Montana.  This law 
establishes a compulsory arbitration system with statutory rights 
to job reinstatement or financial compensation for unjustified 
discharge.  Over the past few years, legislation has been offered 
in 40 states proposing approaches similar to Montana's.  An 
organization called the Uniform Law Commissioners has developed a 
Model Employment Termination Act (META) which includes a provision 
that employees cannot be terminated without good cause.  Many 
state legislatures have introduced legislation influenced by the 
META, though none have yet adopted it.    

State laws also provide private sector employees protections 
unfamiliar to Federal supervisors and managers.  Federal managers 
and supervisors might be surprised to know that smokers are a 
protected class in 26 states, and private sector employee whistle-
blowers are protected by law in over 30 states.  

It can be safely said that private sector employers cannot 
separate poor performers without incurring some risk.  Not 
surprisingly, a survey of human resource textbooks found that most 
advise private sector managers and supervisors to take steps 
fairly comparable to those outlined in OPM's recently-published 
guide, Addressing and Resolving Poor Performance, with the 
additional admonition to "document, document, and then document 
some more."






PROTECTIONS FOR STATE AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES

The avenues for challenging dismissal available to private sector 
employees are typically available to state and local employees as 
well.   In addition, the U.S. Supreme Court gave state and local 
employees new grounds to challenge removal when it found 
dismissals for purposes of patronage to be unconstitutional in 
Elrod v. Burns (1976).  This protection was expanded in 1990 when 
the Court held in Rutan v. Republican Party of Illinois that
employment decisions in hiring, promotion, and rehiring after a 
lay-off that are based on patronage are also unconstitutional.   

Recognizing that the U.S. Constitution and Federal courts provide 
many protections, the State of Georgia, in 1996, eliminated 
administrative appeals processes for employees hired after a 
certain date.  Georgia is the exception in this regard, however, 
and every other state provides internal appeal mechanisms, most of 
which are similar to the Federal process. For example, 
Pennsylvania has a general policy of "just cause" described in its 
Supervisor's Guide to Employee Counseling & Discipline:

   Supervisors and managers need a good reason for taking any 
   disciplinary action and should be able to demonstrate that the 
   decision to impose discipline is not arbitrary, capricious, or 
   discriminatory.  The burden of proof to show  just cause' for 
   disciplinary action rests with supervisors and managers. 

Appeals processes are described in the Internet-accessible state
employment codes and manuals of Indiana, North Carolina, and 
Oklahoma.  Even Georgia's civil service board recommends that, in 
lieu of the rescinded Statewide system, State agencies consider 
establishing their own appeals processes for recently-hired 
employees who do not have access to the older system.  

CONCLUSION

In summary, legal protections for employees in the non-Federal 
sector are similar in varying degrees to those in the Federal 
sector.  This is true in both public and private employment.  
Moreover, there are indications that the level of protection is 
slowly increasing.  Finally, the administrative procedures for 
separating a Federal employee for poor performance are not 
radically different from those for separating an employee in many 
state governments.     







                         VI.  CONCLUSIONS

               We have met the enemy, and he is us!
                                        - Pogo

Human behavior is complex, and it should be no surprise that the 
results of nearly 250 interviews would produce findings that are 
complex and varied.  For every question we answered, new questions 
appeared.  Nevertheless, we are able to draw a number of important 
conclusions from our interviews and research.    

There is good news to report.

Our estimate that 3.7 percent of Federal workers are poor 
performers is lower than the "common wisdom" about Government 
would suggest.  It is unfortunate that we could find no good 
private or public sector benchmarks with which to compare our 
findings.  However, the generally accepted performance norms for 
organizations and individuals suggest that the Government has 
"scored" a 96.3 on this "test."     

Managers do manage.

Our surveys disclose that supervisors do take action to address 
poor performance.  This often takes the form of informal measures 
which resolve the situation before the need to pursue formal 
action, e.g., a poor performer will voluntarily move on when they 
"feel the footsteps getting closer."  Supervisors report that they 
are working in a variety of ways with almost half the poor 
performers in the current workforce, and many report having had
success with rehabilitating workers who were poor performers at 
one time.  Finally, the reports from supervisors who took 
performance-based adverse actions demonstrate an almost-heroic 
determination to address serious performance problems. 

In selecting a course of action, supervisors often report that 
they weigh the time and effort it would take to confront a poor 
performer with a formal personnel action against: (1) the 
prospects for success with that action;  and (2) the cost of 
continuing the status quo in terms of accommodation and the impact 
on other workers.  In this way, supervisors are making what seem 
to be informed judgments related to their accountability for the 
"bottom line," which is their organization's effectiveness and 
productivity.  This behavior reflects pragmatic realism more than 
cowardice or cynicism.   

Things are not so easy in the non-Federal sector.

While employment protections in some non-Federal settings may be 
such that employees can be dismissed virtually at will, the trends 
reported in this study seem to be in the opposite direction.   
Employment protections exist in both the Federal and non-Federal 
sectors.  The challenge for all managers is to balance the risks, 
costs, and benefits, and to make responsible trade-offs.




Our perceptions of reality are not accurate.

Federal managers, supervisors, and employees do not have a clear 
and accurate perception of the scope of the poor performer 
"problem."  Their responses to OPM and MSPB surveys indicate that 
Federal workers are major purveyors of the misperception that the 
Government has too many poor performers.  For a number of reasons 
(one of them may be simply that they are asked so often), Federal 
workers seem almost obsessed with describing the poor performer 
problem.  In point of fact, many employees may be reporting 
numerous observations of relatively few poor performers.  

We think there is also substantial misinformation about the 
difference between employment protections in the Federal and non-
Federal sectors.  Federal managers and supervisors who believe 
that "at will" employment is the norm outside the Federal 
government are ill-informed and may therefore suffer from a "grass 
is greener" syndrome. 

This study is consistent with and supports other survey findings.

In conveying the positive findings of this study, we do not want 
to suggest that the concerns reported in previous surveys and 
questionnaires are without merit.  The supervisors we interviewed 
were definitely not disposed to use formal procedures to "get rid" 
of poor performers, and those who finally did use those procedures 
found the experience distasteful, to put it mildly.  This is 
consistent with many previous studies, and there are clearly 
opportunities for continuous improvement in how we handle poor 
performers.

Organizational culture does not support taking action against poor
performers.

We were struck by supervisors' consistent perception that higher-
level management was not supportive of was even resistant to 
direct action to deal with poor performers.  Clearly, one of the 
factors the supervisors had to weigh in making a pragmatic 
decision was the degree of support or resistance expected from 
higher management.  

It is quite possible that what supervisors are perceiving and
reporting is the accumulated effect of the legitimate concerns of 
higher level managers, attorneys, and human resource specialists.  
However, to the extent that this situation creates a perception 
that management is predisposed to resist or obstruct corrective 
action, it prevents dealing with poor performers.  







Supervisory training has not been useful.

Most supervisors reported that, early in their supervisory 
careers, they received training or orientation related to dealing 
with poor performers.  However, they also reported that, when 
faced with a poor performance situation, the training was too 
remote in time or too general in nature to be useful.  This 
disparity may be partly due to the supervisors' infrequent need to 
draw upon the training; complex knowledge related to an infrequent 
problem is not likely to be retained to a degree that maintains 
its usefulness.  
      







                     VII.  RECOMMENDATIONS

The primary purpose for this study was to obtain new information 
about the scope of the "poor performer problem" in Government.  We 
have accomplished that purpose. However, our findings and 
conclusions lead us to several suggestions for further action.  

1.  Get accurate information into the public discourse.  

Our findings indicate that the public, including the Federal 
workforce itself, tends to exaggerate the scope of the poor 
performer problem in Government.  The proportion of poor 
performers is not as large as the rhetoric suggests, and there are 
indications that efforts to deal with poor performers have 
achieved and will continue to achieve a measure of success.  
However, the prevailing opinion that the situation is otherwise 
may in itself constitute a stumbling block to even more success.  
At the very least, it adds to the burden of supervisors and 
employees who share an uninformed perception of their situation 
and who believe that the only way to improve the situation is to 
escape or roll back public sector employment protections.

Wide dissemination of the findings in this report should serve to 
move the public discussion toward a firmer foundation in reality.  
There is room for improvement in how we handle poor performance, 
but goals for improvement should be based on accurate information 
and realistic expectations.

2. Top agency management should do more to support managers and
   supervisors in taking action to deal with poor performers.

The NPR has called for a change in management culture with regard 
to dealing with poor performance, and our study suggests that this 
call is right on the mark.  The accounts of the supervisors in 
this report are eloquent and compelling, and no top manager should 
be comfortable seeing his or her actions or inactions reflected in 
those accounts.  To the extent that these perceptions are fair and 
accurate, top managers must try harder to support justifiable 
actions against poor performers.  The processes and interactions 
in this arena are complex, and the players are many and varied.  
It will take extra effort on the part of top managers to 
articulate and convey clear expectation amidst the confusion of 
fact and fancy.

3. Training and support for supervisors should emphasize "just in 
   time" approaches.    

It is clear that supervisors do not absorb enough information 
about dealing with poor performers during routine supervisory 
orientation.  It is also clear that, when they need such 
information, they need it badly and in a hurry.  This suggests a 
phased learning and assistance model:





   (1) Orientation training that stresses how to recognize a
       performance problem at the early stages;

   (2) Self-study resources that will answer specific questions 
       and provide general directions when a problem must be dealt 
       with;

   (3) Expert coaches to guide, evaluate, and facilitate the 
       process of dealing with a poor performer.

Because the poor performer problem arises infrequently, the effort 
to provide the resources in phases (2) and (3) must be governed by 
considerations of efficiency.  OPM's recently-published CD-ROM 
guide, Addressing and Resolving Poor Performance, exemplifies the 
kind of self-study resource called for by the model.  Likewise, 
the model suggests that a relatively few strategically-placed and 
readily-available technical experts should be able to provide the 
level of coaching necessary to meet the demand.  To the extent 
that computer-based libraries and "expert systems" might be 
developed, the bridge between phases (2) and (3) will be 
strengthened.