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In greater detail than he has before, Office of Personnel Management Director John Berry outlined his thinking on remaking the federal personnel system during a speech this week. His address to a Human Capital Management: Federal conference was part of a series of discussions he is holding to help in the monumental task of developing a new civil service system. With ...

The effort to expand domestic benefits to the same-sex partners of federal employees took another step forward Wednesday when a House committee advanced legislation to do just that. After sometimes heated debate, the 23 to 12 vote in the Oversight and Government Reform Committee broke down along party lines, with the victorious Democrats arguing that the measure is a matter of ...

Feeling snug in your government building? Before you get too comfortable, consider these incidents involving the Federal Protective Service (FPS), the agency responsible for safeguarding federal facilities, described in a Government Accountability Office report: -- An infant in a carrier was placed on the moving belt of a security X-ray machine while the child's mother looked for identification. "Because the guard ...

If President Obama's plan to attract lots of bright people to work for the feds by making "government cool again" doesn't quite do the trick, money might. Congress is considering legislation to create a program that makes such good sense, you might wonder why no one thought of it before. The Roosevelt Scholars program would draw young people to key positions ...

It's ironic, and shameful, that President Obama's point man on his employment initiative for veterans is barred by law from being one. John Berry directs the Office of Personnel Management and is openly gay. No one is more eager about increasing employment opportunities for those who have served in the military, yet his government, but not this administration, says it does ...

Presidential executive orders are lofty, historical documents, generally signed in White House ceremonies with pomp and circumstance. Seldom do we think of them beginning in a small town on the eastern edge of West Virginia. But it was in Shepherdstown, with a population of 803 at last count, where President Obama's latest executive order, designed to facilitate the hiring of veterans ...

A congressional hearing on the future of the U.S. Postal Service can be one depressing experience. The sky outside the Rayburn House Office Building was bright Thursday morning, but it was all gloom and doom in Room 2154. Members of a Committee on Oversight and Government Reform panel explored novel ways the Postal Service might pull itself from deep debt -- ...

During these highly partisan and contentious times, it's not every day that Democrats and Republicans, labor and management, and workers and retirees find themselves on the same side of an issue. But that was generally the situation Tuesday when the Thrift Savings Plan for federal workers was mostly praised during a House subcommittee hearing. The TSP operates like a 401(k) retirement ...

If the federal civil service had a flag, it would be flying upside down. The civil service is in distress -- not dead, but in need of rescue. Recognizing this, John Berry, the Office of Personnel Management director, ran some sweeping ideas up the flagpole on Monday to see who salutes. At the same time he heaped praise on the "unsung ...

Sometimes Uncle Sam sounds like he has marbles in his mouth. Read, if you can, the accompanying excerpt from an Education Department regulation, which was printed in Wednesday's Federal Register. This one sentence has more than 220 words, nearly the equivalent of a typed page, double-spaced. It's typical of impenetrable fedspeak that produces more indigestion than information. But help is on ...

The 40 people who met behind closed doors in the Ronald Reagan Building on Wednesday weren't in a position to make any decisions about fixing the federal government's recruitment and hiring process, but their discussion could have a lasting impact on federal policy. The Harvard Kennedy School, along with the University of Maryland and the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), organized ...

President Obama wants to issue an executive order creating panels that would foster greater collaboration between management and labor in federal agencies, but it's hard to craft a document that pleases both sides. Union leaders, who had felt good about an early draft, aren't so happy with a revised proposal from the White House this month. But groups representing managers are ...

Ever the optimist, John Berry didn't seem fazed by the dreary skies, the steady drizzle, the muddy paths and the swampy grass. Resplendent in bright-green athletic shoes, the Office of Personnel Management director braved the weather with fellow federal workers to gather on the Mall at lunchtime Tuesday in the name of physical fitness. "Who said federal employees aren't tough?" he ...

One of the most common complaints among federal employees who enforce Uncle Sam's laws and regulations is that there are too few of them to properly protect the public. But one area where one would expect that not to be the case, given our nation's recent history, is border protection. Yet testimony before a House subcommittee Thursday painted a picture of ...

It's been six months since John Berry took over the Office of Personnel Management. With his appointment, and increased attention provided by President Obama's White House, federal personnel issues have gained a much greater profile. More attention, however, doesn't mean Uncle Sam's broken hiring system is fixed, or the confusing employee pay and evaluation structure is suddenly sane, or the federal ...