Top agencies to work for in the federal government

Writing in the Washingtonian Magazine, James Michael Causey notes "don't look now, but working for the federal government is cool again."

As the eldest son of FederalNewsRadio's Senior Correspondent Mike Causey, he brings a unique perspective to the magazine's "Fifty Great Places to Work". Five of the top 50 are federal entities.

"I think if you could distill it down to one element," Causey told FederalNewsRadio, "it's the fact that if the individual employee feels like they're making a difference, everything trickles down from that."

The Washingtonian and FederalNewsRadio conducted a survey of more than 13,000 federal employees this past August. After pouring over the results, Causey said he feels the reason the Internal Revenue Service made the grade was not the pay and benefits.

Ultimately, it came down to mission, which was a pretty common thread throughout all the top winners of the best places to work. The people who I talked to... firmly believe in the mission of trying to help honest people honestly pay their taxes or correct a mistake or fix an error and they really believe in going after the cheats, who they firmly believe are harming the United States by not paying their fair share.

Causey told the Federal Drive about another example, cut from the article for space, about the Offices of the Chief Administrative Officer of the U.S. House of Representatives.

One of the employees there told me that they had overheard one congressman ask another congressman about something, and the congressman said "I don't know" but he pointed to the CAO staffer and said, "Those guys know everything about what's going on here. Go talk to them."

And they were really proud to have it acknowledged how important they are and that they really know the inner workings of the House, and they provide support at all different levels... they do everything. So I just think they really, really believe that they are doing something that matters.

The remaining three federal agencies on the list (in no particular order) are the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, the U.S. Forest Service, and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

"Great Places to Work" was last updated on the Washingtonian Magazine website for the 2007 edition. The latest "Fifty Great Places to Work" can be found in the November issue now on news stands.

For more on the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency and their winning formula for success, click here.