PFP Future: Not Going Away

By Suzanne Kubota
Senior Internet Editor
FederalNewsRadio.com

“Pay for Performance is not going away.”

Despite setbacks with programs across the government (NSPS at Defense and MaxHR at Homeland Security), John Crum, Director of the Merit Systems Protection Board, tells FederalNewsRadio the reason the programs were tried in the first place still exist.

What I see is that the drivers for Pay for Performance remain, even if the momentum has at this point in time slowed down. I expect that at some point in time it will pick back up. For instance, one of the drivers is also recruitment and retention of the best quality people. Right now we’re in a recession – we can do quite well in recruiting, but we will not always remain in that recession. At some point in time I think we’re going to go back to having to recruit pretty aggressively and provide the incentives to come, and stay, as federal employees. So that sort of… need will continue and will drive the need for Pay for Performance.

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With increased federal hiring as a result of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, Crum sees addition opportunities for Pay for Performance. “Individual employees need to be accountable for what they do, as do organizations,” Crum says.

Ultimately, the idea behind Pay for Performance is to pay people, or compensate them, in accordance to what they provide for the organization. So I do think that the idea of accountability will likely track down… through organizations to individuals.

Regardless of the pay system being used, Crum writes that the goal should be for supervisors to “demonstrate to employees that they can be trusted to make fair decisions that affect their subordinates’ pay.”

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