WASHINGTON—The FCC took part in the annual Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey for 2020, and while most of the responses shed positive light on the commission, one area of concern is how staffers perceive those with poor performance are not addressed.
The Office of Personnel Management conducted its 2020 edition of the survey between Sept. 22 and Nov. 3, 2020. Open to all FCC employees that had been with the commission since Oct. 31, 2019 (a total of 1,339), 622 participated. The survey was anonymous.
Asking respondents about a number of different aspects of their job (as agree/disagree, satisfied/dissatisfied), only two questions did not garner majority positive responses. The first was “In my work unit, steps are taken to deal with a poor performer who cannot or will not improve,” with 43.9% responding positively.
When the question was expanded, 40.4% of FCC staffers said that poor performers “remain in the work unit and continue to underperform.” Only about 29% of staffers said that the situation was remedied, by either the poor performer improving (19.7%), being removed/transferred (7.5%) or quitting (1.9%). About 30% of FCC staffers said that there are no poor performers in their unit.
Those numbers are actually an improvement over the survey results from 2019, where 47.9% said that poor performers simply stayed in the unit and continued to underperform.
The other area that saw less than a majority (49.4%) respond positively to a question was the prompt “I believe the results of this survey will be used to make my agency a better place to work.”
On the positive side of the survey, FCC staffers find their workloads to be reasonable (75%), they know what is expected of them (87%) and they know how their work relates to the agency’s goals (89.3%). Overall, 79.3% said that the FCC was a good place to work.
The FCC has shared its results from the survey on its website. The complete OPM report will be released in April.
