Can federal agencies fire you if your performance is satisfactory?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not for performance, but there are other ways to get rid of you. They can fire you for being marginal or lower in any element that is considered critical after PIPing you. If they are literally telling you to move on, they are giving you an easy way out. If you don't take it, I'd expect them to start documenting poor performance and PIP you.

That makes sense. My rating is not marginal and I've not been PIP'd. It sounds like as long as I'm at satisfactory, or above, I should be ok?

OP, you should be fine. Don't get anxious or present yourself that you are worse than everyone over there. Keep your head high and try to improve your skills and stay motivated to get challenging work.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's really hard to fire someone based on performance. They'll likely try and get you on conduct issues. If they want you gone, generally poor, or even average performers have at least a couple conduct issues. It's way easier to document and fire based on conduct.

They can't create conduct issues unless there is one.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's really hard to fire someone based on performance. They'll likely try and get you on conduct issues. If they want you gone, generally poor, or even average performers have at least a couple conduct issues. It's way easier to document and fire based on conduct.

+1 This is what my agency does. Won't touch performance, but give HR a conduct issue and you're gone.

What rises to the level of a "conduct" issue? Where I work, low performers often keep their heads down and don't make waves.

I think that pP was speaking out of his a$$. Over 30 years I've seen only two folks getting fired - one cheated on his travel voucher and the other did something with his young femal contractor. Both were SESs and both were escorted out by security guards

+2. I'm a fed and you can scream at your boss and coworkers if you want to - bullying is not an EEOC offense. Don't cheat on your timesheet and don't steal, like the voucher exampl abov. In over a decade, I know of 2 people getting fired - one didn't show up at work almost at all for 4 years, got fired, sued, won and got backpay + early retirement. The second one had a clearance and he got arrested for beating up his wife.

Depending on the Clearence, it is also very difficult to get fired just for one issue of assault. He could have not reported it and must had pretty high level Clearence.

[Anonymous]

OP, was your PIP started anytime recently?

[Anonymous]

Ridiculous the hoops you have to jump through in the Executive Branch. I’ve just made sure I’m tight with the judges in my district. Then if I want someone gone, I badmouth them to my favorite judge. That judge, now primed , looks for problems with that employee (thank you confirmatory bias). He tells the Clerk to get rid of the person, of course Clerk does because the judge asks, and I go along collecting my paycheck. Rinse and repeat.

Only caveat is to make sure your target has no real ties to members of Congress. We don’t need to give Congress any motivation to come after us.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's really hard to fire someone based on performance. They'll likely try and get you on conduct issues. If they want you gone, generally poor, or even average performers have at least a couple conduct issues. It's way easier to document and fire based on conduct.

+1 This is what my agency does. Won't touch performance, but give HR a conduct issue and you're gone.

It is not hard, it just takes effort and most middle managers do not want to put in the effort.

In my experience, young managers are willing to put in the effort, but once they realize HR won't back them up they give up

Np. I’m a young manager. My HR was extremely helpful and willing for me to deal with poor performers. I went to them for advice and was hoping to counsel the employee. They instead wanted to give a PIP and bring up conduct charges. HR said that if poor performers aren’t dealt with it brings down the whole division.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Something that has worked at my agency is the threat of a bad review. Basically, the employee is told they will receive a poor review. If the person hopes to continue in government or even some other places, they won’t want that on their record. So, the employee leaves in lieu of the bad review.

Does that happen in unionized agencies?

NP. Why wouldn't it? I have given plenty of poor reviews and PIPs to people who are poor performers in unionized agencies. Only lazy managers let poor performers stick around. I have also downgraded people. If you're just a bad GS13, maybe you should be a mediocre GS12 where not as much is required.

Oh, I know you can get a bad review. I was talking about the idea of threatening someone with a bad review as a stick to get someone to leave. Seems a bit underhanded and a way to get around worker protections.

It is all in how you look at it. Letting somebody know, honestly, that their performance is not meeting expectation or in danger of not meeting expectations that is the core of what performance management is about. It provides that employee the opportunity to either improve performance or leave without a mark on their record. If I were in that position as an employee, I certainly would appreciate the heads up before a formal PIP was issued...

In my experience poor performers don’t think a PIP is actually coming so they continue not working. I’ve told a few people at midterms that their performance was at an unsatisfactory level and they didn’t believe me

[Anonymous]

You should seek out additional training and find ways to improve your performance. If you’ve fallen behind, it sounds like you may need to improve some technical skills. Did you used to get better reviews?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's really hard to fire someone based on performance. They'll likely try and get you on conduct issues. If they want you gone, generally poor, or even average performers have at least a couple conduct issues. It's way easier to document and fire based on conduct.

+1 This is what my agency does. Won't touch performance, but give HR a conduct issue and you're gone.

It is not hard, it just takes effort and most middle managers do not want to put in the effort.

In my experience, young managers are willing to put in the effort, but once they realize HR won't back them up they give up

Np. I’m a young manager. My HR was extremely helpful and willing for me to deal with poor performers. I went to them for advice and was hoping to counsel the employee. They instead wanted to give a PIP and bring up conduct charges. HR said that if poor performers aren’t dealt with it brings down the whole division.

I am the prior PP and was involved in three firings over the years. I helped draft the memos based on my roll. In all three cases, the manager was older/near retirement. HR was also supportive. The thing is, if your poor performance impacts your manager or your good employees, that is all the motivation a good manager needs to start the process. I want to end this idea that it is impossible to fire someone in the government because it’s not true. It’s just that lazy managers do not want to jump through hoops to get it done. That, and there actually needs to be a performance issues, not personality clash or an age/gender based firing because the government takes those protections pretty seriously.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's really hard to fire someone based on performance. They'll likely try and get you on conduct issues. If they want you gone, generally poor, or even average performers have at least a couple conduct issues. It's way easier to document and fire based on conduct.

+1 This is what my agency does. Won't touch performance, but give HR a conduct issue and you're gone.

It is not hard, it just takes effort and most middle managers do not want to put in the effort.

In my experience, young managers are willing to put in the effort, but once they realize HR won't back them up they give up

Np. I’m a young manager. My HR was extremely helpful and willing for me to deal with poor performers. I went to them for advice and was hoping to counsel the employee. They instead wanted to give a PIP and bring up conduct charges. HR said that if poor performers aren’t dealt with it brings down the whole division.

I am the prior PP and was involved in three firings over the years. I helped draft the memos based on my roll. In all three cases, the manager was older/near retirement. HR was also supportive. The thing is, if your poor performance impacts your manager or your good employees, that is all the motivation a good manager needs to start the process. I want to end this idea that it is impossible to fire someone in the government because it’s not true. It’s just that lazy managers do not want to jump through hoops to get it done. That, and there actually needs to be a performance issues, not personality clash or an age/gender based firing because the government takes those protections pretty seriously.

Mine and the next level don't care. We have metrics and some do 80% of the entire group's work and some do absolutely nothing and there are ZERO consequences. Actually, the more work you do, the more it is assigned to you, because the management knows they can count on you. It's a vicious cycle. At my agency, people who are 10 years or less away from retirement don't do anything all day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's really hard to fire someone based on performance. They'll likely try and get you on conduct issues. If they want you gone, generally poor, or even average performers have at least a couple conduct issues. It's way easier to document and fire based on conduct.

+1 This is what my agency does. Won't touch performance, but give HR a conduct issue and you're gone.

It is not hard, it just takes effort and most middle managers do not want to put in the effort.

In my experience, young managers are willing to put in the effort, but once they realize HR won't back them up they give up

Np. I’m a young manager. My HR was extremely helpful and willing for me to deal with poor performers. I went to them for advice and was hoping to counsel the employee. They instead wanted to give a PIP and bring up conduct charges. HR said that if poor performers aren’t dealt with it brings down the whole division.

I am the prior PP and was involved in three firings over the years. I helped draft the memos based on my roll. In all three cases, the manager was older/near retirement. HR was also supportive. The thing is, if your poor performance impacts your manager or your good employees, that is all the motivation a good manager needs to start the process. I want to end this idea that it is impossible to fire someone in the government because it’s not true. It’s just that lazy managers do not want to jump through hoops to get it done. That, and there actually needs to be a performance issues, not personality clash or an age/gender based firing because the government takes those protections pretty seriously.

Mine and the next level don't care. We have metrics and some do 80% of the entire group's work and some do absolutely nothing and there are ZERO consequences. Actually, the more work you do, the more it is assigned to you, because the management knows they can count on you. It's a vicious cycle. At my agency, people who are 10 years or less away from retirement don't do anything all day.

So they are lazy, correct?

Document what is going on. Stop taking more than your share of work and when it happens, document it. Seriously, they cannot fire you for doing your job. They cannot fire you for not doing other people’s jobs. They cannot fire you for doing 80% of your sections/units/division’s work. You are letting them be lazy and not fire bad employees. Stop doing that. And document it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's really hard to fire someone based on performance. They'll likely try and get you on conduct issues. If they want you gone, generally poor, or even average performers have at least a couple conduct issues. It's way easier to document and fire based on conduct.

+1 This is what my agency does. Won't touch performance, but give HR a conduct issue and you're gone.

What rises to the level of a "conduct" issue? Where I work, low performers often keep their heads down and don't make waves.

I think that pP was speaking out of his a$$. Over 30 years I've seen only two folks getting fired - one cheated on his travel voucher and the other did something with his young femal contractor. Both were SESs and both were escorted out by security guards

+1. Being shady with young female coworkers has twice gotten someone walked out of my agency as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's really hard to fire someone based on performance. They'll likely try and get you on conduct issues. If they want you gone, generally poor, or even average performers have at least a couple conduct issues. It's way easier to document and fire based on conduct.

+1 This is what my agency does. Won't touch performance, but give HR a conduct issue and you're gone.

What rises to the level of a "conduct" issue? Where I work, low performers often keep their heads down and don't make waves.

Sexual harassment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Something that has worked at my agency is the threat of a bad review. Basically, the employee is told they will receive a poor review. If the person hopes to continue in government or even some other places, they won’t want that on their record. So, the employee leaves in lieu of the bad review.

I work for a contractor. My supervisor is an unethical immoral immature woman who has slept and dated coworkers under her and is brash and sexist. She has special presence for men and her friends. She pinpointed me for having a longer break than usual but let the men she likes slide for having hour long breaks everyday. There is another supervisor who comes in to our office and sits for 2 hours flirting with the men everyday. I asked for help one time and she told the other supervisor mentioned that I didn't do my research before calling her. So when that other supervisor told me these things in our yearly review I knew fighting back was for nothing and signed the review. If this affects me though is it a good idea to tell about what she has been doing? Our contract is ending soon and everyone including her will be kicked out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, was your PIP started anytime recently?

What is the difference between a bad review and a pip? Isn't the bad rebiew before the pip?