Poor teamwork. Miserable balance of work and your life. Little success with strategic management. Doesn't sound like the best place to work, does it?
But those are some of the findings of life within the ranks of the National Park Service, according to this year's Best Places to Work in the Federal Government.
The rankings are compiled by the Partnership for Public Service and American University's Institute for the Study of Public Policy Implementation through surveys of more than 263,000 government workers.
Agencies and subcomponents are ranked according to a Best Places to Work index score, which measures overall employee satisfaction, an important part of employee engagement and, ultimately, a driver of organizational performance. The Best Places to Work score is calculated both for the organization as a whole and also for specific demographic groups.
While this year's rankings show a slight improvement for the Park Service over recent years' surveys, they also reflect that the agency is far from being considered a good employer.
Overall, the Park Service ranked 139th out of 224 agencies. Its combined score of 63.7, compiled from surveys that looked at such things as management, empowerment, diversity, pay, training, and "family friendly culture," was up from 59.8 last year, 58.2 in 2007, and 62.5 in 2005.
In 2003 the Park Service's score was 64.1.
The latest survey found that teamwork in the Park Service is about the worst in any federal agency, with the Park Service's score ranking it 206 out of the 223 ranked. Even worse is the agency's work/life balance quotient, which placed the Park Service 220 out of the 223. Also poor was the perception of the agency's "strategic management," which earned the Park Service a ranking of 203 out of the 223.
The Park Service's best score, 97 out of 223, came in the category of "employee skills/mission match."
A request for a reaction from Park Service Director Jon Jarvis was not immediately granted. However, last September, the day after he was confirmed by the Senate as director, Mr. Jarvis dispatched a system-wide memo outlining his priorities, and topping them was a desire to strengthen the workforce.
"I come to Washington, in part, as your representative, your voice, and your advocate. The day-to-day operation of the parks and the work of our community assistance programs is accomplished by the dedicated men and women (including amazing volunteers) of the NPS who empty the trash, enter the payroll, rescue the lost, clear the trails, help communities, sample the air and water, and tell our compelling stories," he wrote. "Your welfare and safety will always be my top priority. To help you succeed, we will provide the funding, training, succession planning, recognition, facilities, and policies you need to get your work done."
The latest rankings would seem to indicate that Mr. Jarvis has a lot of work to accomplish in this arena.
Here's a look at the breakdown:
Best in Class Scores.........................Score.............Rank (out of varied totals)
Employee Skills/Mission Match........................78.9................97 of 223
Strategic Management.................................50.0................203 of 223
Teamwork.............................................59.6................206 of 223
Effective Leadership.................................51.0................183 of 223
Effective Leadership - Empowerment...................45.5................176 of 223
Effective Leadership - Fairness......................48.7................185 of 223
Effective Leadership - Leaders......................43.8................186 of 223
Effective Leadership - Supervisors..................62.2................180 of 223
Performance Based Rewards and Advancement...........43.7................177 of 223
Training and Development............................53.3................198 of 223
Support for Diversity...............................52.5................194 of 223
Pay.................................................62.4................179 of 223
Family Friendly Culture and Benefits................31.0................188 of 223
Work/Life Balance...................................51.4................220 of 223
Scores by Demographic..........................Score...........Rank (out of varied totals)
Female..........................................65.4................119 of 222
Male............................................64.3................161 of 221
40 and over.....................................64.6................146 of 223
Under 40........................................65.5................134 of 204
Asian...........................................68.0................54 of 79
Black or African-American.......................58.6................148 of 193
Hispanic or Latino..............................66.9................69 of 133
Multi-racial....................................60.3................24 of 42
White...........................................65.8................149 of 222
American Indian or Native American..............61.1................10 of 17
Comments
I've always been a person who respects the "real world", and the 360 degree view that encompasses. From my perspective, the National Park Service is at the top of the list for professionalism, esprit-de-corps, and serving the public. Senior NPS management, park superintendents, and middle management fully understand the nuance and complextity of the mission and workforce. In fact, the National Parks are more engaged with positive reforms now than any other time in recent memory. Yes, you will find some negative people and problems in the periphery, but not out on the general landscape. Kudos to the men and women who wear the green and gray...
Ben Lord
Dear tahoma:
a few of your points:
I am not a fan of reorganizations; for the effort they put into it, you could actually get something done.
No, I don't think it takes a lot of sophistication to deal with either the budget process, or the congressional process, or the constituent-development process. But I DO think there are people who try to make it mysterious, and relegate it all to themselves. I learned a little about it by accident, and learned you can in fact teach most any intelligent person all they need to know about the political process in a day.
The key thing is to understand how meaningful PLACE is to many people. Important places have powerful political leverage. With good interpretation of the meaning of PLACE, parks are compelling, and can draw huge political support.
The national park service butget could be multiplied EIGHT TIMES, and not even be a rounding error in the federal budget. I also think there are problems in the US economic system that could make it unsustainable if managed badly, but I think the NPS budget has nothing to do with that. In fact, there is a lot of evidence that the parks enhance the US economy, draw visitors to the United States who visit parks on their trip and contribute more than $50 billion against our balance of payments. But more than that, parks emphasize what it means to be an American, the things that are the essence of the American experience, and the protection of these places adds richness to the United States. Recently the African Burial Ground in New York City was added to the National Park System, and it was stunning to see how much this mattered to so many people who previously had no idea where they came from, when they were brought to America in slavery. It turns out that 1/5 of the population of New York City during colonial times were enslaved, and that slavery was a northern, not just a southern experience. The national park service took over that site at a time people were anguished at how the United States Government seemed to be trying to erase this history. It mattered to them that the site was recognized as a site of national significance. The cost truly was trivial compared to the electricity of the connection with so many people with that site.
I think referring to something so vital as "a bureaucratic growth imperative" is either deeply cynical or beyond the basic understanding of why PLACES AND THEIR STORY matters so much to PEOPLE.
This is 'pie in the sky?' Unless this was just an impulsive retort we were truly at the opposite ends of the spectrum of people working for the National Park Service. The people I knew were believers, and people who could make real the yearnings for value of the visitor.
Finally, you make a good point in your 'database' example. One problem with the tendency of NPS people to see themselves as self contained is, the National Park Service does not foster training and employee development as much as it should. There are so many terrific examples of self-starters, so many people who prize their independence, and so little money for "Administration" (and such a huge drain of Administration funding to pay for all the Bush-era "accountability" processes) that the NPS spends next to nothing acquainting mid-level managers with the value of current management techniques. Too many people are left to fend for themselves, and are not mentored. Great individual achievement happens this way, but too many people fall by the way, and new management systems and even basic technique gets ignored.
But, I had a Regional Director who emphasized the value of management skills and heuristic use of data, so I know all it takes is some leadership to make this difference. However, do not assume that because people did not immediately understand or learn how to use the tools you provided, necessarily means the information and practice will never work their way into use. It takes persistence to make change, persistence so Management understands the reasons to push something, and persistence to allow busy or distracted people to understand why something new will help.
I agree with Benjamin Lord about the women and men in the NPS. Their substance and zeal has change my life, and every day enhances the experience of millions of visitors.
D-2
Thanks for your thoughtful reply. I don't mean to extend our disagreements about expansion and corruption, but I feel compelled to correct an error in my second post. I should have written: "The reaction from SOME middle managers...". Also, my understanding is that at least parts of that database are used by resource management. I hope you're correct that it will be, or has been, used in the budgeting process as well.
So I watched the Ken Burns take on the Parks and fell in love. I have always known about the parks but now they feel like new friends I want to spend more time with and have begun looking for ways to do so.
I am also a Civil Servant working for NASA - an agency that ranks high on this list of best places to work in the Federal Gov't (though my specific center does not rank high, it barely eeks out a higher ranking than the Park Service) - and I live in an area where there are several National Parks with in a few hour's drive. I recently saw a job posting for the Park Service on the USAJOBS web page that is up my alley. Though it I am a budget guy but I am a hard working ethical person who likes to be around similar people and likes to help make the magic happen in my own behind-the-scenes way, helping out those who are the nuts and bolts (or in this case maybe trees and trails) folks. I like to work for an Agency where there is almost religious like dedication to the mission of the agency and from the comments I see the Park Service is a place like that.
But also after reading the comments I can't help but wonder how rampant is all the negative stuff? Would I want to leave behind what I have in one agency doing exciting things working on exciting projects to go work in a place where middle / regional management and park superintendents are portrayed so poorly? The grass doesn't seem so green on the Park Service side of the fence any more....
But also as I read these comments I see a common theme of lack of training for a variety of reasons: travel, budget, getting time away, etc. and I don't know what internal training resources the Park Service has but how easy is it for folks in the Park Service to find out about training put on by other Agencies and piggy-back on with them or do a detail to another agency? Yes, Park Service employees may not find things that will help answer specific tree and trail problems but other agencies that have lots of training resources may be able to provide applicable training.
For example NASA has classes on everything from converting over to using Windows 7, to project management and leadership development, to writing effective Statements of Work for work being contracted out, to effective communication skills, to using Microsoft Excel as a analytical tool. I would imagine places like the FBI and DEA have great to law enforcement training. Is there something closer offered by another agency that gets you what you need that may be less expensive? I wonder this because as part of rounding myself out I wanted to go do a 6 month detail in my center's procurement group instead it was suggested a DoD course that would give me the procurement training I want but not impact my own work load so much as going off on a detail for months
I agree with many of the things that have been said--even though they may seem contradictory. The Park Service has a great mission, terrific places to be (though not necessarily to work) and it benefits from the enthusiasm and dedication of workers in a wide variety of jobs. The employees that work with the public are nearly all enthusiastic, caring people that help make the public love the rangers and parks. The problems that plague the Service are accurately described by the survey. One of the worst problems being hit-or-miss leadership, especially at the superintendent and regional office level. And when poor choices are made and incompetent, dishonest or downright pathological people are put into those upper spots, upper management goes into CYA mode and refuses to correct the problem. In Alaska, one park recently had to lose almost 75% of its permanent staff before the regional office stepped in and replaced her. There are other superintendents that are just as bad, but no action has been taken to remove them. Once of the bad ones was just promoted to a bigger park in an effort to get her away from employees she has had problems with. It will only make the problems bigger too, but nothing will be done until things get critical. In fairness, there are some great superintendents in other national parks.
To the person who asked about working for the Park Service, I'd say it's a great place to work if you stay at the worker bee level--most of the really ugly stuff happens at the level of park management and above. Be prepared to move around if you get stuck with one of the really bad managers. Moving around is the norm for Park Service employees, so it won't get held against you. It's also a way to see more great parks! I've seen the Service refuse to act to resolve some astonishingly bad situations, but I still love the parks.