Federal Manager's Daily Report

The latest Best Places to Work in the Federal Government report once again shows substantial variation among agencies, with NASA, HHS, Commerce, Transportation and the intelligence community leading among large agencies and FERC, GAO, FDIC, FTC and SEC among mid-sized agencies.

However, the Partnership for Public Service, which prepares the report, said it was unable to present full data on smaller agencies because OPM provided information from the annual Federal Employees Viewpoint Survey only on agencies or subcomponents with at least 300 respondents, rather than 50 as in the past. Among the seven small agencies that met that level of response, the OPIC stood at the top, followed by OMB and the Millennium Challenge Corporation.

OPM since has agreed to again provide full data; the Partnership said it will issue a second report in the coming months that will include data on nearly 200 small agencies and subcomponents of larger ones.

Notable among the findings were that:

NASA retained the top standing among large agencies for the sixth year in a row;

the State Department dropped out of the top five for the first time since 2011 among large agencies, including a 9.2 point decrease in how employees view their senior leaders;

DHS raised its overall score by 6.2 points, about triple the government-wide increase, but still is at the bottom among large agencies with just a 52.0 rating–the VA was the second-lowest;

among mid-sized agencies, the Broadcasting Board of Governors was lowest-rated, with SBA second-lowest;

ICE posted the largest gain among all subagencies, up 11.5 points to 56.7;

the highest-rated subagency was the IG’s office at the TVA, at 92.1 although down 1.2 points–the lowest was the Secret Service at 33.0, up 0.2.