Unsurprisingly, overall job satisfaction in the federal government dropped for a third year on the Partnership for Public Service’s Best Places to Work rankings, which are based on OPM survey data, and prepared with Deloitte.
This past year, satisfaction across 10 workplace categories declined with a backdrop of a budget crunch, which froze pay and awards, and caused sequestration, furloughs and a partial government shutdown (the survey was taken prior to the shutdown). Adding insult, federal workers were again caught in political crossfire about the role and scope of the federal government, unfairly maligned as a bloated bureaucracy first and foremost. Fewer individuals held that view once vital services were put on hold during the shutdown.
Beyond the political arena, PPS parsed the OPM data to better understand internal strife within agencies, finding that job satisfaction and commitment level dropped three percentage points to 57.8, the lowest level since 2003 (citing data from the Hay Group, PPS noted a comparable private sector score was 70.7 in 2013). Satisfaction with pay dropped 4.7 points in 2013 (down 12.7 points overall since 2010), satisfaction with opportunities for training and development dropped 3.2, and satisfaction with rewards and advancement dropped 2.2 points.
