The Department of Homeland Security’s new personnel system,
which Bush administration officials want to use as the model
for other agencies, would essentially scrap the general
schedule job classification and pay system in favor of
broader categories that will give managers more leeway in
setting initial salaries, promoting employees and rewarding
good performers.
On classification, the department plans to create around a
dozen “occupational clusters”—for example, administrative
personnel and science and engineering—to replace the
detailed classification system that is now the basis of job
grading. Within each cluster there typically will be four
pay bands–entry/developmental, full performance, senior
expert, and first-level supervisory—with higher managerial
layers on top. Advancement within a band will depend on
performance, assessment and demonstrated competencies.
Performance also will be one element of employee raises,
although it’s yet to be determined exactly how that will work.
The department plans to divide available salary money into
separate portions for market-based pay and performance-based
pay. Pass-fail systems will not be allowed except in
probationary settings, meaning that there will have to be at
least three ratings levels. An employee must be performing
at least at the “fully successful” level to receive the
market-based pay element. The money in the performance part
of the pay pool will be divided among employees according
to a mathematical formula that also is yet to be determined.
Officials stress that the pay for performance system will
be phased in and say they will adjust it to account for
lessons learned. The system will be rolled out in three
phases, with the first group of about 10,000 employees going
under the system effective October 1 of this year, although
their raises won’t reflect the new system until 2007. The
rest of the roughly 110,000 department employees covered by
the system will be phased in over the two following years.
