Matt Taibbi, who is a contributing editor for Rolling Stone, has posted on his blog about Social Security. In the first part, he talks about Social Security's performance evaluation system of all things. By the way, my experience is that all performance evaluation systems are a mess. There's no good way of doing it. Taibbi segues into a discussion of Social Security's disability claim adjudication process. Taibbi seems to have conflated the jobs done by different categories of employees in ways which make the system seem even more odd than it actually is.
Taibbi, by the way, famously described Goldman Sachs as a "vampire squid." Goldman Sachs will have to live with that one for a long, long time.
12 comments:
He seems to think that Sam, what sounds like his staff attorney friend, represents the Government in some way and didn't just write the decisions He thinks Sam would care if the case is approved or not. As a former Staff Attorney, the answer is obvious no, other than it is true it is much easier to write an allowance than a denial. It would be nice to be able to contact him to explain just where he went off the rails. I did not see an email other than having to pay for his service.
Sounds like most of the same old tropes wrapped in a particularly uninformed or misinformed package. Don't know if I trust this guy and his "man of the people" bullshit style. Attacks are always more successful when they come from places other than the Heritage Foundation. Remember how successful the NPR hit job was? He's incorrect about how much fraud is in the system and how "generous" this system is. I've had more clients die waiting since the Tea Party came to town than any other time in my practice. I doubt Mr Tiabi and his large ego give a damn about being right about any of this. Wonder who funds him and why this was written.
At least in Opeartions, almost every position has specific examples of Level 5 performance that are supposed to be shared with every employee in their performance expectations discussion. However, my experience is that at least 90% of supervisors don't know where to even find those examples. That's just one of dozens of problems I regularly see supervisors create for themselves.
In the last 5 years, I have seen more pressure on managers not to give outstanding ratings, but it didn't have anything to do with bonuses. It was more because they were largely ignoring the standards for satisfactory vs. outstanding performance and giving out 5s without justification, and upper management started getting really skeptical of things when backlogs started getting out of control.
Who?
I'm going to go with @11:07 as the most likely answer as to what's going on here with the ratings system.
Seattle region discouraged outstandings. We had long discussions on how to write up appraisals.
There is no such thing as a " 4 " let's say above average. It is said one has "to walk on water" to get all "5's" … There are mucho mediocre employees who just skate by with all " 3's" … and those with a few "5's" pick up all the slack. FYI the training process for Newly Hired is all virtual. Mentoring in the Covid environment is very cumbersome. There is no substitute for watching an accomplished CS or TE conduct business LIVE. A good CS(Claims Specialist) .. formerly CR takes at 3-5 years (much like an NFL Quarterback) to become competent.
Seems like just an arbitrary way to keep salaries down and reward mediocrity.
@11:31 Couldn't intentionally lowering scores on employee evaluations to avoid giving pay raises or bonuses be considered an illegal labor practice? And, shame on those folks in management jobs in Seattle or folks in management jobs anywhere else at SSA if they are complicit in such illegal labor practices. If they are doing that they should all be fired.
OHO also provides examples of level 5 performance (or at least my managers always have, but I've been very lucky to have great managers). I can also mirror what 11:31 said, but not just for the Seattle region: if a manager assesses an employee as a 5 overall, the regional office now has to approve it first. It's beyond ludicrous that someone who has never reviewed my work and could not pick me out of a lineup has the final say on my annual review.
@239 AM " Couldn't intentionally lowering scores on employee evaluations to avoid giving pay raises or bonuses be considered an illegal labor practice?"
If you get 3s, and just about everybody does, you will still get the step increases you and everyone else is eligible for. It can affect your bonus but for CR/CS position (ones who take claims) it's just a few hundred dollars a year. If one were to get all 5s, in other words walk on water, then they would be eligible for a quality step increase (QSI) which is actually worth much more over a long period of time. If one can string together a few of those in a row, someone who is fairly new can be paid at the rate of someone who has been there 15+ years.
There has never been a good system. The pass fail was just as bad. I had an OS that would write up an appraisal then put it on my chair. She's a DADE now.
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