From Government Executive:
The Office of Personnel Management on Tuesday announced that it will end the use of maximum telework as part of the federal government’s operating status next month, following President Biden’s planned expiration of the COVID-19 public health emergency.
The public health emergency is set to expire on May 11. In a memo to agency heads Tuesday, OPM Director Kiran Ahuja announced that as a result, the federal government’s HR agency will no longer recommend that agencies remain “open with maximum telework flexibilities” as part of a governmentwide operating status. ...
Ahuja stressed that although OPM’s recommendation for maximum telework was ending, agencies should still balance the Office of Management and Budget’s call for “substantially increased meaningful in-person work at federal agencies” with the benefits associated with continued use of workplace flexibilities, including increased productivity, employee engagement and recruitment and retention of workers.
“OMB’s memorandum informed agencies of an expectation to increase meaningful in-person work while still using flexible operational policies,” she wrote. “Agencies should continue to strategically use telework and remote work policies in support of their workforce plans moving forward while capitalizing on the benefits of meaningful in-person work.” ...
[T]he memo did not assuage the concerns of House Oversight and Accountability Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., who compared the memo to a decades-long policy on LGBTQ+ Americans serving in the military. ...
Cut the endless comments on the merits of telework. Don't you guys get tired?
50 comments:
Reducing telework will result in further retirements and brain drain of experienced staff. The agency has a terrible retention rate at the moment.
Of course identical levels of telework aren’t appropriate for all workers. But a huge number of the agency’s staff are performing fully portable work and are assigned to offices hundreds or thousands of miles from the offices they work for. What is the benefit of making them waste 10+ hours per week driving through LA or DC traffic to do that work, or continue living within two hours of their assigned office? If it’s a loyalty test, I don’t think the agency is going to like the results….
This, coupled with the OMB directive, very clearly point to 2 to 3 days in office for all SSA employees. Anyone thinking that SSA is going to ignore OMB's guidance is simply dreaming.
With a DIB backlog of over 1 million claims, I think frontline employees are going to 4 days in office, and possibly 5. SSA is a customer service agency, and it's not possible to serve the public in your Jammies on the couch. The public and lawmakers are going to start asking why their taxes are funding that.
Gee, no comments...they must all be too busy wfh!!!
;) its Friday lighten up~
If ssa reduces telework the low staffing #s will continue to drop and the backlog will only grow. In 2021/2022 critics said nobody would quit upon reentry. 1 year later ssa staffing is at the lowest in 25 years. Increasing in office work will result in less staff and more backlogs. Less staff to answer phones. The tsc staff can work from home 5 days a week…
We get it. Some people love telework and some think everyone’s a slacker. I just come here hoping that someone with inside info will let us know the plan…
SSA field offices already have heavily reduced telework so I don’t think this will change anything. Maybe some of the other components.
The productivity statistics have shown ssa has less staff and continues to produce an incredible amount of work with little staffing. Telework reductions will hurt morale and staffing
This OPM memo just means that telework is no longer required based upon the pandemic . This does not change the fact that telework is now an integral, important, and established part of SSA. employee's lives. It enables us to balance our home and work lives.
And, over the last 3 years, I'm proud to say that SSA workers have become quite efficient at getting our work done from home. Surveys show that over 90% of employees say they are more productive working from home. Management statistics back that up too.
If SSA workers are forced back into the office for political reasons, the inevitable result will be decreased productivity, more leave usage, a wave of retirements ,and more resignations from those employees who are not eligible to retire.
Add to this the other negative effects of low morale, and unfortunately, SSA backlogs and wait times will sharply increase. The very opposite effect from what is desirable.
The White House has told SSA to get employees back in the office. Congress is telling SSA that, too (see the SHOWUP Act).
SSA's workforce numbers were on a downward trajectory long before reentry, and SSA is currently losing 1,000 employees a month under the current telework posture. SSA's new hire attrition is through the roof because nobody is learning to do the job with this remote nonsense going on.
The private sector is and has been sending employees back into the office. Literally nothing says that the status quo is going to persist.
If front line employees are going to continue not showing up to provide in person service, the next alternative is to continue automating front line services or contract them out and eliminate front line jobs. It's as simple as that.
@8:53 no comments because we are tired of arguing about telework. So give the people, politicians and everyone else against telework what they want and wait for the aftermath of reduced staffing and continued backlogs. But the lobby will be cleared and that’s all the care about. They don’t care about the unprocessed claims that can’t get done because everyone is servicing the walk in traffic. So yes let’s try this idea and see how long it takes for people to figure out that was not the solution to the massive agency problems.
Makes since as staff is too disconnected with all this telework. The staff that didn't want to work in the office left. Let's bring back our coworkers so we can have meaningful in person conversations and meetings and serve the public
Doesn't it make sense that OHO needs almost no staff in person - or very little, local offices need enough staff to man the front desks and meet with people coming in, and DDS needs very little in person staff. Phones can be answered from home, computers accessed from home, and efficiently - as Covid has proven. We need people in the local offices to help the public. We need some people at OHO's. We need some at DDS. Let's figure that out, give the best service we can and maximize telework so that it remains a benefit. Otherwise we are going to lose people, again - and things will get much, much worse.
@117. Somehow before telework FO employees with no telework were able to balance their home and work lives. I agree it's great not to commute but the aim of the employer is to firstly produce work efficiently. Balancing work and home life is a secondary aim.
90% of employees say they are more efficient? I'd bet the same percentage think they are above average workers too.
I doubt telework would end due to political reasons any more than it would be extended for political reasons.
Should telework be ended completely I think the wave of resignations and retirements would rival the 2022 red tsunami.
With the public emergency expiring, will OHO's start defaulting back to "in person" hearings?
I’m so tired of everyone lumping all teleworkers into one category. It’s like us comparing all dib law firms together or all state dds together. Everything is different for everyone. I have a genuine question. My position is 700 miles away from my team. My AC lives is a different state as well. This month, I’ve worked with agencies in Texas, Georgia, and Virginia as part of my duties. All from home. When telework ends, I will go into and office and continue to be 700 miles away from my team. Does that mean I no longer have a job? If what my work right now isn’t “meaningful face to face” are they going to pay to relocate me to Baltimore? Will I be able to argue relocating and buying my house and moving my household goods at taxpayer expense is justified if my work has to be face to face?
Secondly, everyone says “automate things.” Do you think the programmers want to return to the office? They have transferable skills and have been leaving for private sector work over the last 15 months already which is part of the huge IT backlog and crappy releases…IE the terrible CCE without proper vetting, etc. This market is going to entice a lot of us with transferable skills to consider the private sector for the first time in a long time because this is a cross-government initiative. It’s not just SSA that’s worrried. But honestly, it’s not going to make work any better for the public cutting telework. It didn’t get better when things went from 5 days in the field down to 2, what makes anyone think this will help? Staffing is the problem but nobody wants to admit that, especially republicans calling for spending to revert to 2022.
If you hate dealing with SSA this much, time to practice a different form of law because it isn’t getting better.
It looks to me like the Biden Adm is caving to the Republicans on the federal employee telework issue.
With the 2024 campaign approaching,, Biden doesn't want the Republicans saying that Democrats allow federal workers telework, while private industry workers have to go in to the office (Not true but that's what House Republicans say)
Anyway it's a win-win situation for me. I love telework, but I also love my free time.
If SSA lets me continue to telework, I will stay another year or two and work my hardest, as I always do.
If I'm ordered back to the office, I'm handing in my retirement papers immediately. I'm not going back to daily commuting
I doubt it. The number of representatives that figured out that phone and OVHs didn’t result in a massive drop in favorable decision rates coupled with the convenience to claimants of not having to drive/ride, park, etc. for in-person hearings has resulted in a number of cases with requests for telephonic or OVHs.
If someone wants an in-person hearing, they can still get one pretty easily. But there are far more cases where the rep and claimant request to convert an in-person hearing to phone/video than cases where they want an in-person hearing.
Will the agency/certain judges be able to insist on in person as being default again?
Missing in this discussion is the chance of catching COVID19 in the office. As much as we would like for it to be gone, it's still. around..
I caught Covid in January, tested positive for two weeks afterwards. Initially was quite sick with fever of 101.5. With telework I just missed a couple of days then I felt well enough to work from home. And I didn't spread it to my coworkers either.
I get wanting to telework as much as possible. However, there is institutional knowledge lost when employees no longer see and know each other in person. You cannot ask a simple, perhaps stupid but still, question quickly to the person in the next desk. You cannot see and help out someone who is struggling or simply falling behind the case load. Yes, I know this doesn't always happen even in person but it can never happen if people aren't working together in person. There is no routine communication with telework as currently constituted.
As to the conduct of hearings, I have learned, as a rep, that I can live with and even prefer video hearings even with the frequent technical glitches. I cannot abide telephone hearings. I think it is still critical for the ALJ to see the claimant and for the claimant to see the ALJ. I miss in person only because I miss seeing other reps and even friendly hearing office staff. As above, there is much gained in informal interactions that are simply lost when we don't see each other in person.
What we heard in our region was that face to face hearings will be the normal operating procedure again because it allows OHO to check the box for meaningful face to face work. Judges will be expected to hold as many hearings in person as is reasonably feasible to bring everyone back together. Telephone hearings will essentially end and video will be limited to claimants with an undue burden to appear, but everyone else will be in person. I’m worried this will slow down the backlog and crowd the waiting rooms. Doesn’t make sense to me.
Maybe in some work situations you can’t or don’t communicate because of telework, but SSA is equipped for communication via instant messaging that also has phone or even video quality. There is literally nothing stopping me from asking stupid questions of anyone in my office. If it can be done quickly, an IM is fine. If it takes a brief discussion, I can call the person and have a longer verbal conversation.
The difference for me is that I’m less likely to get caught up in conversations that have little to do with work when I’m teleworking. Not that I don’t enjoy talking with coworkers, but it doesn’t always help my productivity to do so.
If only there were some sort of telephonic or electronic means of communication. Like an “inter net” or a “tele phone.” Hmmmm….
Sounds like your region is being run by someone who has limited reading comprehension skills and misunderstood the recent OMB snd OPM memos, if they even bothered attempting to read them.
RO employee here (I have maximum telework) - the vast majority of jobs in this agency should have a hybrid work schedule. CO and RO ppl should not be allowed to stay home 5 days a week. And I’m sick of ppl saying we should continue this because we “can.” Bottom line, just because we can do something doesn’t mean we should be doing it. These are taxpayer funded jobs and the vast majority of employees should be seeing the inside of an office twice a week minimum. If there’s some highly specialized programmer or something else we need they can get an exception. The rest from the executives down need to go to work, sometimes!
The RO employee's should have full telework. If they are forced to return morale will drop and more brain drain for our advanced ro personnel who know the programs so well
There should be 2 separate comment sections on this blog. One for the people who a have clue (work or have worked for SSA - sorry reps, you’re not in this category) and another for everyone else (whose fallacy filled comments are completely out of touch with reality, spewing nothing but biased, opinion based rhetoric). The ignorance is astounding and mildly infuriating to anyone with boots on the ground.
2:14 Just because a job is taxpayer funded , is no reason to force employees to commute to an office, to do the exact same duties they can do well and safely from their home. The taxpayers are coming out ahead with maximum telework allowed, if the SSA employee is more productive at home!
The only exception is for jobs which require public contact : they should have a hybrid schedule and some time in the office. But even those positions have a lot of duties which can be done at home. so they should have some telework days.
The acoss committed to telework until 10/2025. Nothing will change. She formally agreed to keep telework in place.
Being an electronically savvy 35 year old GS-12, who started as a receptionist, then senior case tech, then specialist, then an admin position, it's hilarious reading some comments here, from reps especially, pretending to have absolutely any idea what we can or cannot do from home.
The problem is and always will be inflexibility and individual employees. I was able to do any of those jobs (as well as my current one) with my eyes closed. Telework had absolutely no impact at any point on my proficiency.
There have been some complaints in SSA Operations, that the high grade GS-12 and above employees in Baltimore HQ have full telework, 5 days a week.
While other SSA employees in Operations , lower grades, have to come in to the office some days.
PSC employees , for example, don't have public contact, there is no logical reason why their telework days should be less than HQ.
I can't tell you how many times pre-covid, say even 10 years ago or more, that late in the day the SRs were swamped and everyone else went up front to clear out the lobby before we closed. (For many years we actually closed at 4:30 PM.) With telework at 40%, there aren't enough SRs to help walk in visitors and less staff to help when they get behind, thereby putting a big burden on those who are in the office for the day. If FOs did away with telework, there would be less low pressure work from home type days but also less high pressure in office days.
The office I'm in is mid sized (40+) and despite threats from a few, no one left when we returned to the office. These people have been very well represented here over the past few years, hoping offices never reopen despite every other type business or government office open. Now they threaten a large exodus if telework ends. The sky is falling.
9:08 where do you get the ridiculous idea that every other type of business or government office is open.
Nearly 30 percent of jobs are still remote, vs 4% of jobs that were remote before the pandemic in 2019.
Telework is here to stay in a number of private companies.
I’m literally suggesting two days a week in the office. I’d even settle on one day a week but it should be a core day then. Some people I know want a hybrid schedule and some want to come in a couple of times per week so your morale comment is dubious. As far as losing employees, if someone is going to leave because they can’t come in once per week, chances are they’re not that committed to the mission anyway. You’re actually saying an experienced RO staffer under retirement age is going to quit? And start a new career? Not likely.
I’m not saying telework is a failure at all, I’m suggesting two days a week in the office has benefits too. Heck even one day if it’s a core day. Having the staff together from time to time is good for morale and innovation. And while I understand that most CO or RO jobs can be done completely remote, I still a little office time is a benefit for the agency employees and taxpayer.
Your office has SR’s ??? Wow, what a luxury!!!
The comments I made earlier about communication with other employees was not just about SS but is true in all manor of employment situations. Yes, many tasks can be accomplished remotely and to the extent they can be, they should be. But community in the work place is important and there really are no technical means to replicate that.
And, you shouldn't assume that reps don't have Social Security experience. I was a Social Security employee for ten years and there are many former Staff Attorneys and CR's and even State Agency adjudicators that have become representatives of claimants.
"But community in the work place is important and there really are no technical means to replicate that."
Out of touch. Young people are rejecting this philosophy in droves. I'm there to do my job, do it well, and clock out. I don't care about your son's T-ball practice.
@220 AM. I know government offices are open because I've gone to them and received timely service. The staffing appeared to be similar in office to pre-covid.
Nothing wrong with telework for TSC and other places without face to face public contact.
Dear Rep at 9:59 n 4/22. If you miss collegiality, join a bridge club, volunteer for something, or work inside a law office. If you want your claimant seen, ask ODAR for an OVH hearing instead of phone. I predict that ODAR loves phone hearings, and will continue to offer OVH hearings as "a compromise", that in-person ODAR work really means a skeleton staff to check mail, route faxes, and keep an eye on the server farm in the back room, and that the ODAR office footprint will decline - if the judges union will allow office sharing for the judges to have a place to store the artwork their wives won't let them hang at home. Everyone else will stay home and separated and therefore easier to manage, because there will not be any water cooler chatter about anything contentious or divisive. I bet ODAR loves telework, after all.
Your prediction pictures a reasonable future for the division. Unfortunately, though, the division is run by individuals with boundless incompetence. As a result, while ALJs are now permitted to move outside the commuting area fir their offices, despite having to be present in the office for in-person hearings, staff whose jobs require no in-person work are nonetheless required to continue living within two hours of their assigned offices, which in most cases don’t even have room for them to work from. So, while things should move in the direction you described, I predict that OHO will instead continue to decay and be a supremely undesirable place to work for all but its overpaid managers and ALJs.
One thing lost with telework is stumbling into coworkers trying to figure out an SDI offset or WEP and being able to help them or explain it to the public. Sure you can call or message from home or to someone at home but they are not going to wander into your conversation. I learned and shared information with coworkers over the decades about odd SSA situations where the person that may know, say a TE, isn't the person who did know. With the less than ideal training now given to SSA employees, telework becomes even more of an issue.
That type of learning doesn't happen with telework. It's a bit like the learning done only on a computer vs that done in a classroom setting. They both work, one less efficiently.
Typical management lunacy. The problem isn’t a lack of serendipitous collaboration. The problem is that staff don’t have enough damned time to stop and ask for help when it’s needed. Nor does anyone else have enough damned time to teach the less experienced staff. So when problems arise, everyone just mashes buttons until the failsafes are circumvented, and the trash floats upstream to someone with even less time to clean up the mess. And rinse and repeat until (hopefully) the poor sap getting screwed by the bureaucracy just gives up and sods off.
More time would certainly solve a lot of problems but the poster at 6:16 is correct, there are many issues with telework related to training. Training is likely the most damaged concept from telework. Let's face it, SSA training sucked prior to telework, now it's an abomination. And the agency was dumb enough to allow new hires to work from home immediately even in the FO when the contract as written disallowed it. Foolish foolish MOU. Funny, the union pressed the agency on training then fought and won on allowing new hires to telework. Lunacy...
Ain’t that the truth. Very sad state of affairs in the field offices.
If it was so good teleworking and so much more efficient then why did every single workload in every area of the agency suffer backlogs and delays that were longer than in person work? Like it or not it got worse working from home, that is a fact, yes there were backlogs before, but they got measurably worse. That is just a fact.
Please cue the long and tedious lies and excuse that support you denial of actual facts.
@1226 pm I agree workloads got more behind. I think individual CRs/CSs saw that they had 8 hours of time to take and adjudicate claims. When we were in the office 3+ years ago even the best days would have interruptions to sign off on a CPS for an SR, refigure an OP for a supervisor, etc so the total hours taking and adjudicating claims may be 2 or more hours less. In that respect they were more efficient at home. Unfortunately, the agency wasn't.
The one fascinating thing to me is we have done survey after survey asking employees if they are more efficient teleworking or if they want to telework. Have we had a single survey asking the customers what they want? Something like, so do you like the idea of less access to your local field offices? Do you like being ramrodded into internet claims when you call SSA? Better yet, do you like walking into a field office to file a claim only to be told go home we'll have one of our teleworkers call you? Ask those questions SSA. Maybe we'll get some different answers.
You might be surprised at the answers. I’m sure they’d vary wildly from area to area. But for instance, most people in my area hate going to their local office downtown in a federal building. Paying for parking or taking the bus and such. Most are quite willing and eager to do business by phone if at all possible. If you’re a single parent with multiple children, would you rather take them all to the office and get a call? I know not everything can be done over the phone, but most things can.
As for telework in general, I think it’s much less about the fact that it’s telework and more telling of an employee’s integrity. Good employees do their work regardless of their location.
The internet is a whole other animal and I think whether claimants or employees like it, that is the way the service delivery is headed.
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