It's Done: Leaving Federal Service

How I Realized I Never Belonged Here

I was going to ride it out. The downsizing of the federal workforce is long overdue, and even with the threat of being RIF’d (Reduction In Force—laid off), I thought it best to stand fast. The pay, the benefits. It was hard to walk away from, even with my side business thriving.

But then fate intervened and it became clear that sticking it out would be impossible. The ensuing drama that unfolded in the weeks after I put in my notice just made it clear I was never designed to be a fed in the first place.

The Utter Incompetence

Long before all this happened, the complete incompetence of vital federal employees became clear. Our IT help desk personnel (contractors) were bestially stupid. In the days of fully remote work, God help you if your CAC login didn’t work. The people on the phone could only stammer questions from a script and tell you to turn your computer off and turn it on again. When that didn’t work, they would refer you to actual IT person. Who would get in touch with you via email in a few hours. Email. Which you can’t access because you can’t log in to your computer.

None of the managers (except mine) knew basic managerial requirements or personnel regulations that governed them. Many of the researchers were clueless about the report publishing process, even after being on staff for several years and training being readily available in print and video form.

What put the nail in the coffin was HR. When I started with the USDA 5 years ago, I submitted my military records and my records from my previous tenure as a civil servant. Our sole HR person updated my Service Computation Date (SCD) based on these records. I could plainly see on every administrative document that my SCD was 10/1/2010. So that means I’m coming up on a combined 15 years of Civil Service, right?

Wrong. Apparently there are TWO SCDs, one used for leave accumulation calculations, and one for retirement calculations. The retirement SCD is the one HR uses to calculate severance payments.

Guess which one this blithering idiot didn’t update?

Since it would take a long time to get the paperwork I needed to correct the issue, I was at risk of getting laid off with no severance.

Sorry, I wasn’t going to risk that. That gave me the push I needed to take the deferred resignation deal.

Even if things settle down, I will NEVER return to federal service. I just can’t take widespread incompetence.

The Bureaucracy

No surprise here. The nonsensical box-checking that exists in the federal government (for CYA purposes, to accommodate unions, and to accommodate the incompetence of its employees) is enraging beyond all measure.

For instance, my start date for admin leave was pushed from April 15th to the 17th so that, hold onto your hats, I could fill out a checklist. Equipment return was handled through mail and all my tasks were finished in time, but it didn’t matter. I had to fill it out so leadership could prove I had checked the boxes like a good little fed.

Those extra two days felt like torture. It threw all my plans off because the repetitive, useless goodbye calls, the maudlin weeping, the repetitive talking, talking, talking about nothing… it was all keeping me from what I actually wanted to be doing, and kept me distracted.

Gear shifting is not something I do well. I can’t go straight from a meeting into writing. I can’t work in pockets of time, so I couldn’t throw myself into setting up my business as a full-time venture.

I also had to attend an HR outbrief which was only relevant to retirees. It was mandatory and adversarial in nature, with our big boss threatening to end the call because of a quip in the chat.

I had to reschedule a client call for this (So sorry, my very patient paying customer), as they gave us only an hour of notice. It was the last of a long series of pointless meetings that stole my time and taxed my patience.

Susan

The 98-year-old… Her retirement package is ungodly generous. Why is she STILL HERE?? We don’t know. - From My Shameful Secret

There is a 98-year-old federal employee on my team that I will call Susan. She is the longest serving employee on our team, and has, from the very beginning, been useless. Early in my tenure, I was tasked with “helping” her. It became clear to me early on that this woman hadn’t just slowed down because of her age. Susan was incompetent. She did not know how to use a computer, not even email. And she was relying on other editors to do her work for her.

But my boss (rightly) feared that she would be subject to a grievance for age discrimination if she did anything about Susan. We couldn’t appear to be “targeting” Susan, even though she was the only one on the team who routinely missed deadlines, screwed up basic tasks, and basically did whatever she pleased.

Four years this went on. The only reason my boss risked taking action on her at all was because 1) The contractor Susan had been relying on to do her work was let go and it could no longer be ignored that Susan was completely nonfunctional, and 2) As the longest serving fed, she would be the first priority to keep in the event of a RIF, while other competent editors were cut loose.

Ultimately it didn’t matter, as Susan took the deferred resignation too, but only after a lovely woman on our magazine team spent AN HOUR (not exaggerating) on the phone with her to help her push a single button.

This woman has been making over six figures of taxpayer money for years. And she hoarded a job she couldn’t and wouldn’t perform, keeping some talented editor toiling away in low-paying freelance work.

It boils my blood.

The Culture of Entitlement

One thing I wasn’t prepared for in my specific agency was the feeling of entitlement to the job. Most of the people I work with are not long-time feds. They come from academia due to the specialized nature of our research, and because there was almost a 100% turnover in 2020, many more came from regular private sector jobs.

All of these people seemed to believe that acquiring a federal job was the finish line. Once acquired, this job was owed to them, and the rage and disbelief that downsizing or reorganization could occur was really something to behold.

Meetings were filled with words like “betrayal” “outrage” and literal crying occurred more than once. There was a pervasive, dysregulated personalization of the work. As if this was who they were. For some jobs (doctors, soldiers, first responders), this is normal. But that’s not the type of work we do. There’s no emergencies in this job, and no one will die or even lose money if we don’t do what we do.

One guy who had been with the team less than a month prattled on for 15 minutes of a 40-minute meeting about how he “loves you guys” and “this has been the honor of my life.”

My face when he said that shit

Despite this over-invested love fest of their federal job, most of them also made comments and asked questions that made it clear they believed that the executive branch (the employer they love so much) was determined to fuck them over.

All the meetings talking about thoughts and feelings made it clear that I was never in alignment with these people, not in terms of what I believe work is for, and not what I think a government is for.

I’m so glad it’s done.

My husband, a government contractor, was also laid off, which is a pressing issue, so I’m keeping my fingers crossed he gets a new job soon for those sweet, sweet medical benefits.

Though I’ve offered him the job of being my stay-at-home trophy husband, he has thus far declined the offer.

Now I’m onto the next adventure, and I couldn’t be more thrilled.