U.S. General Services Administration reviews

I received a tentative job offer six months before the supposed start date, and Human Resources did not finish my onboarding process and present me with an official offer letter until four days after my intended start date. Even then, my first paycheck was late. On several occasions I witnessed political appointees push half-baked ideas that affected large swaths of the workforce, without seeking the advice of the experienced career public servants around them. SES employees hesitate to try new things or experiment for fear that any failure will earn them a verbal lashing in front of Congress.

The Human Resources Department is full of employees that have only worked for the agency and do not have knowledge or do not care to practice good, sound, personnel practices. There is a culture of pre-selection in the HR Department and management/supervisors are blatantly committing Prohibited Personnel Practices by providing favoritism to those who have been "loyal" to GSA instead of promoting/reassigning based on merit, knowledge, skills, and abilities. There is an issue with veterans preference being improperly adjudicated and personnel selected for positions from public announcements based on the erroneous veterans preference status. Simple HR terms are not understood by some of the uneducated/ignorant managers. Many of the HR "Specialists" do not even know how to do basic qualifications, job analysis, pay setting, etc. The whole HR department needs to be overhauled. There are a few good HR people; however, they tend to not last very long because of the disorganization, inconsistency, and egos that are overly inflated of people in leadership positions.