EMPLOYEES IN ACTION
In this section:
20 Volunteer to Staff Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan,
and Sudan Posts
Volunteer Counselors Assist in Solving Personnel
Disputes
22 Interns Trained as Contracting Officers to
Replenish Ranks
20 Volunteer to Staff Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and
Sudan Posts
After a call from Administrator Natsios at a town hall meeting
of USAID foreign service employees for volunteers to fill
more than 20 unfilled positions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan
and Sudan, all the spots were filled.
The positions were either in areas of high danger or hardship
posts that would bar spouses and children.
At first, the jobs were advertised in normal cycle, in which
about 200 foreign service staffers bid on new positions after
completing their assignment in a mission.
“But we had a number of positions with no bidders—20
for Iraq, two for Afghanistan, two for Pakistan and one for
Sudan,” said Rebecca Cohn, head of the Personnel Operational
Division.
A decision was made not to assign anyone to the other posts
until these critical posts were filled.
“Foreign service officers sign a form when they are
hired saying they will be available for service worldwide,”
Cohn said.
“But we decided to ask for volunteers,” Cohn added.
To make it more appealing for staffers to volunteer, the
personnel office made key changes to the normal bidding process:
- They opened the window to all USAID foreign service officers
in the world, even if they were just starting assignments
elsewhere and not due for rotation.
- They opened it up to GS employees and personal service
contractors.
- And they offered six-month assignments.
Due to the volunteers responding to the need, “it has
been determined that there will be no mandatory bidding process
required,” Agency management said in a statement Dec.
6.
Volunteer Counselors Assist in Solving Personnel Disputes
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From left to right: Mark Phillips, Jean Horton, Michael
Austin, Veronica Young, Tanya Dalton, and David Grossman.
Not shown: Jerry O’Brien, Aimee David, Ajit Joshi,
Louise Pierce, and Melissa Walkup.
USAID |
Veronica “Ronnie” Young is one of four Agency counselors
whose job is listening to others tell their problems, especially
their concerns about possible discrimination.
“Whenever someone had a problem or needed to vent,
they would come to me and usually felt better afterward,”
said Young, who is a congressional liaison officer in the
Bureau for Legislative and Public Affairs.
Her ability to help people with problems led to her decision
to become an Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) counselor,
listening to those who feel they have faced discrimination
on the job.
Young has been an EEO counselor for 10 years.
“The role of the EEO counselor is essentially to identify
issues through limited fact-finding and see if there are ways
to resolve the issue” said Carolyn Mackey, deputy director
for the Office of Equal Opportunity Programs (EOP).
The Agency usually has 12 counselors, but retirements and
resignations had shrunk the current number to four by the
end of last year, Mackey said. Aside from Young, they include
Louise Pierce, of the Office of Inspector General, David Grossman
of the Bureau for Economic Growth, Agriculture, and Trade,
and Mark Phillips of the Office of European Country Affairs.
Seven more are being added.
Typically, when a complaint is made, EEO counselors are
assigned to conduct the initial interview, clarify the issues,
and find out what it will take to resolve the problem. If
the problem can’t be resolved, counselors report that
to EOP and a complaint may be filed.
Counselors undergo 32 hours of orientation and must take
eight-hour refresher courses each year. Each counselor usually
serves a two-year rotation that can be repeated. They’re
expected to maintain confidentiality and be committed to equal
employment for everyone.
The new candidates were nominated by their bureau heads.
That field was winnowed down through interviews. The new counselors
were Aimee David, Melissa Walkup, Tanya Dalton, Jean Horton,
Jerry O’Brien, Ajit Joshi, and Michael Austin.
Young says despite the time it takes, she enjoys helping
coworkers through a dispute. “EEO counseling is a way
for me to get managers and employees to communicate better,”
she said.
In most cases, the problems are miscommunication between
two people.
Young and the other counselors play a neutral role.
“I don’t represent the employee or Agency management,”
Young said. “My role is to interview parties involved
and try to assist them in reaching a resolution. That’s
not always easy.”
EOP gets about 30 complaints each year, with about one-third
progressing to formal complaint status.
“Sometimes just having a third party enter the equation
offers some assistance,” said Anne Hunt Phillips, who
was a legal analyst in the Office of the Inspector General
and an EEO counselor for nine years before retiring from the
Agency at the end of last year.
“An EEO counselor is an employee’s or applicant
for employment’s first contact with the EEO complaint
process,” said Mark Phillips, an EEO counselor for four
years.
“My experience has been that counselees appreciate
it when someone actively listens to their concerns and tries
to address them. This lends credibility to the EEO complaints
system as a whole in the eyes of the counselee.”
Phillips added:“If the complaint goes beyond informal
to the formal stage, the Agency could take years to resolve
the issue.”
22 Interns Trained as Contracting Officers to Replenish
Ranks
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Jeffery D. Bell, deputy director for USAID’s Office
of Acquisition and Assistance, third from left, stands
with some of the 22 interns in the Contract Specialist
Intern Program: from left, Mike Peddicord, Chitahka
Floore, and Moncel Petitto.
Pat Adams, USAID |
The Agency is recruiting and training 22 new contracting
experts through the revival of a program that has been dormant
for a decade—the Contract Specialist Intern Program (CSIP).
Over the past decade and a half, USAID cut its staff and
many officers retired, leaving a need for new contracting
officers, especially now that increased aid is going to the
Asian tsunami victims, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Sudan.
The two- to three-year program introduces the interns to
the world of government acquisition and assistance, as contracting
is now dubbed, and shows them how that meshes with USAID’s
mission of humanitarian and economic development programs
abroad.
The last significant CSIP training program was in 1995,
said Jeffery D. Bell, deputy director in the Office of Acquisition
and Assistance.
“We see CSIPs as our next contracting officers, the
next division chiefs,” he said.
The current crop of interns comes from a wide variety of
backgrounds: Moncel Petitto worked in purchasing in the private
sector; Chitahka Floore has a master’s degree and experience
with Catholic Relief Services; and Mike Peddicord is a recent
political science graduate.
When the interns graduate from the program, they will be
in career-ladder positions with the Agency.
They are also getting hands-on, real-world experience through
four- to eight-week field assignments in Armenia, Georgia,
the Philippines, Burkina Faso, Kenya, or Indonesia.
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