Leaders could do worse than reading Michael Lewis’s 2018 book The Fifth Risk — and a newly published update of essays called Who Is Government? Both books take a deep dive into the federal workforce, profiling no small number of committed, talented and expert professionals, in well-run organisations. Exactly the kind of people you’d want to be overseeing, say, the management of nuclear weapons, or nationwide distribution of social security checks.
William Resh, a management professor in the USC Price School of public policy, points out federal staff tend to be lower paid than private sector peers, but take the financial hit because they are motivated by other factors: commitment to public good, expertise and exposure to important, complicated “puzzles that they cannot unpack” elsewhere.
“They’re providing a subsidy based on . . . two, maybe three things,” Resh told me in a call this week. “Job stability . . . the intrinsic value of the work,” and “public service motivation”. These kind of motivations are closely linked to qualities other organisations also want to cultivate — expertise, supportive teams, or value-driven work. However, Resh says, in federal jobs they are all “being undermined right now”.
This is not just about Doge. Resh’s research shows years of outsourcing work to external contractors have resulted in more federal employees functioning as intermediaries, a loss of institutional knowledge and decline in morale. That has left departments more vulnerable to cuts and less able to make sure external contractors are doing a good job.
The way cuts happen may also be accelerating loss of talent. When organisations announce budget cuts, the people most likely to leave are high performers who can easily get jobs elsewhere. Lay-offs are also targeting newer hires, recruited because they have important skills government needs. Both are exactly the people “meeting emerging needs of government”, according to Resh.
It made me think of how the ways organisations in the private sector attempt to cut headcount — through return-to-office mandates or performance-based firing — risk creating the kind of environment that drives the best people away.
Accounts of the federal workforce show the systems that keep these dangers at bay depend on the skills and qualities of workers. Committed teams, good management, a strong mission and long-term institutional expertise are the kind of things all organisations should regard as extremely valuable. They are not easy to build back once lost.
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