(Witness: Galloway.) (b) Ability. (c) Capacity for original work or executive duties. (d) Adaptability. (e) Habits. (f) Personality. (g) Value of employee. These captions should be further subdivided for the purpose of securing careful consideration and complete answers with regard to all the elements which enter into the composition of an efficient employee and to avoid the giving of general or perfunctory answers of little value to the efficiency board in determining efficiency and relative standing. (3) Report of the time clerk relative to annual leave, sick leave, and leave without pay. The ratings on attendance, as shown by the record of the time clerk, will be based on the following considerations: Annual leave for periods of a week or more is granted to enable an employee to take necessary rest or recreation on the ground that his general health and his efficiency and value as a clerk will thereby be improved and increased. Leave is granted for periods of less than a week and fractions of a day to enable employees to meet emergencies not connected with their officials duties. However, frequent application for leave of short duration is detrimental to the service, because it involves considerable clerical work in granting and recording same, interrupts the transaction of official business, causes inconvenience, and indicates that the employee has other interests which demand a considerable portion of his time, and the real object of annual leave is defeated. For the reasons mentioned, where the records show that an employee habitually takes a considerable portion of his leave in short periods without good reason therefor, the efficiency board will make such deduction from his efficiency rating as in their judgment the facts may warrant. With regard to sick leave, it is obvious that the time the employee is absent on sick leave is lost to the bureau. Sick leave is provided for exceptional and meritorious cases only and is granted as a privilege and not as a right. The practice of taking sick leave by some of the employees of the bureau has grown to such an extent as to constitute an abuse. A considerable deduction will therefore be made by the efficiency board from the rating of any employee who is shown by the records to have been on sick leave during the preceding six months, except where in their judgment any deduction would be manifestly unjust, in view of the employee's past record. The same remarks apply to leave without pay. The head of an office in planning his work has a right to assume that the employee will be present for duty continuously, except for annual leave and legal holidays. Absence for any other cause will result in an unequal distribution of the work to other employees, inconvenience to the office, and detracts from the efficiency of the employee, for which a suitable deduction will be made from his rating. 4. The fourth section of the efficiency report will consist of a statement by the efficiency board showing their rating on each qualification of the employee, based on the statements contained in the preceding sections. In determining these ratings the efficiency board will exercise their judgment, giving due weight to the character of the statement. To secure uniformity and enable comparisons to be made, each qualification will be rated on a scale of 100. As it would be manifestly unjust to give the same weight to each qualification, the following weight factors will be used in determining the average efficiency: (Witness: Galloway.) The sum of the ratings of each qualification multiplied by its weight factor and divided by 100 will give the average per cent of efficiency, which will be the efficiency rating of the employee, as determined by the efficiency board. All the employees affected will then be listed, according to grades, in the order of their ratings, beginning with the highest, which will show at once the relative standing of each employee among those of the same grade. This list, when approved by the chief of bureau, will not be subject to revision or modification, except as provided in paragraph VI hereof, during the succeeding six months, and shall govern all promotions and reductions until the expiration of that period. It is believed that the system outlined above will have a marked influence in securing better service throughout the bureau, because no employee will be overlooked, his merits will be carefully considered at stated intervals, and his relative standing and chances for promotion will depend entirely upon his own individual efforts. Certain qualities are given relatively great weight in determining efficiency and standing. Improvement along those lines will secure a higher rating, and the one having the highest rating among those of his grade will invariably be promoted to any vacancy occurring in the next higher grade so long as he maintains his position at the head of the list and does nothing to forfeit his right of precedence. This rule will be strictly adhered to in all cases, and no exceptions will be made for any cause. Employees who fall below the standard fixed in Paragraph VIII hereof will just as surely be recommended for reduction or dismissal, in order to make room for more efficient employees. It must be distinctly understood that advancement or reduction depends entirely upon the quality of the service rendered. Service in other Departments prior to appointment in the Bureau of Plant Training and experience prior to entering Government service (character of training, compensation, etc.) (Above blanks to be filled in by employee.) (Following blanks to be filled in by head of office, laboratory, or supervising officer. Grade on scale of 100, as indicated, and assume that 90 per cent is a fair average. Printed numbers indicate the highest possible number of points that can be given for any subject. Employees whose general average falls below 80 and who fail to improve will be recommended for reduction. Those whose average falls below 70 and who fail to improve will be recommended for dismissal.) (I) Efficiency and deportment: (1) Efficiency in performing present duties (mark one only of the following (a) Clerical work (amount 50, quality 50). (b) Stenographic work (accuracy 30, speed 20) and typewriting (accuracy 20, neatness 15, speed 15) -- 100 (c) Clerk, stenographer, and typewriter (accuracy, 40; 100 (d) Artist, photographer, gardener, carpenter, painter, 100 (Witness: Galloway.) (1) Efficiency and deportment-Continued. (2) Deportment (mark all of the following) — (b) Is employee trustworthy?___ (c) Is employee absent from desk during office hours (fre- (d) Does employee voluntarily remain after office hours (e) Is employee habitually industrious (10), prompt (5), - ; subordinate (5), conscientious (5), cheerful (5), zealous (5), ; neat (5), : faithful (5), 45 Does employee smoke cigarettes? Does employee habitually use intoxicants? (NOTE. A deduction of 40 will be made from the average on deportment of any employee who is reported as smoking cigarettes or using intoxicants.) (II) Utility and ability: (3) Capacity for original work or executive duties (i. e., (a) Character of duties__. (b) Degree of capacity for such duties. (4) Adaptability— 100 (a) Capacity of employee to readily perceive what is (III) Estimate of employee's value: 50 (a) Are employee's services entirely satisfactory to his superiors in his present situation? (b) If not satisfactory, in what respect? (c) Would employee be likely to render better or more efficient service if given other work or transferred to another office? what work or office? (d) Is general health of employee good, fair, or poor? If so, (e) Has employee performed any special service during the past six months which would tend to distinguish him from others of his class? If so, what service? (f) Is employee deserving of promotion? (g) Has anything occurred during the past six months which would detract from employee's efficiency and should be considered in determining his present rating? If so, what? (h) In your opinion what could employee do to make his services more valuable or satisfactory in his present position?__ (i) Is employee likely to improve in general efficiency?_ (j) Is employee's efficiency likely to decline in the near future for any cause (e. g., age, ill health, habits, etc.)?_ If so, for what cause? (k) In your judgment, what are the services now performed by employee worth, as compared with others performing like service in the Bureau? (1) What, in your judgment, would his services be worth if given other duties or transferred to another office of the Bureau involving increase of work or responsibility which employee is capable of performing? Name the duties or the office__. Remarks Date____ (Signature) (Title) Attendance: (Witness: Galloway.) [To be filled in by time clerk.] (1) Number of applications for leave during past six months (a) Less than one day--‒‒‒ (b) More than one day but less than a week..... (c) Total number of applications for leave.. Attendance Continued. (2) Number of days absent on annual leave with pay during (3) Number of applications for sick leave.... (4) Total number of days absent on sick leave_. (1) Record of service in the Bureau (2) Training and, experience, including previous departmental service (3) Efficiency in performance of present duties. (4) Deportment (5) Capacity for higher-grade work. (6) Adaptability (7) Sick leave and leave without pay. Total weights and points.... General average (total number of points divided by 100, showing effi In accordance with the provisions of Paragraph VI of the Rules Governing Promotions and Efficiency Ratings in the Bureau of Plant Industry, promulgated July 1, 1906, you are advised that your efficiency rating for the six months ended 190__, is ---, and your relative standing is ployees of your grade. --- By direction of the Chief of Bureau: among em Secretary Efficiency Board. The CHAIRMAN. Now, as you have explained that in very satisfactory detail, will you be kind enough to state in your own way, taking these various classes of clerks that you have, the difference in their duties, if there is any? You have already spoken about efficiency, but I wish you would state the difference in the duties that are performed by your various clerks in the various classes, beginning with your $600 class and then going right up through, if you please, taking each class$720, $840, and so on. Doctor GALLOWAY. I might, Mr. Chairman, before taking that up, make a statement here that I think has not been made before, and call your attention to something that has perhaps attracted your attention, and that is the great number of low-salaried clerks that the Department of Agriculture has on its rolls-these $600 people. The CHAIRMAN. Yes. Doctor GALLOWAY. That is explainable from the fact that for a number of years the Department appointed help under the general name of "laborers." They were appointed without examination. Some of those people have been in the Department for twenty-five years, and were in the Department as laborers until three or four years ago, when they were all blanketed in under the general term of "clerks, but their salaries were not changed. They went on the roll then as clerks at $600, because that was the maximum salary a laborer could be paid. Since that act of Congress there have been other similar acts putting these people into the classified service, or allowing them to go in through examinations, so that we now have most of them in, not by blanket, but by noncompetitive examinations, taken after they were transferred from the laborers' roll to the clerks' roll. So that a considerable portion of these people in the Bureau of Plant Industry who are down on the rolls as $600 clerks are still doing the class of work that they did as laborers. They are counting franks; they are assorting franks into groups; they may be putting up packages of seed, or arranging the packets in which the seeds are to be put up, and doing work of that kind. It is a class of work that is more in the nature of skilled labor than it is in the nature of clerical work. The CHAIRMAN. Putting up packages and assorting franks in that way is not a very highly developed character of skilled labor, is it? Doctor GALLOWAY. Yes, sir-that is, counting the franks is. A Member of Congress, for instance, might properly find fault if we reported back that he had submitted 5,000 more franks than he had seed to send out. The question of accuracy of count amounts to something. |