It was reported this weekend that all federal employees received an e-mail from the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) telling employees to report “five bullets about what you did last week.” The e-mail also states that failure to do so would be interpreted to mean that the employee is offering their resignation. This is reported as part of the drive to shake up or reform, review, or rebuke the federal workforce. Whatever one speculates about motivation, this will likely be taken by many as a threat, but the e-mail reportedly does not have details about how any of the five points will be evaluated. 

With this context, I would politely offer some suggested “bullets” as a former federal employee. My own career included different jobs over time at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Office of Prevention, Pesticides, and Toxic Substances (OPPTS) — now known as the Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention (OCSPP). I started my federal career as a GS-4 summer intern in the pesticide program and had different positions, eventually leaving government service as a Schedule C political appointee as Assistant Administrator of OPPTS. I left government service in 2001.

With that range of positions in the Office, from a low-level employee in the organization to a much higher one, I offer some suggestions, in bullet form, describing generally the EPA work in words I believe would be applicable to what is “done” by employees in most every position in that Office. Most bullets are probably applicable across other federal programs and offices.

I have pondered how a federal employee can summarize the past or any week in simple bullet form. Since the reported e-mail does not include details about how granular the report should be, the following bullets describe the work of employees in OCSPP, applicable generally from my first job there in 1975 until the present time.

Suggestions for “five bullets”:

• I complied fully and faithfully with my oath of office. (“I do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.”)
• I performed tasks and assignments to implement the laws and regulations that govern the official duties of my program and agency.
• I performed the duties outlined and required by my job classification in my position of record.
• I followed the law and regulations regarding confidentiality of data and information sharing with outside parties that are part of my work.
• I performed these assignments during work hours at my duty station as outlined in my personnel records (Standard Form 50 — Notification of Personnel Action).

If all those involved in the current attempt to “shake up” the civil service can credibly claim to have “done” these five things in the past week, the entire effort would not only be less controversial but also more successful.