First NSPS rating period complete Published March 17, 2008 By Steve Brady 21st Space Wing Public Affairs PETERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Colo. -- Civilian employees at Peterson recently received their first rating under the new National Security Personnel System. NSPS is a pay-for-performance management program that officials say will allow the Department of Defense to establish a more competitive, progressive, and flexible civilian personnel management system. The wing plans to change some aspects of the process for the next review cycle. "We're going to put all employees into the same pay pool, instead of the seven separate pay pools used this year," said Col. Scott Shepherd, 21st Space Wing vice commander and the performance review authority, or PRA, for the wing's NSPS program. Employees will initially be divided into four sub-pay pools, Colonel Shepherd said, to make the groups more manageable. Each of the sub-pay pools will be overseen by a group commander. To ensure objectivity, the group commanders will not oversee a pay pool that involves anyone from within their own organization. After ratings are given, the four sub-pay pools will be combined into one pay pool, so employees will receive the same share value regardless of the pay pool. "Having one pay pool will make it a more equitable program for our civilian employees," he said. Under NSPS, employees are rated on a scale from one to five. Those receiving a one or two rating receive no shares; a three rating receives one or two shares; a four rating gets three or four shares, while a five receives five or six shares. Each share equates to a percentage increase in salary, so if each share is worth 2 percent, an employee receiving a three and getting two shares would receive a 4 percent raise for the year. In the wing, 8 percent received a five rating; 39 percent received a four; 51 percent received a three rating, and 2 percent received a two. To help improve the process, Colonel Shepherd met with supervisors Feb. 25 and 27, sharing lessons learned and expectations for the next year. "We wanted to meet with NSPS supervisors within the wing to share the lessons we learned from our first year under NSPS," he said. "It provided an opportunity to address their questions and concerns and to share the improvements we are making." While supervisors are learning from last year's performance period, civilian employees are also weighing in on the process. Incorporating additional duties was also difficult, he said, making it hard for employees to receive credit for other work they do that falls outside of their job objectives. More training on how the new system functions would be helpful, he said, as well as streamlining the objectives writing and approval process. The objectives are a crucial part of the ratings process. Another key area is to improve how supervisors write job objectives. "When we met with NSPS supervisors we stressed the importance of revalidating the job objectives of those they supervise," Colonel Shepherd said. "This is one of the most critical parts of NSPS." The best objectives are measurable, tie into organizational missions and goals, and are able to identify the mission impact an employee has, he said, and contributing factors and how they tie to each objective are also vital. "The better job we do collectively of defining job objectives, the clearer it will be for our employees to understand the expectations and to know how their performance will be measured," Colonel Shepherd said. Taking care of our civilians - is critical to the wing's mission. "Getting NSPS right across the wing is clearly one of the most important challenges we have," Colonel Shepherd said. "The civilian employees in the 21st Space Wing are crucial to us successfully executing our mission. We will continue to emphasize the importance of taking care of our people and holding supervisors and commanders responsible for meeting their requirements under NSPS." For common questions and answers to NSPS, click here.