The Foreign Service Journal, March 2016

The Foreign Agricultural Service is among the smaller foreign affairs agencies, with Foreign Service offi- cers accounting for only 20 percent of its total workforce. And despite widespread agreement within the agency that there should be bal- ance between the Foreign Service and Civil Service, there appears to be a growing imbalance as it relates to Washington positions—of which few are designated for FSOs—and overall influence. For FAS FSOs, this balance usually amounts to parity in the number of deputy administrator positions and other good jobs available to FSOs during their rota- tions in Washington. In fact, FAS has developed several mechanisms to maintain this balance, the main one being the placement mechanism for returning FSOs and the Off Balance? THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | MARCH 2016 67 fact that FSOs are generally expected to spend two-thirds of their career overseas. There is little disagree- ment that providing mean- ingful Washington-based positions for FSOs and the “cross-pollination” that comes frommixing rotat- ing Civil and Foreign Service employees offer valuable learning experiences for all involved. However, this sentiment can fall apart at the individual level when desirable jobs are at play and when civil servants view any open position as an exclusive promotional opportunity. FSOs are beginning to see the balance change—not because the system has changed, but because of shifting FSO demograph- ics. As noted in my previous columns, FAS has a desper- ate shortage of higher-level officers, and recent fixes won’t begin to alter the sys- tem for as much as a decade. Consequently, Senior Foreign Service officers and those at the FS-1 and FS-2 levels have to spend significantly more than two-thirds of their careers overseas. At the same time, baby boomers are retiring and management has to fill domestic slots with civil ser- vants, who encumber posi- tions for much longer periods of time than FSOs. In addition, the few FSOs in Washington, D.C., are now very concentrated in the Office of Foreign Service Operations, which deals exclusively with overseas issues and is itself isolated from the rest of FAS. This means the presence of FSOs in the rest of the agency is dangerously low and shrink- ing. As a result, opportuni- ties for “cross-pollination” between the Foreign and Civil Services are shrink- ing; many of the best jobs will be encumbered by civil servants for years to come; the number of Senior Foreign Service officers staying in Washington is diminishing; and the Civil Service culture is starting to predominate. FSOs are in danger of find- ing ourselves “out of sight, out of mind” as our unique experiences and points of view become increasingly out of step with an agency that focuses inward, rather than outward. If FSOs cease to be embedded in posi- tions throughout the agency, we may very well lose what connects us to our non-FS colleagues in FAS—and FAS risks losing the perspectives that, by definition, make it a Foreign Service agency. n Views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the AFSA FAS VP. Contact: mark.petry@fas.usda.gov or (202) 720-2502 FAS VP VOICE | BY MARK PETRY AFSA NEWS AFSAWelcomes Spring Semester Interns We are pleased to welcome our latest crop of interns to AFSA: • Advertising: Koen Valks, of Baarn, Netherlands, is a graduate student in inter- national affairs at American University. JeongEun “Jes- sie” Shin is also a graduate student at American Univer- sity. She joins us from Seoul, South Korea. • Awards: Atlanta native Marcy O’Halloran is a senior international affairs major at The GeorgeWashington University. • Communications: Briar Blount hails all the way from Queensland, Australia. She is studying criminology and international relations at Bond University. • Executive Office: Allison Bailey, of Webster City, Iowa, is a junior political science major at Coe College in Cedar Rapids. • Labor Management: Blake Ladenburg is a junior at Whitman College inWalla Walla,Washington, where he majors in economics. He is from Columbia Falls, Montana. • Professionalism and Ethics: John Balle comes to us from Detroit, Michigan. He recently graduated from the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor with a degree in policy, economics and development. • Scholarships: Kathryn McGirk is a senior politics major at The Catholic Univer- sity of America. She is from Elmhurst, Illinois. We thank departing interns Devon Fitzgerald, Quinn Stevenson,William Roberson, Dastan Sadykov and Milo Opdahl for their great work this past fall and wish them the best. Long-term intern Shannon Mizzi has moved over to a contract editorial assistant position. n