The Foreign Service Journal, October 2012

32 OCTOBER 2012 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL We Need a Stronger Brand T he number-one factor for me to make this my career is the importance of the work the department does. The number-one retention issue, in my view, is making sure that State has the tools and resources to do its job, and some measure of public respect for and understand- ing of what we do. The department needs to be visibly fighting for these things. Put another way, we need a stronger brand. It will be difficult to retain highly motivated, talented professionals — especially those with private-sector experience prior to joining the department — if the institution and its people are neglected, underfunded, misunderstood and looked down upon. Important but lesser retention priorities: 1) a plan to deal with the bottleneck that will develop when all these Diplomacy 3.0 folks are FS-1s trying to get into the Senior Foreign Service (I suspect a lot of folks will develop an exit strategy well in advance); 2) more emphasis on helping families (very broadly defined) cope with the lifestyle; 3) additional academic work relevant to our cones and training, including in organizational development, man- agement and leadership; and 4) improvements to the bureaucracy and administration of day-to-day life in the department. Those of us coming from the private sector are aghast at the inefficiency we witness, though I chalk some of it up to oversight, transparency and reporting requirements. —State Economic Officer Mark Palermo new places and cultures. Several USAID respondents say that working in the field and visiting projects are most satisfying for them. “The most satisfying element is the ability to make a tangible difference in people’s lives and in advancing democracy in their country. The least satisfying is dealing with the endless bureaucracy that seems designed to block you at every step,” says a USAID officer serving in Central Asia. Another USAID officer, Ashley King, writes from Almaty, describing her job satisfaction this way: “I feel challenged all day, every day. I use my language, technical, people and writing skills, and I’m trying to develop new ones. There’s always some- thing fascinating and meaningful to dig into, and the agency is so hungry for the experience I bring. I feel very valued.” In the least-satisfying category, “the bureaucracy” takes first place; one in three respondents mention it. Next comes management, especially mid-level management. Other nega- tive elements include funding (the struggle for resources), visa work/workload, the annual evaluation system, bidding, the endless stream of visitors to manage, and waiting years before serving in one’s chosen career track. Mid-Level (Mis)Management With the high caliber of new hires joining the Foreign Service, and the professional experience many already have coming in, it is no surprise and probably similar to previous generations that they find fault with how they are managed. This is perhaps inevitable given that they are hired at entry level. However, there appears to be an extra burden today that exacerbates the problem. That is the mid-level staffing and management experience gap. The problem, which some call a crisis, is outlined in the June Government Accountability Office report, “Foreign Service Staffing Gaps Persist Despite Significant Increases in Hiring.” (See p. 60 for a discussion of the impact of this problem in the Foreign Agricultural Service.) According to the GAO report, close to one-third of all mid- level positions are either vacant or filled by FSOs in upstretch assignments (positions above their grade). Many of these mid- level managers have had no management training and are still fairly new to the Foreign Service themselves. In fact, while State has expanded leadership training in recent years, professional and practical management training is still lacking. “There is a dearth of leadership capability among the mid- level managers,” says an entry-level FSO who comes from a career in international business. He adds: “Managers should be trained on how to engage and inspire their employees. I haven’t been in long, but I have already seen a lot of mid- level managers taking advantage of tenure and not adding much value to the organization, oblivious to the fact that their employees need coaching and encouragement. Quite demoral- izing.” One PD officer serving in Russia says that the State Depart- ment “is very hierarchical. For managers, this manifests itself in kiss-up, kick-down behavior.” The three least-satisfying elements of the job for an FSO working in a consular sec- tion in South Asia are: “Working in an environment with little or adverse management, being given responsibility but no authority, and receiving limited practical training but bearing huge consequences for making mistakes.” FOCUS THE NEW FS GENERATION