(Gov Exec's Tom Shoop interviews John Sepulveda,

CHCO, VA, and Robert Buggs, CHCO, Education.

Picture is from ClearanceJobs.com, one of our

fellow underwriters for the Press Club event.)

On Tuesday, I heard two top Chief Human Capital Officers (CHCOs) confirm what we have been sharing with our clients as the way ahead in 2012: Even amidst budget issues, agencies and their workforce need to get the story out about their value. In fact, with government employees being slammed as under-worked and over-paid, the present is the best time to show taxpayers the ROI on their taxes and government leaders the ROI they receive from investing in employees. Employees can then genuinely believe their own management finds them worthy of enhancing skills through education and training.

The occasion was a Government Executive leadership briefing at the National Press Club on human capital challenges, co-underwritten by TMP Government. Both John Sepulveda, Assistant Secretary for Administration and CHCO at Veterans Affairs (VA) and Robert Buggs, CHCO at Education, acknowledged that retention and recruitmentneed a boost from branding.  Mr. Sepulveda noted that getting everyone on board for this effort remains challenging as many in government still feel alien to branding. Yet with retirements happening and possibly fewer high quality applicants (see the recent NACE survey), government has to get across the significance of critical work, e.g. reducing homelessness of veterans.

Mr. Buggs mentioned that the two strongest statements of federal branding he knew were President John F. Kennedy's first inaugural address with its call: ""Ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country" The second was the U. S. Army's "Be All You Can Be" brand, which ran for 21 years and came from legendary N. W. Ayer copywriter Earl Carter. This latter brand was based on Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of needs, which has influenced the TMP approach to employer value propositions. Maslow saw that once people have satisfied basic physical and psychological needs, they sought higher fulfillment in becoming the person they "were meant to be," e.g. a calling.

In our branding process, we parallel this self-actualization need, with the self-expressive aspect of a value proposition, when a person aligns their personal goals with the agency mission. It follows that the best way to get and keep people is for them to feel genuinely that they are achieving their highest potential while working for your aims. The Kennedy line reinforces that this ideal employee is sufficiently self-actualized to be able to "put service before self."

Of course, enunciating a value proposition is only one step in creating brand salience, i.e. ensuring that job seekers will remember you at the time they apply. Current government employees are extremely influential in shaping attitudes, and, as Mr. Sepuveda said, they have been "punching bags" over the last few years. These employees need to see that they are valued and worthy of investment.

Hence, the CHCOs pointed out the need for training and additional retention measures. The hiring process needs to have its value affirmed, too. At the top end, CHCOs need to assume a strategic advisory role with agency heads to help them understand the staffing demands of incipient programs. On the tactical level, hiring managers had best speed up processing applications and reduce the still unfavorable time-to-hire that loses prospects to the private sector. 

We'll add that both need to be able to articulate who you are, how you benefit the American people, and what you offer your workforce.

Because American government has been assigned a nearly unprecedented role in spurring economic recovery, many agencies are expanding their mission responsibilities. And as missions are extended into new realms of activity, Federal workers in many agencies are effectively in the hot seat. Their performance—and that of the teams they’re assembling-- will tell the tale on the government’s readiness to shepherd us all out of this crisis. Many a Department with a recovery-related mission—including Treasury, Energy, Commerce, HHS, and a long roster of other agencies--is poised to ramp up efforts to recruit new employees at all levels.

As I’ve said before, this year has provided us with an unmatched opportunity to recharge the government’s working talent—provided agencies can get 2009’s “windfall” of candidates on board expeditiously. Weakness in the general economy has brought thousands of qualified recruits to the government’s doorstep: likewise the widespread surge in enthusiasm for government careers among recent and imminent grads. And now many agencies are retooling for recovery-support responsibilities, which will in turn create more demand for qualified workers.

The key is life-cycle talent management, not just recruiting. But bringing a wealth of new talent onboard is just the beginning. Keeping employees productively engaged and enthusiastic about their work is the real key to sustained human capital success. The dispiriting truth today is that most agencies don’t devote enough attention to matching talent to task, and to keeping productive teams and individuals engaged and inspired by their work.

Recruiting programs, no matter how successful, aren’t meant to address the underlying challenge here. All employers have to respond creatively to evolving workforce needs throughout the full employment life-cycle. Otherwise, attrition drains away any human capital advantage the organization has gained while its available supply of talent was deep.

Senior leadership has to step up. If government is going to address this issue squarely, senior agency and Department executives (and not just Chief Human Capital Officers) need to step forward as vocal and proactive champions of strategic talent management. This means mandating comprehensive talent management programs at the heart of every human capital initiative, coupling life-cycle talent management with all Department or agency strategic planning, and fostering a pervasive talent “consciousness” among their key subordinates and agency populations.

If government is to gain any traction in our economic recovery, Federal executives have to take the lead in shaping realistic, long-term strategies to engage, retain, and reward the talented individuals who will sustain their newly expanded missions in the months and years to come.

They can’t fall short here. There’s just too much at stake.