Special Points of Interest:
Causes of Poor Performance
Electronic Data Interchange (EDI)
Handling Medical-Related Absences
The “Federal Supervisor” is a quarterly newsletter geared towards those who supervise federal civilian employees. This newsletter is merely one venue in which the Human Resources (HR) Civilian Personnel Office will begin utilizing in “reaching out” to Department of Air Force supervisors. The purpose of this bulletin is to provide important and useful information on a wide variety of HR topics that will empower supervisors with the knowledge they need to effectively supervise federal civilian employees.
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The Causes of Poor Performance
There are many causes of unacceptable performance. Some of them are attributable to the organization and some to the individual employee. Before a supervisor can deal with a performance problem they must consider the cause or causes of the performance problem. Let’s look at the various problems that might be contributing factors in poor performance:
Employee-based causes
- Lack of ability.
- Lack of effort.
- Lack of attention.
- Lack of skill.
- Lack of judgment.
- Problems not related to work.
- Substance abuse (i.e., alcohol, drug abuse)
Organization-based causes
- Lack of communication on performance expectations.
- Lack of performance feedback.
- Failure to provide necessary training or instruction.
- Failure to provide necessary tools or other resources.
- Failure to provide a reasonable accommodation that would permit the employee to perform satisfactorily.
- Unrealistic performance expectations.
- Harassment or otherwise hostile work environment.
If the root of the employee’s performance problem is a lack of effort, for example, then counseling, a direct warning, and then either discipline or a performance-based adverse action would make sense.
But if the root of the employee’s problem is a lack of resources necessary to do the job properly, counseling, warning, and then disciplining the employee won’t help at all.
Similarly, if the root cause of the problem is a disability that could be reasonably accommodated, taking the traditional counseling/warning/discipline route would not only be ineffective, but would violate laws and regulations.
As you can see from the examples above, before a supervisor can deal with a performance problem, they must find out the reasons for the poor performance. The reason for this is different actions are likely to be effective in different situations.
When a supervisor determines an employee is failing to meet performance expectations, they must take immediate steps to address the employee’s unacceptable performance.
Document unacceptable performance! Counseling sessions should be documented by a counseling memorandum. The counseling memorandum, which is presented to the employee during the session, is addressed from the supervisor to the employee. It is not a record of the actual conversation, but of the employee’s poor performance. It describes briefly:
-When the poor performance occurred.
-What it was.
-What adverse effect it had on the workplace or the agency’s mission.
-What performance is expected in the future.
The next step to take would be a formal action (reprimand) that if performance does not improve, specific actions will be taken.
For additional information on performance deficiencies read DoD 1400.25-M, SC 1940. You may also contact your servicing Human Resources Specialist or call our HOTLINE at (719) 556-4737.
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Electronic Data Interchange (EDI)
Work Injury Claims Go Electronic…
It has been DoD’s policy since July 2003 that supervisors utilize EDI when filing claims for federal employees who sustain either a work related injury or occupational disease. EDI is a web-based system supervisors use for filing federal workers’ compensation claims electronically. The benefits of using EDI to both the agency and the employee are:
Increased Timeliness of Filing
Faster Turnaround on Claim Numbers
Decreased Errors on Paperwork
Meets DoD SHARE Goals
Automatic Reporting to Safety Offices
EDI allows supervisors to access the Notice of Traumatic Injury/Occupational Illness claim forms in an electronic form and once completed, submit those forms with just the click of a button. Supervisors are responsible for submitting all claims for traumatic injuries and occupational disease claims through EDI. To find out more about EDI review the following PowerPoint slide presentation:
The supervisor’s link for accessing EDI and inputting workers’ compensation claims can be found at:
Question: I have an employee who sustained an on-the-job injury and/or occupational disease. Where do I go to input the employee’s claim into EDI??
Answer: CPMS maintains the EDI system. The supervisor’s link for accessing EDI and inputting workers’ compensation claims can be found at:
If you have questions concerning EDI, please contact the Civilian Personnel HOTLINE at (719) 556-8050.
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Handling Requests for Medical-Related Absences
What type of documentation is needed to support an employee’s request for time off due to a medical reason?? There are a wide variety of leave programs available to federal employees, such as sick leave, advance leave, leave donor programs, and leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act. There will always be a need to obtain medical information from employees to verify and document their entitlement. Unfortunately, each of these categories of leave has different medical documentation requirements to be met.
Here are suggested steps to follow when handling requests for medical-related absences:
- Determine the type of sick leave or medical absence the employee seeks to use. Routine absence where an employee has ample sick leave available and only needs a few days off, there may be no need for clarification or discussion with the employee about the type of leave they are seeking to use. However, if the employee seeks time off for an extended period (e.g., more than three days), does not have sufficient sick leave to cover the amount of time off, or has a serious health condition that could potentially qualify them for leave under FMLA, the employee needs to be specifically informed of their options and asked to make choices based on those available options.
- Obtain administratively acceptable evidence of the employee’s entitlement to the sick leave or medical absence. No federal employee is permitted to use sick leave, advance sick leave, FMLA, or to participate in the Volunteer Leave Transfer Program without meeting the legal and regulatory requirements. An employee must always provide to the supervisor some form of administratively acceptable evidence that they are qualified for and entitled to use the leave that they are asking for. In some cases, such as for absence under FMLA, the evidence is specified by law and regulation. In other cases, what’s administratively acceptable may be dependent on the circumstances or length of time off requested and the individual employee involved. Generally, supervisors will accept an employee at their word that they are sick and allow them to self-certify their entitlement to use sick leave for a minor absence of three days or less.
- Review the employee’s evidence. For employee self-certification, this won’t be necessary. However, in all other cases, review the documentation to ensure it contains all the information required for approval. All medical documentation provided by the employee should generally meet the following requirements:
- It should be legible and understandable.
- It should be recent (documentation more than three months old should be rejected).
-It should be signed by an appropriate health care provider.
-It should be consistent with facts reported by the employee.
-It should indicate that the employee (or qualified family member) is, or is expected to be, incapacitated for duty or to receive treatment on the days and times being sought for approval by the employee.
- Make a timely decision. An employee is owed a timely response on any request for leave. This is especially true with regards to medically-based reasons. If management must deny all, or a part, of an employee’s request for sick leave or for a medical-related absence and efforts to resolve the problems or issues with the employee’s request have not been successful, put the denial of the employee’s request in writing, along with an explanation of the reasons for denying the request, and inform the employee of his or her grievance rights if he or she is dissatisfied with the decision.
For additional information and guidance on this subject read AFI 36-815, Absence and Leaveor contact the Civilian Personnel HOTLINE at (719) 556-8050.
We would like to hear from you. Please tell us what topics and issues are important to you and what you would like to learn more about. We will include your topic in a future edition. Send your comments, suggestions, and requests to us at:
("CPF-Peterson" in the GAL)
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