Report - Government Executive

CHAPTER 4
ASSESSING DCIPS’ IMPLEMENTATION
INTRODUCTION
Implementing a single personnel system across multiple organizations represents a fundamental
change to the management of the DoD civilian intelligence workforce. Each component within
the enterprise has its own mission, reporting chain, and idiosyncrasies in culture, processes, and
outputs. Any system-wide change that has unifying or adding consistency as its purpose poses
major challenges and requires careful planning and execution.
Unlike most performance management initiatives, the implementation of DCIPS has not been
driven by a specific “performance problem.” Rather, the goal is more structural and process
related. An underlying assumption is that disparate personnel systems pose a potential risk to the
accomplishment of the overall DoD intelligence mission. However, advocates do not go so far
as to draw a link between DCIPS and the production of better intelligence. DCIPS’ goal is to
achieve greater unity and uniformity in personnel management. As of yet there is no plan for
measuring and assessing DCIPS’ ultimate success. This poses one challenge to implementation:
The end point lacks clear definition.
DCIPS’ implementation is challenging on different levels. It poses a fundamental shift in values,
moving from a tenure-centric to performance-centric focus in workforce management. It also
imposes multiple requirements on day-to-day activities and the personnel required to support the
system. The degree of intensity of the new performance management process requires a new
philosophy within the DoD intelligence components; modification to the pay and promotion
system adds an emotional dimension to the effort. The implementation process involves a
culture shift with impacts beyond the mere mechanics of adopting new administrative processes.
The process must deal effectively with many obstacles to change and the charged atmosphere
that typically surrounds compensation issues.
The number of DoD intelligence components engaged in this sweeping change presents an
additional challenge. Introducing DCIPS in one organization is difficult. Conforming to the
DCIPS conversion schedule—which entails managing shifts in values and behaviors
simultaneously within multiple organizations with very different cultures and characteristics—is
daunting. For example, the civilian intelligence workforce within the military services—unlike
DIA, DSS, NGA, NRO, and NSA—faces unique tests:
• The affected workforce is smaller—slightly fewer than 2,800 in the Navy and
approximately 200 in the Marine Corps.
• There is predictably high turnover of the uniformed supervisors, requiring retraining of
new supervisors every two to three years.
• Supervisors of DCIPS employees often must be conversant with and able to apply
multiple personnel systems to the members of their varied workforces.
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