Executive orders & MOSAIC

[Half Fast]

I DO go out onto the shop floor and talk with employees, meet with various people, conduct visual audits each week,.....

It's difficult to measure but I'd bet there is more impact from this than you might think.

The best leadership is done by relationship and trust, and only rarely has to resort to authority. Going onto the floor, talking with people, putting your own eyeballs onto their work, hearing their concerns, etc., goes a long way to building that trust.

 

[Checkout_my_Six]

It's difficult to measure but I'd bet there is more impact from this than you might think.

The best leadership is done by relationship and trust, and only rarely has to resort to authority. Going onto the floor, talking with people, putting your own eyeballs onto their work, hearing their concerns, etc., goes a long way to building that trust.

Only if you act on their concerns and earn their loyalty.

 

[SoonerAviator]

It's difficult to measure but I'd bet there is more impact from this than you might think.

The best leadership is done by relationship and trust, and only rarely has to resort to authority. Going onto the floor, talking with people, putting your own eyeballs onto their work, hearing their concerns, etc., goes a long way to building that trust.

Absolutely, and it's a lesson I picked up early-on in my career. People are much more likely to ask questions or be open about issues when they believe you're a friend rather than a foe. Now, would our actual production output change? Probably not. It likely doesn't result in any measurable increase in efficiency or financial performance. It does likely help in some tiny amount with morale and my ability to address small issues before they become problems and headaches.

There is certainly enough nuance in much of front-office work that makes claiming working from home as less-efficient. Every job is different in that respect, so it would honestly be best for every person/job to be evaluated on how best it should operate (in-person or remote). I seriously doubt there's any savings in bringing people back into the office after half-a-decade unless they've been mismanaged by their superiors.

In the case of Trumps EO, I have a feeling it's a way of driving voluntary attrition rather than having to do mass layoffs in order to trim government staff. The people who refuse to RTO will jump ship for a job in the private sector and the government will avoid backfilling until something critical is being delayed due to lack of staffing.

 

[Half Fast]

Every job is different in that respect, so it would honestly be best for every person/job to be evaluated on how best it should operate (in-person or remote).

Exactly. And the EO allows for exemptions so those judgement calls can be made.

In the case of Trumps EO, I have a feeling it's a way of driving voluntary attrition rather than having to do mass layoffs in order to trim government staff. The people who refuse to RTO will jump ship for a job in the private sector and the government will avoid backfilling until something critical is being delayed due to lack of staffing.

DING DING DING! We have a winner! And I wouldn't be surprised if, a year from now when the EO has brought about all the staff trimming it's likely to, WFH will be allowed again for some of the remaining staff.

Much of what Trump is doing looks pretty familiar to business people who have watched a new boss take over a floundering business, but to people who have been in USG jobs for many years it probably looks like an alien invasion.

 

[Lindberg]

In the case of Trumps EO, I have a feeling it's a way of driving voluntary attrition rather than having to do mass layoffs in order to trim government staff.

That is one of the stated goals.

Among other things, soon after the presidential election, Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, who at the time were both slated to run Trump’s newly created Department of Government Efficiency, signaled that having a full-time return-to-office mandate was an invitation for many to quit.

“Requiring federal employees to come to the office five days a week would result in a wave of voluntary terminations that we welcome,” they wrote in an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal.

https://www.cnn.com/2025/01/23/business/trump-federal-workers-rto-mandate/index.html

 

[172andyou]

Much of what Trump is doing looks pretty familiar to business people who have watched a new boss take over a floundering business

Yep. And those of us that have seen this before know that it tends to lead to the best staff leaving because they find it easy to find another job, while the lower performers stick around because they don't have as many options. This is far from universal, but it's definitely a tendency.

 

[Salty]

Yep. And those of us that have seen this before know that it tends to lead to the best staff leaving because they find it easy to find another job, while the lower performers stick around because they don't have as many options. This is far from universal, but it's definitely a tendency.

In general I agree. In the case of government employees, I'm not so sure.

 

[RussR]

DING DING DING! We have a winner! And I wouldn't be surprised if, a year from now when the EO has brought about all the staff trimming it's likely to, WFH will be allowed again for some of the remaining staff.

In my experience, your estimate of "a year from now" is way overly optimistic. Implementing this EO is easily going to require months of study, meetings, and negotiations before anything really happens with the individual employees. That's not (necessarily) a bureaucratic-slowness issue, but simply a realistic one. Heck, many organizations have been WFH for so long now that office facilities are no longer adequate. Issues as basic as "we don't have desks for these people" need to be resolved.

As another example, there was an effort a few years ago for government organizations to terminate leases on office space they no longer needed due to WFH. I have no idea how successful this was, but certainly at least SOME office space got turned back to the building owner and is now being used for other things. That's going to require a decent lead time to resolve, and until that happens, where do those people go? Rhetorical questions, of course.

After all, it's not like this WFH thing only lasted a week or two. You can't just say "we sent them all home, now bring them all back to work", because heck, even the "them" has changed in the last 5 years.

but to people who have been in USG jobs for many years it probably looks like an alien invasion.

Not as unusual as you think. We government employees are used to pretty constant policy changes, reorganizations, new administrations, etc. And we just kind of roll with it - most changes seem to have little real effect on the individual employee's daily life, although this one could certainly be the exception to that.

 

[wanttaja]

Yep. And those of us that have seen this before know that it tends to lead to the best staff leaving because they find it easy to find another job, while the lower performers stick around because they don't have as many options. This is far from universal, but it's definitely a tendency.

Saw that at Boeing about thirty years ago. Had a surplus of engineers in a certain field, and the powers that be decided the best approach would be to offer early retirement to anyone who wanted to.

Wasn't the slackers that took them up on it. It was the best engineers, men and women with the confidence that they'd be successful in another field/company. The slackers were left, and it hurt the company.

BTW, Boeing is as close to "government" as you can get, without a "GS" code in your job title.

Boeing went back to their traditional way of paring the work force: Studying the performance ratings, and laying off the low-performers.

What's weird about the new administration's approach is their assumption that all government employees are LRUs...Line Replaceable Units, any given employee can do any given job. If a person is a high performer, THAT'S the person they should want to retain, not chase away. Just saying "We'll get rid of anyone who wants to work from home" ignores what a given person might be accomplishing.

Oh, I know there's a certain percentage of WFH types who do it just to skate. But the RIF should take the performance levels into account, not just that they don't want to commute every day.

The main product here is going to be low morale among government employees...their abilities aren't valued, just their willingness to NOT do work from home. Poor morale isn't conducive to efficiency. The new administration has told the rank-and-file what they think of them.

Seems to me the government should be able to cross-reference performance records with whether the person works in the office or remotely.....

Ron Wanttaja

 

[Half Fast]

If a person is a high performer, THAT'S the person they should want to retain, not chase away. Just saying "We'll get rid of anyone who wants to work from home" ignores what a given person might be accomplishing.

Remember that exemptions can be made on a case-by-case basis. Who do you think will be more likely to get a WFH exemption, the star or the bottom feeder?

 

[Checkout_my_Six]

depends who the star picker is....

 

[UngaWunga]

My old boss worked 24 hours, 6 days a week. Almost literally. I don't know when the guy slept. Totally anti-WFH before COVID. During COVID, he got an extra 1.5 hours of work done everyday. So he never wanted to come back. That's not most people. Especially nowadays when everyone has anxiety, ADHD, neurodivergence, imposter syndrome, burnout, and gluten sensitivities.

both of you sound like you'd be fun to work with.

 

[AvNavCom]

Remember that exemptions can be made on a case-by-case basis. Who do you think will be more likely to get a WFH exemption, the star or the bottom feeder?

Truthfully? Neither, because exemptions open up a Pandora's Box of potential discrimination claims as to why one person got it while another didn't. Today, senior leadership made it clear that there are zero exemptions outside of contractual requirements. The government already has a hard time holding on to talent because the pay is lower, so telework was at least a non-monetary strategy to encourage applicants and to retain strong performers. I'm not sure this is going to result in the lean, efficient government as some people seem to believe.

 

[wanttaja]

Remember that exemptions can be made on a case-by-case basis. Who do you think will be more likely to get a WFH exemption, the star or the bottom feeder?

So either:

A. The employee has to beg for his or her job, or

B. The employee gets to commit extortion if their boss want to keep them ("I'll quit if you don't get me an exemption").

Neither is conducive to good labor relations.

What are the procedures and policies for requesting an exemption, and the process for approving it? I'm guessing there aren't any. Classic, right out of Catch-22. "You can apply for an exemption, but we can't give you one because we don't have the procedures yet. Until then, your work from home is cancelled."

This is tailor-made to drive out anyone with a spark of pride or initiative. You're left with those who think they can't survive anywhere else.

Ron Wanttaja

 

[Ed Haywood]

Many positions in the federal government have no commercial analog. The primary qualification is expertise with internal government processes, which are often agency-specific.
Some of these folks have very marketable skills within the government contractor industry. I have hired some. However, many others will find limited outside demand for mid-level bureaucrats.
In 15 years in the industry, I have never seen a contractor employee decline an offer of a government job. I have also never seen a government position go unfilled.

 

[Warmi]

So either:

A. The employee has to beg for his or her job, or

B. The employee gets to commit extortion if their boss want to keep them ("I'll quit if you don't get me an exemption").

Neither is conducive to good labor relations.

What are the procedures and policies for requesting an exemption, and the process for approving it? I'm guessing there aren't any. Classic, right out of Catch-22. "You can apply for an exemption, but we can't give you one because we don't have the procedures yet. Until then, your work from home is cancelled."

This is tailor-made to drive out anyone with a spark of pride or initiative. You're left with those who think they can't survive anywhere else.

Ron Wanttaja

Thats pretty much the policy Elon is utilizing at SpaceX and other his companies - how they manage to get these rockets flying is somewhat mysterious to me given that by now all the people with pride and initiative are surely gone ( at lest according to your theory of proper labor relations )

 

[wanttaja]

Thats pretty much the policy Elon is utilizing at SpaceX and other his companies - how they manage to get these rockets flying is somewhat mysterious to me given that by now all the people with pride and initiative are surely gone ( at lest according to your theory of proper labor relations )

There's a difference between space and government. Most of the people working space programs are pretty dedicated, and will sacrifice. Pencil pushers at the Department of Agriculture, not so much.

For the rest, well...did the employees in the other companies have WFH pulled out from under them without warning, or were they allowed to do it during the pandemic with the warning that they'd have to return to the office at some point. There is a difference.

Ron Wanttaja

 

[pfarber]

I think perhaps you are confusing 'work from home' with 'use of personal devices'..

You would think people who work on PCs, programming no less, would not muck up a dev system. You would be wrong. It also tells me that you may not have a technical job (no, 'office 365' is not it).

If you know, you know. *nix systems are the worst offenders. Even though there are rules, who is there to enforce them at home? In the office we would 100% rip on you for something as stupid as getting your environment out of wack.

 

[pfarber]

We solve that with containers. Same container build is used for dev/stage/prod. Same container build is used when commits are automatically tested. This class of problem doesn't exist in our organization.

Now, that said, none of those problems are WFH problems. We had those problems when working at the office/lab also.

The one thing private and guberment depts have in common is supporting legacy apps. Its both sad and hilarious that way more mega corps are still dragging 20,30+ year old code around. At NAVSISA we still ran COBOL. It was hilarious when we had to do a disaster drill and rebuild one of the TRIM servers..... we chouldn't find the activation key or the floppy disk it was written on. This was in the mid 2000's. Good times. DITSCAP would routinely disable machines that has a specific library used for password strength checks.

Also emulation is nice until you get into the lower level stuff. Containers and VMs are not a global solution. Many older drivers would search for hardware that would not run under a VM. Granted this was a few years ago.

 

[RussR]

Remember that exemptions can be made on a case-by-case basis. Who do you think will be more likely to get a WFH exemption, the star or the bottom feeder?

It doesn't work like that. Much of the federal government is represented by various unions. WFH would need to be reasonably equally applied to all (or none) of the workers in each bargaining unit.

 

[Salty]

There's a difference between space and government. Most of the people working space programs are pretty dedicated, and will sacrifice. Pencil pushers at the Department of Agriculture, not so much.

For the rest, well...did the employees in the other companies have WFH pulled out from under them without warning, or were they allowed to do it during the pandemic with the warning that they'd have to return to the office at some point. There is a difference.

Ron Wanttaja

I left an employer pre covid to a 100% remote position at another company. Post covid I went back to that original employer who used hybrid as a “new benefit you didn’t have before” as part of the enticement back. They just recently announced 100% RTO will be reinstated with no exemptions. If they stick to that “threat” for me, it’ll probably be enough to convince me to retire.

 

[AvNavCom]

In 15 years in the industry, I have never seen a contractor employee decline an offer of a government job. I have also never seen a government position go unfilled.

I've seen it a lot in the medical field. Numerous civilian clinician positions go unfilled because the pay is too low and the schedule too inflexible. An example in recent memory is of a superb licensed clinical social worker who provided counseling for the large number of active-duty personnel at a particular airbase. She experienced a family issue and requested two days of telework each week so she could provide family support while still performing counselings via video or phone. She was denied and subsequently left her position to take care of the family issue.

That position has been unfilled for nearly three years now because they literally can't find anyone to take it despite advertising numerous times. Their solution in the absence of this counselor? Refer to network for telemedicine. So now we're paying more, getting fragmented care, have difficulty obtaining records, and we have access-to-care issues. The real icing on the cake? After not being able to fill the position and not being able to increase the offered wages, they decided to add an additional incentive...two days of telework per week. Unfortunately, that great LCSW is working for someone else now and there are still no takers.

You can't make this stuff up.

 

[Bob Noel]

The one thing private and guberment depts have in common is supporting legacy apps. Its both sad and hilarious that way more mega corps are still dragging 20,30+ year old code around. At NAVSISA we still ran COBOL. It was hilarious when we had to do a disaster drill and rebuild one of the TRIM servers..... we chouldn't find the activation key or the floppy disk it was written on. This was in the mid 2000's. Good times. DITSCAP would routinely disable machines that has a specific library used for password strength checks.

Also emulation is nice until you get into the lower level stuff. Containers and VMs are not a global solution. Many older drivers would search for hardware that would not run under a VM. Granted this was a few years ago.

ya know, software doesn't wear out, doesn't break with age. If the legacy app still works, why would anyone waste money/effort to "fix" what ain't broke?

 

[jsstevens]

ya know, software doesn't wear out, doesn't break with age. If the legacy app still works, why would anyone waste money/effort to "fix" what ain't broke?

Largely because unless you have dedicated, vintage hardware platform (that doesn’t break) the underlying system will get updated and the legacy system won’t work anymore. I dealt with this on military simulation systems for many years.

 

[nauga]

Largely because unless you have dedicated, vintage hardware platform (that doesn’t break) the underlying system will get updated and the legacy system won’t work anymore. I dealt with this on military simulation systems for many years.

And on systems where function is required for e.g. safety of flight you may lock down and maintain that underlying system so that everything continues to function and nothing needs to be revalidated when a vendor changes some "feature" in a new release of underlying code without notifying you. The cost of chasing updates is not insignificant, and to let it happen on a whim is inexcusable.

When they start laying off those responsible for configuration management things might get dicey.

Nauga,
and his library of old software

 

[Bell206]

Having seen and heard of a number issues at the FAA field levels, I dont think ASIs and similar positions should still be eligble to WFH. About the only FAA depts that have mastered the WFH are Registry and the ACOs. But given there are 1M+ federal employees across dozens of different agencies and skill sets still WFH, how would one determine which positions could remain WFH or require RTO in a timely manner without a general RTO requirement? I think any position that requires any level of interface with the public should be mandatory RTO at a minimum.

 

[Checkout_my_Six]

Having seen and heard of a number issues at the FAA field levels, I dont think ASIs and similar positions should still be eligble to WFH. About the only FAA depts that have mastered the WFH are Registry and the ACOs. But given there are 1M+ federal employees across dozens of different agencies and skill sets still WFH, how would one determine which positions could remain WFH or require RTO in a timely manner without a general RTO requirement? I think any position that requires any level of interface with the public should be mandatory RTO at a minimum.

Most of the public interface is thru zoom. That doesn't require an office visit. Agreed, ATC and inspectors can't inspect from home....most all others are office workers.

 

[Brad Z]

Get ready.....to dodge the spit balls. I was thinking of all the crap I'll have to haul back and forth...not having a dedicated space/cube/office. All we have are a dozen or so common cubes for who ever shows up. And if all 200 show it's gonna be interesting. I'd probably go to the cafeteria.

I'm might see if DCA has some cubes free up in the tower.

 

[Ed Haywood]

I've seen it a lot in the medical field. Numerous civilian clinician positions go unfilled because the pay is too low and the schedule too inflexible. An example in recent memory is of a superb licensed clinical social worker who provided counseling for the large number of active-duty personnel at a particular airbase. She experienced a family issue and requested two days of telework each week so she could provide family support while still performing counselings via video or phone. She was denied and subsequently left her position to take care of the family issue.

That position has been unfilled for nearly three years now because they literally can't find anyone to take it despite advertising numerous times. Their solution in the absence of this counselor? Refer to network for telemedicine. So now we're paying more, getting fragmented care, have difficulty obtaining records, and we have access-to-care issues. The real icing on the cake? After not being able to fill the position and not being able to increase the offered wages, they decided to add an additional incentive...two days of telework per week. Unfortunately, that great LCSW is working for someone else now and there are still no takers.

You can't make this stuff up.

I have hired dozens of LCSW as contract employees, including on remote AF bases. That position is a bad fit for GS, and should be converted to a contract position. There is no shortage of LCSW, many of them with massive student debt working in low paying jobs. For $100K you could hire an LCSW on the moon.

That example is also a good example of where WFH is not as effective as on premises work. I am a current user of LCSW counseling for grief. I have tried video counseling. It is not as good as face to face. It is better than nothing, but I don't blame the leadership at that base for wanting more.

 

[rwellner98]

Also emulation is nice until you get into the lower level stuff. Containers and VMs are not a global solution. Many older drivers would search for hardware that would not run under a VM. Granted this was a few years ago.

I mean, as written that's objectively true. But it's also terribly misleading. The vast majority of software can run in virtualized environments just fine. There is a reason AWS does 90B a year in revenue, and it's not because the world is filthy with software that requires bare metal.

 

[jsstevens]

And on systems where function is required for e.g. safety of flight you may lock down and maintain that underlying system so that everything continues to function and nothing needs to be revalidated when a vendor changes some "feature" in a new release of underlying code without notifying you. The cost of chasing updates is not insignificant, and to let it happen on a whim is inexcusable.

When they start laying off those responsible for configuration management things might get dicey.

Nauga,
and his library of old software

And for those systems they tend to stockpile more parts to keep them functioning as they age.

 

[Bell206]

Most of the public interface is thru zoom.

Maybe in your department, but thats not what I’ve seen and heard at the FSDO level and select other offices. It becomes more telling when someone has to call the FSDO Admin Officer, who did return to the office some time ago, to do the work of the ASI or the Line Manager. My take is that we should promote the admin staffs to ASIs and put the Registry personnel in charge of all FSDOs.

 

[nauga]

And for those systems they tend to stockpile more parts to keep them functioning as they age.

Or contract to keep the supply chain open.

Nauga,
Linked

 

[hindsight2020]

I should be able to sit at home in front of a screen and just monitor its progress. Get up only to pick up my Door Dash order.

I thought you didn't want to go airlines

 

[jsstevens]

Or contract to keep the supply chain open.

Nauga,
Linked

I never worked on a program that was willing to spend that much.

 

[bentmettle]

I never worked on a program that was willing to spend that much.

Spares were always part of our simulator programs. And when the ISA backplane machines ran out, the eventually paid for a hardware upgrade. Our stuff was all ground sims, and from a hardware perspective, mostly COTS. Went to check out the Abrams simulators at Knox and felt like those were wrapped up pretty tight in lots of custom everything that was never going to be upgradeable...

 

[jbarrass]

There's a difference between space and government. Most of the people working space programs are pretty dedicated, and will sacrifice. Pencil pushers at the Department of Agriculture, not so much.

For the rest, well...did the employees in the other companies have WFH pulled out from under them without warning, or were they allowed to do it during the pandemic with the warning that they'd have to return to the office at some point. There is a difference.

Ron Wanttaja

Well, you can't say "without any warning" it was a major theme for a while, anyone who didn't expect it was not paying attention.

 

[flyingcheesehead]

Thats my point - you end up with distractions that , while contributing to your quality of life , do end up diluting your working time because , while at home, it takes 100% dedication and basically perfect work ethic to generate the same output that you get in the office for free simply because of the virtue of not having any choice in the matter.
In other words, while this arrangement works for small number of workaholics , most people cannot keep up that kind of discipline.

Hah! It's SO much easier to get more done at home because there's a ton of extra time (without having to commute) and the interruptions are much rarer.

There is some value in being able to call someone over to look at something with a fresh set of eyes, and there's definitely value in being able to learn from those around you, but it's not nearly as valuable as the benefits of WFH.

The big worry here, as far as I am concerned, is the potential political consequences of taking a Biden-era proposal and just implementing it. The previous administration was accused of being corrupt, with barratry being one of the few crimes left out.

MOSAIC is not a Biden-era proposal. The name didn't come around until 2023 but the proposal was leaked in 2018: https://www.pilotsofamerica.com/com...ight-limit-to-be-increased-to-3600-lb.114171/

Sport pilot licenses are a joke and so limited they are all but useless IMHO.
LSA/SLSA/ELSA aircraft are so limited to make their usefulness, well, useless.
ELSAs are DOA and a joke.... nothing more than venture capitalists looking for a write off. How do so many people not understand battery limitations? We can't get MOGAS at 90% of the airports yet now they are going to invest millions in charging stations?

ELSA = Experimental Light Sport Aircraft. Not electric, as you seem to be saying.

"Electric light sport aircraft (ELSA) are aircraft that are powered by electricity and are certified for light sport aircraft operations. Some examples of electric light sport aircraft include:"

Well, unless it does.

Where did you find that? Because the only way I can get that text is to feed Google AI. Keep in mind that AI does not actually know anything about anything, it is a probability based model that spews the words it thinks are most likely what you're looking for.

And if someone wants to fall on their sword over remote work, more power to them. But work location/type is an employer’s choice to make. It the employee/potential employee who has to choose whether that’s right for then or not.

And it's the employer's choice whether they're willing to severely limit their potential pool of applicants by not allowing WFH.

That's why I said IN MY HUMBLE OPINION.

Literally hundreds? I wouldn't have guessed that many. Seriously. I liken the SP ticket to those people I see driving those glorified golf carts around the 'hood. They spend $5-10K on a buggy you can't even take to the local Dollar General (not street legal).

Before I got my PPL I actually did think about SP. Until every.single.school and every.single.CFI said don't waste your time and MONEY. If your mission in VFR day with one passenger then OK.... good on you. But most people want way more than that.

Is there a way to look up the actual number of SP vs PPL?

US Civil Airmen Statistics

As of the end of 2023, the following active pilot certs were held - and I'm wondering if you were thinking Recreational pilots, which also have limitations and were the first attempt at a drivers license medical pilot certificate, but the FAA ended up requiring a 3rd class anyway. Rec pilots can fly 4 seat airplanes, but can only take one passenger, among other limitations.

316,470 Student
71 Recreational
7,144 Sport (only)
167,711 Private Airplane
106,711 Commercial Airplane
174,113 ATP Airplane
13,428 Rotorcraft (only)
21,292 Glider (only)

131,577 Flight Instructor
332,313 Instrument Ratings

Yep. And those of us that have seen this before know that it tends to lead to the best staff leaving because they find it easy to find another job, while the lower performers stick around because they don't have as many options. This is far from universal, but it's definitely a tendency.

I haven't seen it work any other way.

In general I agree. In the case of government employees, I'm not so sure.

Why would it not be the best people leaving? We love to talk about government employees as if they're some sort of weird, Neanderthal type creatures who work less and aren't as capable. The reason that narrative plays well is that the most common interaction people have with government employees is at the DMV, which is not where you'll find the best and brightest.

So yes, even in the government, the best employees are the ones who will have an easy time finding a different job.