By Dan Gephart, January 7, 2020
Michael Bogdanow, Acting Director of Regional Operations, Merit Systems Protection Board
When I first started working in the area federal employment law many years ago, I called around, looking for advice. One highly regarded and experienced attorney told me: If you need to understand anything at all about the Merit Systems Protection Board, talk to Michael Bogdanow (see photo).
I’ve been lucky enough to work with Bogdanow, MSPB’s Acting Director of Regional Operations, on a conference advisory board and to see him present many times. Whether it’s case law, procedure, or MSPB history, Bogdanow speaks with intelligence and authority, in his own unpretentious manner.
It makes sense that Bogdanow knows MSPB history. He has lived it. Not only was Bogdanow there at the agency’s inception, he actually worked for several years with the Board’s predecessor – the Civil Service Commission. The Board has faced its share of tests over its 40-plus years in existence, yet nothing like what’s happening now. It’s been three years since the Board lost its quorum, and it will soon be a whole year that the agency has gone without any Board members at all. Meanwhile, the pile of PFRs awaiting Board review continues to grow. (For more on that, be sure to read our earlier interviews with MSPB General Counsel Tristan Leavitt and James Read, Director, Policy and Evaluation.)
Bogdanow noted that Board has “always been ready to meet huge challenges.”
“Within its first three years, [the MSPB] was hit with about 11,000 appeals filed by fired striking air traffic controllers,” Bogdanow said. “And in 2013, three times that number of furlough appeals were filed as a result of sequestration. In both instances, the AJs and the Board worked almost non-stop to assure that the appeals would be decided with as little disruption to the normal workload as was possible under the circumstances.”
There is one thing that hasn’t changed over the MSPB’s long history, and that’s the myth that it’s impossible to fire a fed. That’s where we started our conversation with Bogdanow.
DG: Why do you think that myth persists that it’s impossible to terminate a federal employee, and what can be done to shatter it?
MB: You are certainly right, this is a persistent myth. One of the motivations for enacting the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978 was that same myth. A lot of changes were implemented in the law to put it to rest, but they did not succeed in ending it, and now more than 40 years later, the same argument endures.
However, OPM recorded a total of 29,785 executive branch employees who were removed for cause in fiscal years 2013-2017, and that number is far lower than the actual number because OPM does not track actions taken by the Postal Service, the intelligence community, and certain other agencies. During that same period, the Board decided more than 44,000 adverse action appeals, and fewer than 600 of them were reversed or mitigated.
I think that a significant part of the reason for the belief that federal employees cannot be terminated is that there are laws and regulations, as well as agency policies and procedures, that establish the system for removing employees, and to agency officials who do not use them regularly, they may seem daunting. In fact, those authorities are guides for how to take and prosecute such actions, and, if followed carefully, the process will become more obvious and yield the result the agency expects. It is not an exaggeration to say that the Board frequently sees lack of proper preparation both before agencies take an adverse action and also in prosecuting the action on appeal that contribute to the perceived difficulty of making a removal action stick. (Needless to say, we see this from both parties.) Of course, agencies must also be prepared to defend themselves against affirmative defenses appellants may bring, most frequently discrimination and whistleblower retaliation claims.
I should note that an MSPB Office of Policy & Evaluation publication in December 2016 found that rather than preponderant evidence, which is the standard required for proof of an adverse action before the Board, “90 percent of proposing officials and 84 percent of deciding officials reported that the standard they used was ‘beyond a reasonable doubt,’” the standard used in criminal proceedings. Thus, management’s perceptions of the hurdles faced in taking an action actually exaggerate their difficulty. That same publication noted the three greatest perceived barriers to removal were the agency’s culture toward taking such actions, the level of support given by managers and leaders, and the quality of service provided by the human resources office, none of which is attributable to the systems created by title 5 or to the MSPB.
In short, while nothing will guarantee 100 percent success, I would suggest that better preparation, from before an action is proposed and throughout the appeal process, would help shatter the myth.
DG: Why are removals most often overturned?
MB: MSPB generates statistics on many aspects of the appeals we address, and for adverse actions and performance-based cases, that includes the number and percentage of cases reversed on procedures, on the merits, because of a finding of discrimination, and because of a prohibited personnel practice (PPP) other than discrimination. Those statistics do not break down the categories based on the specific procedural failure or the problem found with the merits of the case. Leaving aside the number of cases reversed because of discrimination or a PPP, which are relatively small, the percentage of cases reversed on procedures is consistently lower than the percentage reversed on the merits.
To me that suggests that, contrary to the view that reviewing authorities like the Board throw procedural obstacles in the way of agencies so that they lose meritorious cases on the basis of insignificant or irrelevant procedures, in fact, it is the agency’s failure to meet its burden of proof that causes most reversals. In my view, agencies’ failure to do their homework by thoroughly investigating before bringing charges and preparing their cases to make the most persuasive presentation to the Administrative Judges and the Board account for a substantial percentage of merits reversals.
Another important aspect of Board caselaw that is frequently given insufficient attention is being sure to bring the correct charge. Because the Board and courts over the years have attached significance to the words used in a charge, and have insisted that agencies prove what they claim, agencies must know that criminal charges require proof of all elements of the crime, and that certain misconduct charges require proof of the employee’s intent. The distinctions between charges such as “theft” and unauthorized possession, between “insubordination” and failure to follow instructions, “falsification” and misstatement or lack of candor, between “threats” and inappropriate conduct, all make a tremendous difference in the proof an agency must present. If an agency has not assured itself that it can prove the specific charge it brought, it is unlikely to prevail.
Is that fair? Ask the employee who may be branded a “thief” when his only misconduct was that he borrowed or had unauthorized possession of government property, or the employee tarred as being insubordinate when he simply failed to follow a supervisor’s instructions.
There is little doubt that over the years, more attorneys have become skilled at raising challenges to adverse actions taken against their clients, which has led to increasingly technical, “legalistic” arguments. Moreover, adverse actions and performance-based actions were both created by Congress, so are statutory in nature, and are reviewable at a US Court of Appeals. As a result, the parties must both be prepared to argue and respond to the due process requirements of statute in an increasingly law-based environment.
DG: Only about 5 percent of terminations are for poor performance, and the rest are for misconduct. Why is there such a disparity?
MB: If your question really is why there are so many more actions taken because of misconduct than poor performance, I’d say that’s because there’s an infinite variety of misconduct on which charges can be based, misconduct is generally pretty obvious, it can be a one-time act, and it tends to get supervisors’ attention more quickly than does poor performance. Moreover, taking an action for misconduct does not require that the agency first take a set of steps to address the misconduct.
However, if you are asking why more actions based on performance are taken under chapter 75 (“adverse actions”) than chapter 43 (“performance appraisal”), I’d venture to say that although the CSRA was intended to make it easier to take action against poor performers, agencies have not found that to be the case. Chapter 43 establishes a system, one that governs not just separating or demoting a poor performer, but also establishing performance requirements, rewarding good performance, appraising performance, and providing an opportunity to demonstrate acceptable performance before removing an employee. Thus, there are more preparatory steps an agency must take to be able to effect an action under chapter 43. Still, the heart of chapter 43 is found in employee performance standards, which must be written so as to inform an employee of the tasks he must perform and the specific indicia of performance he must demonstrate in order to be rated at the various levels against which he is measured.
Absent valid performance standards, an action under chapter 43 will not succeed, and because a chapter 75 action based on performance may not be sustained if the performance at issue is “governed by and meets” the performance standards, valid standards are one chapter 43 requirement that cannot be ignored. Make no mistake, writing proper, understandable, substantive performance standards is often difficult, but Congress clearly expected that such standards would be implemented for the benefit of both the employee and the agency. In return for doing all of the required preparation before an action is taken, Congress gave agencies two major advantages over chapter 75. First, their action will be sustained if they meet a lower burden of proof, substantial evidence rather than preponderance of the evidence, and second, the Board may not mitigate a chapter 43 action where the poor performance is proven.
Board cases show that not only do some agencies fail to draft sufficient performance standards, but they may also add specific requirements to the process for taking an action under chapter 43 that are not imposed by regulation or case law. For instance, while the statute and the Board require that an employee be given an “opportunity to demonstrate acceptable performance” before an action is taken, neither has specified what the opportunity must consist of, how long it must be, or that training is a necessary component. Many agencies, though, add such requirements in their own policy and procedure documents.
Regardless of which of the two questions you are asking, I think the short answer is that taking an adverse action, even one based on performance, is a lot quicker, requires fewer preparatory steps, and can be accomplished even if all of the safeguards set by chapter 43 are not in place.
DG: What information could our readers learn that could make them more likely to pursue a removal for poor performance?
MB: I’m not sure that I know how to answer that question. Agencies have certainly had enough time to get comfortable with chapter 43 requirements, so suggesting that they become familiar with chapter 43 and even some of the legislative history of the CSRA that explains the reasons Congress chose to establish it might not be enough. It is, though, good management practice to comply with the requirements of chapter 43, not just for taking actions against poor performers, but also to do what 5 U.S.C. § 4302(a)(3) requires, to “use the results of performance appraisals as a basis for training, rewarding, reassigning, promoting, … [and] retaining … employees.”
Agencies must have performance standards for their employees, and if those standards are valid and accurate measures, the hardest part of the chapter 43 process is already done. Providing an “opportunity to demonstrate acceptable performance” as required by § 4302(b)(6), means just providing a chance for the employee to work for a reasonable period of time (which depends on the nature of the work) on his or her regular tasks so as to be able to show the ability to successfully perform those duties – or not. Therefore, the remaining parts of chapter 43 should all be straightforward, and in return, the agency will have a considerably lighter burden of proof if the employee files an appeal, and its action will be insulated from mitigation.
One other thing I would mention: I have often been asked to speak to agency groups about chapter 43, and when I ask why, since MSPB rarely sees appeals from chapter 43 actions, I’ve been told on several occasions that once an employee goes through the chapter 43 pre-action process and is unsuccessful, he recognizes that he is better off moving on to a job he is better able to perform than to fight the action.
