cross-posted from: https://sh.itjust.works/post/48899185

The Defense Department is stripping away job protections from its civilian employees and directing managers to “act with speed and conviction” to fire employees performing “unsuccessfully.”

A new Sept. 30 memo titled “Separation of Employees with Unacceptable Performance,” which became public Tuesday, also warned that managers will be held accountable if they fail to remove poor performers.

Pentagon’s Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness Anthony Tata, who signed the memo, suspended the department’s requirement that managers attempt to rehabilitate underperforming employees — clearing the way for supervisors to fire workers whose performance is deemed “unacceptable” more quickly.

“They are trying to cloak it in legalistic language and make it sound legitimate, but the reality is they’re stripping due process significantly and making it easier for arbitrary terminations, similar and functional to private sector employment,” Sean Timmons, managing partner at Tully Rinckey PLLC, told Federal News Network.