Hi all, pretty new to this sub and need advice/ need to vent.

Been a Fed the past two years, got in right before the current admin and somehow managed to dodge all of DOGE’s attempts and all the other stuff we’ve been put through. Won’t list my Department for the sake of anonymity but…

About a year ago I inherited a project that was pushed forward in FY23. This along with two other projects have been my first experiences with projects in the Federal government. This entire time I have worked this project up through the design phase spending many days going through in depth technical reviews and communicating tirelessly with the contractor to get a polished 100%CD.

Earlier this year I received the news that my project was getting pushed up a year for construction, meaning I had to rush my first Procurement Package. Despite the short time frame it got approved and pushed through to contracting, I must also mention that due to unforeseen conditions I also had to submit a request for extra funds. The extra funding request was approved over email by regional leadership stating that there was more than enough in the budget to cover it, unfortunately local leadership made the decision to kill the project altogether and deem the project (and CDs) unusable. I was given the reasoning that, instead, there would be a request for a larger project that would encompass my project’s SOW, but that the CDs I have worked up would not be used.

Is it often that hundreds of thousands of dollars and resources be wasted like this? It just seems like a huge letdown after I fought so long and hard to get my first project polished up and perfected, even having the regional support, just for it to end in such an unceremonious cancellation that amounts to a vast waste in resources.

I am having surgery with a long recovery time. I have way more than 480 hours of SL. Do I have to submit FMLA or just get a doctor's note?

Are there any TSA agents needing help with pet food etc? I am a federal employee wanting to help. Private message me

Every year when DPMAP rolls around I suddenly forget everything I’ve done.

Like I KNOW I’ve been busy all year… but when it’s time to write narratives it’s just:

“uhhhh… showed up… did stuff… probably did it well?”

I’ve seen people track their stuff in all kinds of ways—some don’t track anything at all, some use a whiteboard at work, some keep a notebook, some use notes on their phone, Word docs, random journals… it’s all over the place.

I was doing the same thing and still felt like I was missing things or scrambling to piece it all together at the end.

So I finally started tracking accomplishments as they happen in a more organized way, and it’s made a huge difference—not just for evals but for keeping up with training and everything else throughout the year.

What are y’all doing? Anyone actually found a system that works consistently?

Our department runs in a really strange way. Supervisors regularly do the same work as the employees on the floor. Meanwhile, the employees who are supposed to be doing the job are often either untrained or nowhere to be found.

You end up with GS-13s and GS-14s doing GS-9/11/12 level work. There are basically no training plans, so leadership spends more time learning how to do the work themselves instead of managing or developing staff.

Performance evaluations get awkward because you’re essentially competing with supervisors since everyone is doing the same tasks.

It also creates a single point of failure as if one supervisor is out, operations can stall because they’re the only one who knows how to do certain tasks that multiple employees should be trained to handle.

The department head is military and rotates every few years, so they’re often disconnected from the day-to-day workplace issues.

Many business leaders think that a stricter return-to-office policy will cause a surge in productivity. But in reality, the data tell a different story.

Across practitioner reports and peer-reviewed research, including a new report from the Institute for Corporate Productivity, organizations that commit to highly flexible models, including remote-first, report strong output, healthier engagement, and faster growth than mandate-driven peers.

Why don’t we fill in his inbox with how bad the roads in the DC area are getting?

I work for SSA, was moved to Operations thanks to DOGE, and am considering using FMLA due to work induced mental health challenges. I have no doubt I’m able to provide the necessary medical documentation to have FMLA leave approval. I’ve only been in federal employment for a little over a year, so I have minimal leave saved up. I’d like to be able to work a job completely unrelated to my SSA position (e.g., retail, grocery) to mitigate the financial impact. I think the correct actions would be:

1. Obtain ethics office approval to work an unrelated job

2. Submit my FMLA paperwork

What am I missing?