Federal Government Policy and Business

The 6 Agencies Where Employee Morale Has Declined the Most

Government Executive: While federal officials boasted modest gains governmentwide in employee satisfaction and morale in the 2017 Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey released Thursday, not all agencies kept up with the overall improvement.

Across government, the measure of worker happiness—represented by the global satisfaction index—increased by 3 points, from 61 last year to 64 in 2017. This marks the third straight year that satisfaction increased, although 2017 also marks the lowest response rate among employees in recent memory—45.5 percent.

But some agencies have seen progress on worker morale slow or reverse course. The State Department saw the worst swing among agencies with at least 1,000 employees, the apparent culmination of months of news about discontent within the department. Its global satisfaction index score dropped 2 points from 2016, while engagement dropped 1 point, and employees’ response rate decreased by 16.9 percentage points.

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