Managing the Changing Face of the Organization

Numerous factors impact our employees, including network rationalization and restructuring the retail environment. The aging of the American population also reflects in the faces of our employees, and we will continue to manage multiple generations in the workplace. As our package business grows and as our employee population transforms, we will continue to implement employee-centered Human Resources programs.

Shifts in the career–to–non-career employee ratios reflect cost containment measures and the growing need for on-demand shipping necessitates a more flexible workforce. In response, we hired over 80,000 non-career employees in FY2014 including PSEs, CCAs and MHAs. Recruitment, hiring and retention of non-career employees involved outreach via social media outlets, attendance at over 20 job fairs for CCAs and the launch of a realistic job preview video (subtitled in Spanish) for CCAs. We recognize that retention of the non-career workforce begins with on-boarding. In FY2015, we will engage employees before their first day of service and provide ample training to ensure individual and organizational success. New entrants to the Postal Service workforce will desire greater flexibilities, development programs and technologies for increased collaboration, productivity and engagement. Our focus on building the workforce of the future is aimed at meeting these needs.

The Postal Service career workforce has an average tenure of 15.3 years of service and is an average age of 49¹. Currently 33 percent of our population is optionally eligible to retire. As our average age continues to rise, identifying successors will be critical to filling voids created by retiring employees. Furthermore, an aging workforce will increase the need for knowledge management and alternative career paths. To address these needs in FY2014, we redesigned the leadership development programs, included non-career employees in employee engagement surveys and continued the refinement of communications to obtain vital feedback and input from employees.