State bungles simple inventory process

This hit my radar about a week and a half ago, but it wasn’t quite as sexy as some other stories I blogged.  That said, it’s pretty serious when an organization with this much on the line is incapable of defining and adhering to very simple processes:

The State Department does not have an accurate accounting of its laptop computers, including ones meant for classified use, and has failed to encrypt machines as it is supposed to do to protect sensitive information, according to a new report by the department’s inspector general.

Inspectors found that 27 laptops, worth $55,000 were missing out of a sample of 334 from four State Department bureaus, the report states.

“Because the content and the encryption status of the missing laptop computers are unknown, there is a risk that PII (Personally Identifiable Information) and other sensitive Department information may be susceptible to unauthorized access and use,” it says.

Encryption is not rocket science, but inventory?  That’s trivially easy.  Checking out a library book is a more stringent procedure.

The fix is easy, necessary, and urgent.  This is the sort of thing that demands to be corrected immediately.

VOA’s PNN successful, disgruntled

In a second HT to Nukes & Spooks this week (who appear to have moved into the “job satisfaction” space), the State Department Inspector General has found that VOA’s Persian News Network works well, but not happily:

“Virtually everyone voluntarily brought up the subject of disgruntled employees and destructive rumors. Some said it was the most unpleasant place that they had ever worked, citing raised voices and the lack of civil, professional conduct when disagreements arose,” states the report, based in part on interviews of Persian News Network (PNN) staff and management.

The full report is here.  I wouldn’t be surprised if Bob Sutton found some asshole bosses at PNN.

The interesting question posed by the IG’s report is in the disconnect between job satisfaction and firm performance–why do people do good work if they hate it?  Anecdotally, this reminds me of a USAID contractor R worked for in which consultants promised interview confidentiality to employees, then released the raw data.  The staff had similar results to those at PNN.  The word “toxic” showed up a few times.

A good guess would be dedication to mission.  The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees is a good example of a place with difficult employee conditions but strong commitment to mission.  Upon hearing reports–horror stories, really–from staff misbehavior and asshole-ness in the field, I continue to be surprised that this organization accompishes what it does.

Another hypothesis is that mission-oriented organizations foment dissatisfaction by placing mission concerns over the health, happiness, and general well-being of employees.  Back to R’s former workplace, part of the culture was, “why are you complaining when people in Africa are dying of HIV/AIDS?”  How does an employee reply to that when the person asking feels she is sacrificing herself to the mission?

The obvious answer would be that employees are more effective when they are satisfied with their jobs.  Although research tends to support that view, I am not certain that the research applies in all cases.  I’m also not certain it doesn’t.  It would be interesting to see research on the mission-driven organizations and the relationship between firm performance and job satisfaction.

Again, those are guesses.  I don’t know how the urgency of the PNN commission compares with UN and USAID.  It’s really interesting to find such a sharp disconnect between mission success and workplace failure.

MORE:  By the way, Cynthia Fisher questioned the correlation between job satisfaction and individual performance in the Academy of Management Review.  Individual performance and firm performance are not the same thing, but they obviously should be related.

MORE MORE:  Is there some requirement that IGs release climate surveys this time of year?