U.S. Postal Service: Age and Disability in the Executive Service

Equal opportunity in the federal workplace is intended to result in a diverse and highly qualified workforce. Such a workplace uses the talents of all employees-- without regard to factors such as employees' race, ethnicity, gender, and disability status. Diversity within an agency's senior executive ranks, including the U.S. Postal Service's (Service) Postal Career Executive Service (PCES), is particularly important because it allows agencies to draw upon a wider variety of perspectives and approaches to address the wide array of challenges facing the federal government. The Service had 959 employees in the PCES during fiscal year 2000 and 867 PCES employees during fiscal year 2007. In April 2008, we reported on the demographic representation of employees in the Service's PCES (which includes postal officers and executives) and certain levels of the Service's Executive and Administrative Schedule (a pool of candidates for the Service's managerial and executive leadership positions). We provided these data for the end of fiscal year 2007, as well as baseline data from fiscal year 1999, which we previously reported for those positions. As requested, this report provides additional information on the demographic representation of employees who were in the PCES at any time during fiscal year 2000 and fiscal year 2007. Specifically, this report provides information on (1) the average age at which these employees entered the PCES; (2) the average age at which these PCES employees left (separated from) the Service, including the average age at which they retired; and (3) the number of PCES employees who reported having one of nine disabilities that the government, as a matter of policy, has identified for special affirmative action emphasis ("targeted" disabilities). This report also provides information on, among other matters, the average length of tenure that employees had with the Service prior to entering the PCES as well as their average length of tenure in the PCES before separating from the Service.