USPS Organizational Structure and HR Strategy Analysis

Overview of the United States Postal Service

The United States Postal Service (USPS) employs more than half a million civilian employees. It operates more than 30,000 individual post offices throughout the nation and delivers approximately 660 million letters and parcels to more than 140 million individual delivery points every day, amounting to approximately 175 billion pieces of mail every year (Edwards, Wattenberg, & Lineberry, 2009). The USPS was originally conceived by the Second Continental Congress in 1775, in connection with which Benjamin Franklin served as the nation's first Postmaster General. The USPS is an independent federal agency and is considered the second largest civilian employer in the United States (Edwards, Wattenberg, & Lineberry, 2009).

Structural Framework: Working Units and Vertical Coordination

Working Units and Management

The United States Postal Service consists of three subcomponents: headquarters, functional (i.e., administrative) staff, and operational staff (Edwards, Wattenberg, & Lineberry, 2009). Because the USPS is a U.S. federal agency, its organizational hiring rules, policies, and procedures are dictated by applicable federal codes and regulations that define all aspects of its structure and operations. As a federal agency, the USPS hires according to formal assessments and qualification-based criteria that emphasize previous work experience, formal education, and specific elements of knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs). Those KSAs are evaluated by an objective system that solicits responses from prospective employees to questions about specific positions within the organization. An automated system determines initial eligibility for employment and the specific General Services (GS) civilian pay grade for which every applicant qualifies (Edwards, Wattenberg, & Lineberry, 2009). Once hired, working groups are assigned based on operational responsibilities and supervised by more experienced personnel at higher pay grades and, generally, longer tenure with the organization.

Vertical Coordination

Managers of Postal Office Operations are responsible for approximately 75 district post offices and report directly to the District Manager. District Managers are responsible for 85 national postal districts and report directly to the Area Vice President. As is the case with most U.S. federal agencies, the USPS is organized into nine federal regions, which in connection with postal operations are called Areas rather than federal regions in the manner more common among other federal agencies (Edwards, Wattenberg, & Lineberry, 2009; Watson & Wyatt, 2003). Every Postal Area is under the authority of an officer-level Area Vice President for that geographical region. The Area Vice Presidents report to the Chief Operating Officer, who reports in turn directly to the U.S. Postmaster General (Watson & Wyatt, 2003).

Each USPS Area Vice President is responsible for nearly 100,000 employees per area and receives direct reports from each of nine District Heads per Area, in addition to approximately the same number of direct reports from executive-level Area support staff (Watson & Wyatt, 2003). Each of the 85 District Managers is responsible for approximately 8,500 district employees and four to five Managers of Postal Office Operations. District Managers typically receive direct reports from their Managers of Postal Office Operations, several Plant Managers, District Postmasters, and senior district support staff (Watson & Wyatt, 2003).

Nearly 400 Managers of Postal Operations are each responsible for close to 2,000 postal employees (Watson & Wyatt, 2003). They directly supervise up to 100 individual post offices. Approximately 28,000 postmasters oversee up to 2,000 employees each and typically report to District Managers (Watson & Wyatt, 2003).

Lateral Coordination and Internal Enforcement

Generally, the USPS is a highly centralized organization in that all USPS offices and personnel are uniformly subject to the same rules, policies, and procedures, which are determined by federal law and administrative policies implemented at agency headquarters (George & Jones, 2008). At the logistical level, individual local postal offices often coordinate hours of operation and various services to ensure optimal provision of services (George & Jones, 2008).

As is the case with many U.S. federal agencies, the USPS maintains multiple agency components in connection with its operational functions and both external and internal enforcement (Edwards, Wattenberg, & Lineberry, 2009). In that regard, the USPS maintains a Postal Inspection Service (USPIS) component and a Postal Office of Inspector General (USPS-OIG) component. The former is a federal law enforcement agency principally responsible for investigating and prosecuting crimes that potentially involve the services provided by the USPS. The latter is principally responsible for addressing abuse or fraudulent use of USPS services as well as ensuring internal compliance with applicable federal law. The OIG also maintains direct oversight of the USPIS (Edwards, Wattenberg, & Lineberry, 2009).

Structural Dilemmas and Restructuring Recommendations

After an independent analysis commissioned by Congress (Watson & Wyatt, 2003) identified the need to implement four specific structural changes, the USPS undertook fundamental reforms. Those recommendations were precipitated by findings that the specific responsibilities of the Manager of Postal Operations position lacked clarity and consistency, and that communications and directives issued from headquarters often caused confusion and duplication of effort (Watson & Wyatt, 2003).

With respect to the Manager of Postal Operations position, that role deviated from the general concept of organizational uniformity and centralized control. Individual managers defined their roles, responsibilities, and direct reports in a manner that was excessively autonomous — especially in an agency where virtually all policies and protocols are defined by headquarters. The span of control exhibited by some individuals in this position exceeded best practices and, partly as a result, the levels of support for the position varied considerably and unacceptably relative to those best practices (Watson & Wyatt, 2003).

Regarding the confusion arising from headquarters communications and directives, Watson & Wyatt (2003) identified two fundamental problems. First, changes in policies and protocols generated by headquarters and affecting operations management were not properly vetted prior to implementation. As a result, unanticipated problems manifested themselves only after implementation at the operational level. In addition to the operational problems that resulted, this dynamic also undermined respect for headquarters among personnel and contributed to diminished morale.

Second, directives from headquarters sometimes conflicted with established policies and procedures properly set at the local level. This problem was attributable to a lack of communication and coordination between headquarters and postal districts regarding initiatives generated by headquarters without any input from the field (Watson & Wyatt, 2003).

As a result of the 2003 Watson & Wyatt analysis, the USPS adopted the following four measures in accordance with the recommendations in that report:

1. Accelerated Network Rationalization — designed to better coordinate the organizational structure to actual demand for postal services, and thereby accommodate demand fluctuations with appropriate reductions in the number of managers.

2. Increased Decision-Making Authority of Operations Managers — designed to maintain the existing management structure while simultaneously incorporating the expertise and experience of Area Vice Presidents, particularly in relation to strategic management and decisions.

3. Increased Coordination between Headquarters and Area Staff — designed to promote better integration of policy and procedure and to reduce duplicative efforts and redundancy.

4. Implementation of a Consistent Cluster Model — designed to clarify the roles and responsibilities of the Managers of Postal Operations and to establish the District Manager as the principal point of accountability for performance clusters.