The New Federal Incentive Awards Program

Abstract

THE Government Employees' Incentive Awards Act (Title III of Public Law 763, 83d Congress) is a firm expression of the intent of the President and the Congress that there be established a governmentwide incentive awards program which will effectively encourage all civilian employees of the federal government to participate in the common task of improving the efficiency and economy of government operations. President Eisenhower in a memorandum on December 28, 1954, asked the heads of all agencies to give personal leadership to the incentive awards program in their agencies. The new program, which went into effect on November 30, 1954, establishes a single system of awards for suggestions, inventions, and superior accomplishments in place of several different systems of limited coverage. It also centralizes responsibility for administration of the system in the U. S. Civil Service Commission. i. Before the enactment of Public Law 763, incentive awards programs in the government were based upon a number of separate statutes. This situation resulted in some confusion, since control responsibilities were divided at the executive level. The Civil Service Commission, the Bureau of the Budget, and certain individual departments had responsibility for different types of awards. Under the new legislation the Civil Service Commission is made responsible for administering the governmentwide program. The commission has established an Incentive Awards Office that reports to the executive director and has issued regulations and instructions needed to implement the law. The regulations are broad, giving departments and agencies wide latitude to set up incentive awards plans to