Quickie: Foreign Service 2009 Promotion Lists

The Foreign Service promotion lists came out staggered this year. The Director General of the Foreign Service, Nancy Powell says that the implementation of a cascade plan for announcing promotion lists is part of recent initiatives at HR.

"As soon as the Boards for a particular class of FS employees finish deliberations, HR releases the decision, resulting in publication of several promotion lists much earlier than anticipated and giving employees more time to prepare bids for onward assignments.”

Apparently, this is part of HR’s effort in “making the Foreign Service selection process more efficient and employee-friendly.”

Meanwhile State VP Daniel Hirsch in AFSANET message dated October 15, 2009 has this item on the promotion lists:

“Many members have expressed distress over the time lags involved in releasing this year’s promotion lists, which play an important role in many members’ decisions regarding bidding for onward assignments. While the lists were all released before paneling began, many members felt disadvantaged. We will be working with management to try to address the underlying causes of these delays. AFSA has also contributed information to an OIG review of the promotion process, which we hope will lead to greater transparency, fairness and accountability.”

Ah, we'll be in the lookout for that particular OIG review. The promotion lists for 2007 and 2008 are online at AFSA here.

The 2009 promotion lists are here.