When I was first looking for a job after graduation, I was very naive. I kept thinking, just get a job; you can do anything for two years. Little did I know that two years is a really long time when you’re not getting paid much, you are working all the time, and barely making it financially. I have been told many times that I built a lot of character in those two years. I think I should have been smarter when I was looking for my first job. Pay grade, promotional opportunities, workload, and benefits all could have steered me in a different direction. You should be paid what you are worth, and that is how you attract good talent.

In my last blog I discussed some benefits of having a unified food safety agency based on risk assessment that covered all food products. Part Two of that discussion was about the labor pool. I hope everyone has had the chance to listen to the podcast hosted by the Federalist Society with former Undersecretary of Food Safety, Mindy Brashears, the former FDA Acting Commissioner, Stephen Ostroff, and former FDA Deputy Commissioner of Food Policy and Response, Frank Yiannis. Labor was a discussion. How can we attract the best labor pool for this new agency?

I am hoping that we can take politics out of food safety. If we can remove politics, the labor pool will be wide open. How can we attract the best talent? It goes back to what I mentioned above: pay grade, promotional opportunities, workload, and benefits.Currently, public service in the government food safety sector has excellent benefits, but they lack significantly in pay grade, especially in top administrative positions. Excellent qualifications deserve great pay and that’s how we attract the correct talent.

I have been in this industry long enough to see extremely qualified people enter public service positions in government, and shortly after leave. They have extreme talents in managing and leading food safety processes and regulations; however, public service is a terrible job. Granted, it is highly satisfying, but after a while it is absolutely soul crushing, and for this reason we have turnover. It takes a strong personality to stay in top administration in food safety public service as you take blame for everything, all while you’re trying to navigate thousands of employees across the country. These people should be paid what they are worth. If not, they will leave and find industry jobs which pay much higher and they can feel more valued.

What about those not in top administration? If we compare government entry level jobs to those of industry, there is no comparison in pay grade. I am not suggesting government employees are of lesser quality. Not at all. What I am saying is that we are missing talented food and agriculture graduates. In academia, we never suggested government jobs. Most of our students had jobs by the start of their senior year and were getting paid as much if not more than I was as a professor (again, public service job). The talented students would have had to consider a significant loss of pay for government opportunities. With current student debt, this was not even an option.

How can we solve this labor/ talent pool if a new agency is ever created? I have no idea. But I think it deserves some thought. Public service is a tough job. Those that do it for a living should be compensated to maintain longevity and talent needed to ensure our safe food supply.

Public service leaders: Talent should equal compensation

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