U.S. Postal Service

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO provided information on promotions of women and minorities to management-level jobs under the Postal Service's Executive and Administrative Schedule (EAS), focusing on: (1) whether the Postal Service's required promotion procedures were followed at 4 Postal Service performance clusters for promotions to EAS levels 16 and above during fiscal year (FY) 1997; (2) the percentages of women and minorities who submitted applications, were considered best qualified, and were promoted; and (3) how these percentages compared to women's and minorities' EAS levels 16 and above workforce representation at each respective location, before the promotions.

GAO noted that: (1) documentation in the promotion vacancy files and GAO's discussions with Postal Service officials provided evidence indicating the Service's required promotion procedures GAO reviewed were followed for the 127 FY 1997 promotions at the 4 performance clusters; (2) a total of 1,164 applications were received for the 117 promotions to EAS levels 16 and above that GAO reviewed at the Atlanta, Dallas, and Van Nuys performance clusters; (3) of these applications, 64 percent were submitted by women and minorities; 64 percent of the applicants considered best qualified were women and minorities; and 64 percent of those promoted were women and minorities; (4) variation in the percentages existed among the clusters, and in no case did women and minorities receive less than 50 percent of the promotions; (5) in addition, 62 percent of those in the three clusters who were promoted to EAS levels 16 and above were women and minorities compared to their representation rate of 59 percent at the same grade levels in all three clusters combined, before the promotions; (6) when looking at the distribution of specific equal employment opportunity (EEO) groups throughout the three promotion process stages--application, considered best qualified, and promoted--for the promotions reviewed to EAS levels 16 and above, white men accounted for the largest percentage of applications submitted, considered best qualified, and promoted throughout all three clusters; and (7) when considering the distribution of the remaining EEO groups at all of the three promotion process stages, the specific EEO group accounting for the highest percentages varied among the clusters.