Focus on Foreign Service Families

A recent survey of U.S. Foreign Service (FS) Officers and Specialists by the American Foreign Service Association (AFSA) paints a sobering picture for workforce retention. A full 32 percent of FS employees reported that they are giving serious consideration to leaving the Service, with an additional 45 percent noting that they have given some thought to departing but had no immediate plans to do so. These alarming numbers set the table for a clear defeat in the Foreign Service’s ongoing, so-called “war for talent” and require remedial action on a number of fronts.

As detailed in AFSA’s review, retention is a multifaceted problem requiring solutions on a range of issues from eliminating bias in the assignment process to ensuring that DEI principles are woven into the DNA of Foreign Service career management. But perhaps most important, it should involve a broader conversation recognizing that the question of “retention” cannot be limited to the retention of individual staff members. Rather, it’s a question of retaining families.

Family life at U.S. diplomatic missions can certainly be attractive: unparalleled opportunities for travel and adventure, often-excellent schooling options for children, and the chance to develop strong bonds of friendship and community both within and beyond the walls of the Embassy. But these benefits are often outweighed by the harsh reality that even in the 2020s, the prospects for meaningful employment of FS spouses remains highly limited, with the husbands and wives of Foreign Service Officers and Specialists essentially required to sacrifice their own career advancement (and frequently, their own employment) to the caprices of the Foreign Service assignment system. In effect, the Foreign Service remains trapped in a 20th century “one career per family” model even as the world has evolved towards as a two career per family paradigm.

As a former Senior Foreign Service Officer, I had the chance to draw some key observations from more than two decades managing the work of fellow Foreign Service personnel, and one key factor was obvious: more often than not our most intelligent, hardest-working staff members were likely to be married to equally talented, ambitious people who struggled with the idea of putting their own careers on hold to “trail” their FS partners. Some accepted this fate through gritted teeth, seeking whatever opportunities might come available through Embassy “associate” programs (i.e., ridiculously under-graded, under-compensated, and sometimes make-work jobs offered as a sop to spouses and significant others who were pausing or giving up high-achieving careers in totally unrelated fields). A few would find opportunities volunteering or working in the humanitarian/development sector where their skills were rarely rewarded with commensurate wages. Others would elect to remain stateside to continue in their careers, resulting in significant financial cost and emotional strain on their families, especially where children were involved.

Separately, many of our most valuable members of the Foreign Service are "tandem” couples, i.e., marriages where both partners are FSOs or Specialists. While the Department has made commendable attempts to ensure tandems can serve together over the course of their careers, they have yet to adopt an equitable, systematic approach to ensure the fully realized career development of both members of the tandem couple: often, one spouse takes the “lead” for an assignment rotation while the other is offered a consolation prize in the form of the least-worst available assignment at that Post, often outside their career field.

The Remote Work Revolution that began in earnest in 2020 can and should signal the end of this era of sacrifice. Many Foreign Service spouses are working in fields eminently conducive to teleworking arrangements from overseas, but their employers—especially in the private sector-- are under no obligation to offer them such accommodations. It will take creativity and aggressive engagement with key legislative and executive branch stakeholders to address this critical gap for the retention of Foreign Service families. AFSA and the Department of State can begin by exploring several solutions:

·        All Executive Branch employees who are the registered Eligible Family Members (EFMs) of Foreign Service personnel should be automatically authorized full teleworking status for the duration of their FS partners’ overseas assignment, with reasonable accommodations made for time zone differences and other factors.

·        AFSA and the Department should work to obtain, via either Executive Order or legislative remedy, an adjustment to federal contracting and acquisitions regulations requiring any firm that does business with the U.S. Government to offer teleworking arrangements for their employees who are EFMs of a U.S. Government employee on assignment overseas.

·        The Department should make available reliable at-home broadband internet connections, reasonable home-office furniture/equipment (desks/chairs, monitors, etc.) for FS spouses telecommuting from their assignment location as part of the standard home furnishings offered to Foreign Service personnel worldwide.

·        The Department should restructure its approach to Tandem assignments, allowing for more telework options (wherein one member of the Tandem couple may work remotely from Post in a Washington-based assignment) or even where both members of the Tandem may be based at the same Embassy for up to four years, with each member working two years “at Post” and the other working remotely in a position tagged to another location.

To operationalize a modernized, more family-focused Foreign Service, the Department should convene a blue-ribbon panel with strong representation from current and former Foreign Service families, including tandem couples to examine these and other recommendations. The panel may not be able to identify a perfect fix for all two-career Foreign Service families; some FS spouses are engaged in work not immediately conducive to telecommuting solutions (e.g., physicians, skilled trades, etc.). But it’s a start.