IBC Culture
Three directorates. One mission. Infinite opportunities. We are the Interior Business Center.
At the Interior Business Center, we believe employees are our greatest asset. This is a belief we take great pride in, and carry out each and every day.
The Interior Business Center understands how important our employees are to our overall success and continually recognize our employees, and their excellence, in a variety of ways.
Read below to learn more about IBC's culture.
Employee Development
At IBC, we realize employee development is a vital tool for improving individual performance and opportunities, as well as the performance of the Interior Business Center and the Department of the Interior. IBC continually looks for ways to enhance our employee's proficiency in both the areas of leadership and technical skills. Some of the employee development activities the Interior Business Center offers include:
- Mentor Program- IBC’s Mentor Program is designed to help develop our future leaders. The program gives participants an opportunity to gain increased self-awareness, self-esteem, skill and competency, and greater confidence. Goals and objectives are developed for each participant to allow for a tailored approach based on each individual's unique interests.
- Career Paths- We have identified competency models for almost the entire IBC workforce. These models provide clarity to employees and managers in terms of career development, career progression options, and transparency into available career paths at the Interior Business Center.
- Online Training- all IBC employees have access to an online library of over 3,000 courses, covering topics from project management and budget/financial management, to IT applications and leadership skills. Many of the courses provide opportunities to earn college credits, Continuing Educational Units, Professional Development Units, Project Management Institute Units, and Continuing Professional Education Units.
Giving Back
At IBC, we continually find ways to partner with both internal and external organizations to assist and volunteer in a variety of ways. One of the biggest and most successful endeavors our employees participate in is the annual Combined Federal Campaign. The CFC is the world's largest and most successful annual workplace charity campaign. The money raised goes towards supporting eligible non-profit organizations that provide health and human service benefits throughout the world.
Diversity and Inclusion
At IBC, diversity is not a defined or prescribed concept, but is a belief that is interwoven into the Interior Business Center culture. We believe in diversity in every sense of the word- from employing people from a wide variety of backgrounds and cultures, to cultivating an environment where people feel free and comfortable sharing their perspectives and opinions.
IBC regularly hosts celebrations to support and promote diversity programs such as National Black History Month, National Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month, National Hispanic Heritage Month, Women's History Month, Gay and Lesbian Pride Month, Disability Employment Awareness Month, and National American Indian Heritage Month.
In 2017, we instituted an annual Diversity Day to include speakers and roundtable discussions which provide opportunities for employees to share experiences and participate in conversations about the importance of diversity and inclusion in the workplace.
Working at Interior
Hear from Employees About Working at the Department of the Interior
The work done across the Department of the Interior is vast and varied. Hear directly from a few Department employees and get a better idea of what a career at the Department of the Interior looks like through the diversity of our people, occupations, and workplaces.
Employee Awards and Recognition
Here at the Interior Business Center, we have a robust employee rewards and recognition program that has been enormously successful and that is continually enhanced. Some of the highlights include:
- Annual employee appreciation events in our major Interior Business Center locations each summer. This is a wonderful opportunity to escape from the office, relax with our colleagues, and gives the Director the opportunity to present the Interior Business Center Award for Excellence, the highest honor award in the Interior Business Center.
- Our annual awards ceremony, held each winter, recognizes the IBC Employee of the Year, IBC Supervisor of the Year, and the IBC Outstanding New Employee. The ceremony provides an opportunity to acknowledge a small group of truly exceptional employees by presenting them with this prestigious honor and a corresponding award. The IBC Employee of the Year and IBC Outstanding New Employee are selected by the leadership team; the IBC Supervisor of the Year is selected by a panel of employees.
- Our compensation program includes various cash rewards given throughout the year such as project-based and "special thanks" awards as well as annual performance-based awards.
IBC Employee Council
For more than 10 years now, IBC’s Employee Council has been working with IBC leadership and identify issues and challenges across the organization. This group of employees is located all over the country and works to share best practices from across the enterprise, provide feedback on new or revised programs, policies and processes, identify ideas that impact all IBC employees, and share concerns that may impact IBC as a whole. The Employee Council is sponsored by IBC's Chief of Human Capital Strategy and meets regularly with the IBC Executive Team.
Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey
Understanding how our employees feel and what they think of working for the Interior Business Center is important to our senior leadership. Each year we participate in the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey, a survey that measures our employees' perceptions of whether, and to what extent, conditions characterizing successful organizations are present in our organization.
Over the past few years we have seen positive results and trends in several key areas of employee engagement. The results indicate our employees feel a sense of accomplishment in their jobs, they have a very strong understanding of how their work relates to the agency's mission and goals, and they truly enjoy the people with whom they work. The results also tell us areas where employees feel further improvement is needed. We look closely at both our strengths and challenges and are committed to implementing initiatives to continue what we are doing well and help fix areas where we need improvement. Employees are a key part of our annual action planning process.
Snapshot of our results from the 2022 Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey [pdf]