robert mueller testifying to congress on wednesday about possible obstruction of justice and abuse of power by president trump and russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. our live coverage starts at 8:30 a.m. eastern on c-span 3, online at c-span.org or listen wherever you are with the free c-span radio app. before the hearing listen to the complete mueller report at c-span.org on your laptop or mobile device. type mueller report audio in the search box. the audio is courtesy of timberline media. the house will be in order. >> for 40 years c-span has been providing america unfiltered coverage of congress, the white house, the supreme court and public policy events from washington, d.c. and around the country, so you can make your up your own mind.

created by cable in 1979, c-span is brought to you by your local cable or satellite provider. c-span, your unfiltered view of government. the house modernization of congress committee explored best practices on how to recruit and retain a diverse congressional staff. human resources executives and an author of three books on workplace topics testified and answered questions from committee members. this is about an hour and a half. >> okay. all right. the committee will come to order without objection the chair is authorized to declare a recess of the committee at any time. this hearing is entitled cultivating diversity and improving retention among congressional staff. i now recognize myself for five minutes to give an opening statement. one of the main ways in which we retain staff is by having it be a 90 degrees in here, so my apologies to each of you.

we will be distributing fans to the entire audience. today we are going to talk about what's really the backbone of this institution and that's the congressional staff that work here. i think i speak for all of us on the dais and those yet to come when i say we couldn't do our jobs without the teams of people who work for us. anytime i get a compliment where someone says nice job on this or that, my response is always i've got a really good team and i feel lucky for that. they are dedicated public servants who are here because they want to do meaningful work. this he often choose careers on the hill and in our district offices despite the long hours and occasional lack of job security and since we work on a two-year contract, and lower pay compared to what they could make in the executive branch or the private sector. we are as an institution very fortunate to attract such talented people and hard working people, however, keeping them

here is another story. turnover rates for house staff are really high with most of the positions in member offices turning over every two years or less. of course, that isn't always a bad thing because a lot of staff leave one job on the hill for a different job on the hill. but even when taking into account all the movement between different jobs, the typical staffer leaves the hill after four or five years, and we hear that they leave because after time the desire to do good and serve the public is outweighed by the need for a better work/life balance and the need to make more money to afford housing and support their families and put kids through college. that puts congress at a disadvantage compared not only to the private sector but also to the executive branch, and that doesn't serve the interests of the american people. congress needs to do more to not only attract the best talent, but to keep the best talent and attract the individuals who represent the diverse backgrounds and views that exist across our country. who you do we create a work environment that makes staff want to stay here instead of

heading for the off ramp and how do we make sure we have a congress that looks like america? i thought it would be a good idea to bring in the point person who handles human resources for the house staff so they could talk about what benefits are available to staff, then i found out that that person does not exist. there literally is not an hr point of contact for house staff. but we're still going to talk about benefits today, we are going to hear about comment trends in employee benefits and look at what congress can do better. we're also going to look at what congress can do to recruit and retain diverse staff that reflect america. the 116th congress is the most racially and ethnically diverse congress in history and the congressional staff should represent the diversity of our constituents around the country, and i'm looking forward to hearing what thoughts and recommendations our witnesses and members of our committee have from improving staff retention and fostering staff inclusion and diversity the house.

i will invite our vice chair tom graves to share opening remarks. >> let me command you for your leadership and making staff of this institution and diversity we will stus today a focus this have committee. the modernization doesn't just mean updating our technology and improving the legislative process, but it also means ensuring that the people's house invest and professionally develop a dynamic workforce that reflects those we represent and does that to both not only in our committees and our offices, but also on the house floor as well. those serving on the this committee represent very unique districts, we have northwest washington state, northwest georgia here represented, and our constituents have different backgrounds and unique experiences and those who want a career in public service they're certainly no different. i look forward to hearing from our expert witnesses today about how we can attract and retain a workforce comprised of different voices, different characteristics, experiences and skills here in congress. with unemployment now in our

nation at the lowest rate in 51 years, i'm also looking forward to discussing how this institution can compete with the private sector in hiring and retaining some of the most talented persons in our country and that ultimately help us serve the american people better. so i'm glad we're having this conversation, it's building on the work that this committee has already done and we will have a conversation to learn a little bit more about best practices from those that have been helping to change the narrative and set new trends to increasing opportunity nationwide. with that, mr. chairman, i have to yield back. >> thank you. i know representative cleaver expressed an interest in sharing some opening remarks and i'm happy to recognize him for that purpose. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i thank the ranking member as well. i am extremely fascinated by the diversity of our nation, the

heterogeneity of the u.s. population. i am frustrated by the home mow jen aty in the upper ranks of our government and to some degree even down to where we are now, and because i personally believe that there are at this moment in history only a few -- only a few people who would intentionally work toward exclusion, but that leaves the people who are unconsciously excluding. so that's the area that i think we can impact and i'm looking forward to ways in which the panel can present that might help us deal in that realm. thank you, mr. chairman. i yield back. >> thanks very much.

with that, i think we will -- did anyone else have an opening comment they would like to make? okay. with that we welcome the testimony of our three witnesses. first, dr. alexander alonso is the society for human resources management chief resource officer. during his career he has worked with numerous subject matter experts worldwide with the aim of identifying performance standards, developing competency models, designing organizational assessments and conducting job analyses, he has also served as a columnist analyzing major trends in the workforce for hr magazine. i'm a subscriber. he received his doctorate in industrial organizational psychology from florida international university. next up -- is it laura liswood, is that right? okay. laura liswood is the author of "the loudest duck" a book that divers into the aspects of diversity and ensure a fair

level playing field. she is a nationally recognized speaker, author and adviser and has contributed to leadership in the women's community for more than 20 years. she is the secretary general of the council of women world leaders composed of women presidents, prime ministers and heads of government. it's the only organization in the world dedicated to women heads of state and government. she holds an mba from harvard business school, a jd from the university of california davis school of law. and then dr. kwasi mitchell is principal in deloitte's consulting and government and public services practice with over 15 years of experience. too date he has served over 40 clients across deloitte's government practices. as a leader he is passionate about mentoring and developing the next generation of diverse leaders. he served as the diversity and inclusion lead for deloitte consulting and deloitte's first ever inclusion hiring blitz. he holds a ph.d. in organic chemistry, is that right? >> inorganic.

>> inorganic chemistry, i'm sorry. [ inaudible ]. >> i literally don't know what that means. from northwestern university, an mba -- i really don't know what that means -- an mba from drexel university and a ba from kalamazoo college. witnesses are reminded that your oral testimony will be five minutes and without objection your written statements will be made part of the record and, dr. alonso, you are now recognized for five minutes. take it away. >> thank you. good afternoon, chairman kilmer, choice chair graves and distinguished members of the committee. i serve as the chief knowledge officer. as the voice of all work, workers and workplace they are shaping the way employees and employers work together by maximizing human potential. as the chief knowledge officer for sherm it is my job to examine an understand the issues based by employees, employers

and hr pro terms nls on a daily basis. i deeply appreciate congress leading by secretary and recognizing how it can improve its employment practices. an important area we have studied is the use of strategic benefits. hr departments and organizations invest significant resources in designing benefits packages to recruit new employees and retain their top talent. in sherm's most recent survey 92% of employees indicated benefits play a role in ensuring their overall job satisfaction. the schultz also showed a strong correlation between benefits and retention. this undersoaring the benefits of organizations and need to plan benefits for return on investment and competitive advantage. this is especially true in congress. congressional employees often face long hours, a high stress environment and lower pay than their private sector counterparts. under these circumstances

benefits play a significant role in employee satisfaction and retenti retention. a study by the congressional management term and thrm found 72% of congressional employees reported benefits influence their decision to stay in their current positions. in today's labor market benefits offerings set organizations apart when recruiting and retaining top talent. benefit offerings with important to congressional staff, they have not kept up with the pace of private sector benefits. moreover, they have not met the needs of our diverse and modern workforce. research shows improvements in the economic landscape and increasing diversity are driving organizations to refine their benefits programs. for example, there are currently five generations in the workforce with increasing racial and ethnic diversity across the country. this diversity shapes perspectives as far as workplace benefits, leading hr professionals to restructure benefit offerings to appeal to a more diverse workforce.

congress should examine hill staff used on work and benefits as a result. in a tight labor market workforce development has become a big driver in supporting employees who want to upskill and employers who seek to maintain global competitiveness. 87% of employers report offering professional development opportunities as a benefit and 14% of organizations say they increased their investment in professional development offerings over the last year. more than 90% of organizations offer paid leave of some type to their employees while 34% offer maternity leave and 30% offer paternity leave. remote work continues to be one of the most popular benefits and as a result teleworking options of all types are on the rise. with heavy work loads, long unpredictable hours and limited time for family and friends alternative schedules could be an attractive option for congressional staff. a growing number of employers have begun to offer student loan repayment benefits to their

employees. shrm's benefit survey shows student loan repayment was doubled since 2018. some congressional offices offer student loan repayment however there is room for improvement. shrm supports education assistance, an important tool for plo irs to attract the best employees and build a diverse workforce especially in a situation or work environment such as this where you have the best of all talent. in addition, retirement plans and healthcare coverage remain the corner stones of employers' provided benefits which i discussed further in my written testimony. while benefits offerings are critical, it is equally important that congress address inclusion and diversity when discussing a modern workforce. the 116th congress is the most racially and ethnically diverse in american history as the chairman has pointed out. capitol hill staff should

reflect a diverse workforce representing its constituents around the country. the employment process for capitol hill is vastly different than the private sector. congress should explore the implementation of a centralized talent management system, while also keeping an eye toward effective people manager development as an important part of a great culture. mr. chairman, and vice chair graves, thank you again for allowing me to share my experience and shrm's views on the importance of benefits as well as inclusion and diversity in the workplace. congress with lead by example by communicating the true value of benefits and inclusion and diversity. what happens in washington, d.c. will, in fact, impact other workplaces and we at shrm truly believe that creating better workplace policies leads to better workplaces and in turn a better world. i welcome your questions. >> thank you. thanks very much. ms. liswood, you are recognized for five minutes.

>> they only worked through that three times with me. >> that's all right. >> thank you, chairman kilmer. >> you may have forgotten because the sweat shop. >> that's it. thank you. >> it's clouding of my judgment. i forgot about inorganic chemistry. it's all challenging. >> so we're good. >> you can restart her clock, we are i was doing is thshtick her >> thank you very much for a will you go me to testify, my name is laura liswood. i think we know diversity and inclusion are keys to better decision-making, effective policy and innovation. we know also that home gentleman naty works only when problems with simple, communication is easy and the environment is not changing. you must have heterogeneity if the problems with complex, the communication is not easy and the environment is easy.

you must have let gentleman naty. it's about the number of people diverse on your staffs and tracking those numbers but it's not just about that. it's not about what i call the noah's arc response to diversity. which means if we can only get two of each in the arc we will have our diversity, but that's a problem. i will explain in a bit. so we do know the value of diversity and inclusion, creativity, innovation, different perspectives, experiences, backgrounds, talents, ideas, cognitive diversity. think about your congressional baseball team. you don't want all catchers on your team. diversity and inclusion also avoids the risk of homogeneous thinking, also known as group think. it avoids the overreliance on dominant group members' perspectives. it signals trust in institutions by representing a reflection of america and connecting to communities. yes, it is about race and

gender, but also about socio economics, disability, sexual orientation and identity, language, sports, religion, education, background, family status, military status, language, nationality and we could go on. diversity and inclusion are strategic tools to ensure better solutions but what are some of the challenges? i mentioned noah's arc. the problem with that is that if the giraffe in the arc is looking at the zebra and is looking at him and says, gosh, you are funny looking how do you do anything with that stupid short neck of yours, that's a problem, because we have unconscious beliefs and perspectives and preferences and associations and roles and arc types about who people are. we also have the challenge of i don't know firmation bias, which is whatever it is i believe i will sort the incoming information to confirm that which i already believe. so, for example, we know from research if you have a non-anglo name you will have to send out

50% more resumes to get a response than someone with an anglo name. we also know if you send the same resumé out with female and male names you will get the same result. we also have what i call the elephant and mouse theory about things which is if you are the elephant in the room what do you need to know about the mouse? not much. if you are the mouse in the room what do you need to know about the elephant? everything. so by and large dominant groups aren't necessarily as in tuned with nondominant groups. we also know that like gravitates to like and like avoids not like. some organizations that i have worked with don't necessarily have an intake problem, but they all have an upgrade problem. so you may be getting diverse people into the organization, into your staffs, but they may or may not be getting into the senior staff positions. we have -- we also know that

homogeneous groups don't come to better solutions, they just think they did. heterogenous groups come to better solutions they just don't think they did because diversity turns out to be a little more complex than home gentleman naty. and then there is the challenge of avoiding the illusion of inclusion, which is just because you have some programs around diversity and inclusion it doesn't necessarily mean your organization is fair. so some of the tools that i think are valuable, a central human resource and diversity effort which can help overcome unconscious bias, create consistency in recruiting and developing and training, creating an office of diversity and inclusion which i know has happened is a strong step. pay interns to avoid socioeconomic exclusion. get referrals from minority groups. provide a clear route to advancement. understand why people leave and why they stay. learn about other representative bodies efforts on differ iet through organizations like the

inter parliamentary union. think about i think you know the roon rooney rule or the mansfield rule which is law firms commit to go considering 30% women, lgbtq and minority lawyers for significant leader positions. obviously creating things like a resumé bank and having transparent widely available job postings is very important to attract different groups. and understand that certain words when you are attracting people don't necessarily work for others. so if you are looking for a highly competitive ninja super warrior you may get a few people but you may be excluding a few people also. make sure diverse voices are heard and understand and use tools to create a level playing field. understand what i call the power of the mirror, knowing what it is you can be by who it is you see. as a brief aside i do run a council of women's heads of state and government, 76 if you want to know the number. when i talked to the president of iceland she said after she had been in office for eight

years, going around the country and she noticed that for the children under eight they all thought only a woman could be president of iceland. and the boys had to ask if they could be president of iceland because they had never seen it. so obviously most importantly having a strong and committed leadership. this is the number one requirement on the path to a more diverse and inclusive workplace. thank you for letting me testify and i welcome your questions. >> thank you. dr. mitchell, you are now recognized for five minutes. >> thank you, chairman kilmer, vice-chairman graves and other members of the select committee. i'm honored to have the opportunity to share deloitte's experience today, again, my name is kwasi mitchell, i'm a personal with our government and public services practice and current i serve as our chief inclusion officer. at deloitte we've been leaders in diversity and inclusion since the early a. 90s. we think of diversity as a different skills, backgrounds,

attributes and perspectives we each bring to the table. for example, i'm one of nine siblings, raised by a single mother and a family of factory workers. i was the first member of my family to obtain a ph.d. in inorganic chemistry and -- >> you nailed it. >> -- and become a principal at a global professional services firm. ultimately these aspects are substantially more complex than the descriptor african-american male. our employees and your staff members are similar, with different roles, hobbies and affiliations that shape who they are and how they see the world. inclusion is leveraging all of those things which make each of us unique in a way that encourages us to be authentic and know that we are valued. in our experience based upon serving clients there are four distinct areas that might help you in your efforts that i'd like to share today. firstly, recruiting must be a top priority. we know that teams with diverse backgrounds and experiences are able to generate creative solutions for the most complex challenges we face as a nation.

you must extend that to the way that you recruit as well. what we do internally and one of our most successful efforts was alluded to earlier and that was our inclusion blitz. in that particular effort we had diverse candidates of nontraditional backgrounds that were screened by others with nontraditional backgrounds so that they could obtain a view of their full potential unencumbered by potential bias. secondly we have established a market leading approach to engaging our people which we call inclusion councils. these councils are local office groups that bring together people from different parts of the business with different backgrounds and experience. the result has been a vibrant dialogue that's enabled our colleagues and professionals to learn more from each other, be exposed to new experiences and ways of thinking and share practices on building inclusive cultures on a daily basis. this is important because this collaboration allows people in

areas that are less diverse to mingle with those that are more diverse, share best practices and create a common culture that benefits all. thirdly, mentorship and sponsorship are key aspects to our culture and are critical for retaining a diverse workforce. personally my first two weeks at the firm i interacted with a partner who became a mentor, told me that he thought that i would be successful within the firm and that he was going to do everything within his power to help me achieve what i could potentially achieve. i've tried to pay that forward and we've established a very robust mentorship and sponsorship program that just recently one of my initial sponsors was recently promoted to managing director, which i am incredibly proud of, but more so than anything else it proves that the tactics that we put in place and the path that we are on will lead us to be successful and continue to be able to do so in the future. lastly, we develop our people and coach our managers in a

culture of training focused on unconscious bias. really that is focused on designing programs, tips, tricks, guidance such that people can create inclusive teams in such a way that they are allowing our staff to operate in a way that they are unencumbered by potential biases that may limit their full potential. it's absolutely critical for all managers going forward today and has become an industry standard let alone a best practice. now, many of these trends and approaches that i have described are broadly applicable for improving diversity and inclusion across many organizations. i would like to discuss one thing that's particularly relevant to congress. i find more and more that strong inclusive cultures also include an element of purpose and dedication to the greater good. in fact, purpose-driven work is one of the top factors that today's workforce is seeking. few organizations have a strong of a purpose as congress and

it's an outstanding foundation for all of your efforts going forward. it is important to note that when it comes to diversity and inclusion there is no one size fits all model. much like each of your offices in the districts that you represent, every organization has unique characteristics that must be taken into account. how are venues like today where best practices are being shared are invaluable to advancing the goal of diversity and inclusion and i'm happy to help in any way possible. thank you, chairman, and vice-chairman, for providing this opportunity to share our experiences and i'm happy to address any questions. >> thanks very much. stuck the landing. right at five minutes. well done. we're going to roll into questions and i will start by recognizing myself for five minutes. i want to just ask you to put yourselves on this committee. we have to make recommendations to the broader body around whether we are talking about benefits or diversity and inclusion.

put yourselves in our shoes and give us some thoughts as to what you think we ought to be recommending to improve recruitment, retention and diversity of staff in the united states house. >> well, i will go ahead and start off and argue that the same thing i would argue with any employer and from shrm's perspective we approach this as recommendations we would make to any employer provided benefit strategy or any strategy involving workforce development or anything that has to do with retention of top talent. we would ask individuals to really survey what it is that congressional staffers want and what it is that they value. our recommendation in general is that it is a good starting point when you actually get a general consensus around what it is that your workforce is looking for, whether it be benefits, whether it be looking for new diversity, new inclusion programs, what have you. i think the other thing that we'd recommend is really to take a data-driven approach when

thinking about what it is that is the best solution given your philosophy around talent. if your philosophy around talent is to retain top talent and to attract that top talent, then you have to build the systems that support that. whether it be through recruitment strategy or whether it be through recruitment tools or whether it be through talent management systems as a whole. >> well, there is one way in. >> i would like to weigh in on that. from the standpoint of a very tactical aspect of diversity, i would say one of the key things that we have found is in particular who screens resumes and recognizes different experiences. personally it's been interesting just watching how so much is lost when we have people who are screening resumes that have different backgrounds than the person who is actually applying for a position. so from a very tactical standpoint having a more focused perspective on how resumes are

screened and shared across different opportunities is absolutely key. >> i would also add in addition to what was being said there is that when you do do interviews with potential staff members that the interviewers are diverse themselves, not -- to ensure that you're getting a wider range of questions. with respect to job descriptions, i would recommend that you perhaps get some people here who have companies that do this kind of algorithm work that can help you think about how you create job descriptions and so that they don't advantage some groups and disadvantage other groups. and then obviously to reaffirm what was said, making sure you have databases, making sure that you have metrics and accountability for all of your efforts. >> dr. alonso, you mentioned in your written testimony and spoke

briefly about employee benefits, you know, including things like not coming into the office, maybe working remotely or maternity and paternity leave. can you talk about some other things that might fit under the category of creative benefits that we ought to be thinking about that might maybe not be budget busters, but might positively impact the ability of people to feel valued and stick around. >> absolutely. i think the number one benefit that we see that is actually something that we consider to be an attracter or causes somebody to retain is professional development and the investment in professional development. when you're thinking about a highly skilled and highly talented workforce it's the opportunity to engage in a variety of different professional development opportunities, some that are more geared towards career rather than the actual benefits or rather than the actual business that one is in really has a real impact in terms of

making sure that you're retaining top talent. so when i think specifically about your question, what i really point to is professional development opportunities and some that are well outside the scope of what you might think, whether it be in data analytics, computer programming and coding, whether it be in a variety of other settings or other skill sets. >> i know i'm a little short on time to be able to ask another question, so why don't i move on to vice chair graves for five minutes for him to ask questions. as much as i want to ask dr. mitchell about compounds that don't include carbon hydrogen bonds. vice chair graves. >> google. >> yeah. >> i wanted to just sort of take a second and maybe expand on an idea that ms. liswood brought up. you referenced an hr department. you've recognized, i think all

three of you have, that we're 435 unique operating entities with unique budgets. when you are talking about staff retention, that also impacts those making hiring decisions. so you have maybe a person who is accustomed to hiring decisions and evaluating resumes in a certain way and creating a certain work environment within an office, may change as well and then you're going back through that process again. maybe you could just help us understand is that possible, to have one unique hr department that assists all 435 offices? is that possible in this institution or do we need to learn how to train or teach 435 unique entities how to do this? so, ms. liswood, you brought it up, maybe you want to start and if each of you could comment on that. i'm intrigued by that idea. >> i think certainly a

centralized entity can assist in these 435 businesses that you have. in other words, they can be the ones who help identify the best practices, they can bring experts in to help, they can perhaps do diversity audits for your office to help you see what it is that you may need to think about. they could potentially help you think about -- i mentioned what pools you're fishing from, you know, and to expand the number of pools. so i think you can get some consistency across the 435 and with the understanding that each office is going to have its own particular perspective on what it wants and what it needs, but to help ensure that you are not doing unconscious bias kinds of things, as we discussed. just to give you those tools to improve that which you're already trying to do. >> great. thank you. dr. mitchell? >> and i would encourage you when you think about that, especially since the rooney rule was brought up as well, you can

have an office that acts as a referee to provide guidance that is used individually across the entire body, or, you know, in going back to a chemistry reference, you can have a body that acts as a catalyst to fundamentally change how everything is done. i think that starting as a referee is a good initial step forward that can provide some consist ensy and move you along that particular path to see how much additional change is needed. that can be a lightweight solution that you put in place there. >> any thoughts, dr. alonso? >> well, i'm an organizational psychologist by training so my natural tendency is to say it depends. however, what i will say is in this case i think it is exactly as my colleagues have described, a possibility, as long as we consider that there is a need for really one thing and that's to set a foundation for flexibility so that each of the 435 offices can really deliver

the philosophy and the strategy as far as employment, recruitment, retention that they want to carry out or they'd like to execute. so when i think of this i think about setting a foundational set of rules or -- roles i should say that relate specifically to a centralized hr function, but that only enable or allow or unlock the ability to unleash potential. >> that's really helpful. i hope the committee thinks about this more because, you know, in a political environment all of us are -- we attain this position through an election and oftentimes when that happens the persons that lead your office there come from your campaign potentially and may not have much, if any, experience as it relates to establishing a new office that has a multi-million dollar budget and up to, you know, 20 employees or so. and then there is the challenge and if you have any thoughts on this it would be helpful is that you have your district office and staff and you have your d.c.

office staff, too, that are sometimes very different -- obviously very different roles, but they come from different hiring pools as well and could a single hr department, centralized here, be able to accomplish both of those tasks? have you given any thought to that yet? ms. liswood? >> as i listen to you i'm thinking, well, this he could certainly be a resource for you to help you identify what organizations might be useful for you in your district, for example, to find more diverse candidates or to post for jobs. so i can see that as certainly a value for something like this centralized group. yes, you have those kinds of disparities between d.c. and your particular -- on the other hand i would also encourage thinking about diversity as a much broader sense of what diversity is, because you are

looking for who is going to give me the different perspectives i need? whose world view is different than my world view? who is going to ask questions that perhaps wouldn't get asked otherwise? and so that's part of the mix of who you want in your -- in your organization. and i think a centralized group can help you get to that goal. >> thank you. i know the time has expired, but thanks for interjecting a really unique idea. thank you, mr. chair. >> thank you. mr. cleaver. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you for being here today. my son is an actor and the reason he's getting a lot of work now is the new rules governed by the actors guild, and the reason you see so much diversity in commercials is that they are not allowed now to

select people for roles that are not primarily based on personality. in other words, you don't need to get anybody to play michael jackson, michael jordan to sell the underwear. nobody is going to do that. but if you need a man and a woman, they are not allowed to say, okay, we want two white -- a white man and a white woman. they just have to get two people and that's what -- if they start doing otherwise they are violating contracts. and so if you ever notice, just watch the commercials that are coming out now. a few years ago it would never have happened. the other thing that i would like for you to -- because it connects, i've thought about an office of inclusion and diversity -- inclusion and retention under the house missees of house administration

and they collect resumes of individuals from all over the country and one thing you have to do -- methodist pastor, the civil rights laws allow for us to hire methodists. this he don't say you can't discriminate so you have to hire an atheist. you can hire a methodist if you are catholic, you are hire a catholic, what you can't do is say i want a black catholic or a latino episcopalian. so this office would have all of them and you could -- you know, obviously if you are a democrat you can say i want a democratic legislative director and this would be the central place where that could take place, race neutral, gender neutral, just you ask -- they send it out. here are ten people that are --

that fit what you have asked for and the only thing that i haven't worked through in my mind is most people would know a woman's name from a man's name. we can pass along -- everybody must be named george, but really i'm interested in you hearing it up, repairing it and suggesting something that you think might be helpful. any of you. >> i'm happy to start. i think that the notion that you pulled -- that you've spoken of a centralized office that would hold resumes and be able to extend the reach of the candidates beyond specific offices like core contacts and their immediate network is definitely something that would be -- seems reasonable. i have in my experience done both resumé reviews that are blind, you know, without particular names and also those

with names and more or less when you have standard recruiters who would be trained in things such as unconscious bias have not noticed substantial difference between the two. that's just one piece i would offer to you is that that might be a step but i think the training of the people who were interviewing and screening resumes and understanding the backgrounds may, in fact, be sufficient. >> i would add that in terms of resumé review and specifically in thinking about how you go about reviewing resumes, it is much more powerful not just to focus on unconscious bias training and frame of reference training, but also to focus on what it is that people managers and the people who are actually hiring managers make decisions around when reviewing resumes. so it's not enough to focus on the centralized screening of reviews, it's much more powerful to also focus on what those hiring managers are looking to review. in many cases that is much more powerful than the initial screen itself.

>> and i might also add that the blind resumé technique, there is something known as bunching theory which is if you bring a group of resumes together you are more likely to appoint a disparate group of people versus just one resumé at a time. so bunching theory i think goes to exactly what you were talking about. it's also a training issue to make sure that when you're screening you're screening for cultural fit because that's, you know, a term that can be used to exclude people. >> thank you. thank you, mr. chairman. >> mr. woodall. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i can't help but notice we're spending a lot of time talking about recruiting talented staff and retaining talented staff. there has been no discussion about recruiting talented congressmen and retaining talented congressman. i say that only a partially tongue in cheek. my question is give me a

parallel to what it is that we do up here in our 435 jobs. i could be completely without talent and get elected and i've got to go out and find a team. i've got to find a team not just that knows how to check the four corners of the box, i have to find a team that believes in me and that's going to create a whole bunch of bias for who believes in me. and then i've got to find folks who have a different level of trust and commitment in that. easy to find folks who believe in deloitte, hard to find somebody who believes in that new freshman congressman that wasn't supposed to win to begin with. 640 miles away in washington, d.c. what's the parallel? rather than asking you all to give me all the answers, who has got a similar situation to us in congress and they're already doing it well today? >> so i've actually given this some thought, congressman woodall, and the closest parallel that i can think of that comes from the private sector is actually the

healthcare industry and especially the industry involved with physicians and residents in general or residency programs in general. you have a unique situation that is quite similar in that you're talking about the top talent in their particular field, you are talking about individuals that have to pull together an office in many cases as far as private practice, whether it be within a healthcare system or outside of a healthcare system, and they have to engage in entrepreneurship and leadership with almost no training in it whatsoever. so when i think specifically about how they are going about that, much of what that individual is doing is looking specifically at how they build those types of training programs through a centralized system like the association for american medical colleges and their efforts to really focus on how they train and build better physicians but not just better physicians better leaders. >> okay. >> so that's where i would turn to first if i was thinking about it. >> okay. dr. mitchell? >> the only extension i would say to that, because i completely agree, is that you can look into instances that

have partnership structures, right, at its core. if you have institutions that have partnership structures where you have people who have made partner based upon a set of skills who must be leaders or business owners, it's analogous. >> now you've got my wondering if i go start looking at deloitte partners one by one i will, i will see a different group of young people who are attracted to beattracted to tha ambitious partner down the hall from you. tell me thinking about diversity, if i look down the row here i see a lot of ethnic diversity, i see gender diversity, i don't see a lot of age diversity, gray hair is not a common practice here, particularly in personal offices. in the industry are we ranking diversity? you talked about noah's arc, ms. liswood, we are just going to get two of everybody here. is there a -- if i'm trying to do better and i genuinely believe folks are trying to do

better, is there a hierarchy. we will do better with race first and then socio economics second and regions and age. is there a measuring stick for success? >> i'll jump in here, congressman woodall. there is no actual measuring stick or ranking if you will. i think what we've seen is there's a strong emphasis on compliance. and thinking about compliance there are certain characteristics that are regulated and require us to be compliant. i think what we see, though, is that as an industry especially in private sector what we're seeing is a great movement towards more than just visual diversity. in other words, where is the diversity that exists that isn't that easily readily available diversity. and so we're seeing a lot of that especially as it relates to new fetechnologies like artificl intelligence. >> diversity and inclusion signal many things including a desire to embrace america.

i worry we're going to create a kplee compliance culture. let me ask the final question, and that's burn out. folks give this job everything because they so believe in it. we talk about family medical leave. we talk about parental leave. we don't talk a lot about sabbatical leave. i can't spell that to my constituents back home but that is my problem. i want people who get at everything and then by definition they take care of themselves more. do i have an analogous burn out retention model i can look to? >> certainly some industries do much the same thing. let's say financial services industries or even the consulting firms. you're working 24/7, if you will. and some eergzs are developed these kinds of off-ramp, on-ramp

kind of approaches to it. for some organizations they have developed what they call return ship programs which are those mainly dreked towards women who have taken family leave issues. but it allows them to step off but stay connected with the organization, stay up and current with what's going on but step off for a bit and then come back to the organization. >> thank you all very much. >> appreciate it, mr. chair. thanks for being here. so let me talk about compensation because that's what a lot of people automatically assume. in this case it really is an issue. this is a crazy expensive town. people start out low 30s, medium bedroom apartment. not paying taxes, eating, doing anything else. when i first got elected when i

was campaigning i was fund-raising for another colleague for a young professional group that was there. a couple people i was talking to they explained to me how everyone here makes more than a member of congress because they all worked on the outside as a fund raising sort of group. and that's the reality. we have a lot of outside groups that hire people away at higher salaries, salaries here where even or most senior folks can't exceed our salaries by rule. on the outside those groups don't have that limit. this year we've got a 1% increase for our accounts. pretty hard to divide that up and make it work for people. i know there's a lot of factors. but just raw comp saegz, can we talk about that a little bit and get an idea your thoughts? >> certainly our position is really compensable factors need to be accounted for. when we look at the science what

really stands out is fair evaluation of compensable factors. so in my mind the natural recommendation i would make to any employer when trying to be competitive is to think specifically what are those compensable factors and how you counteract that. total compensation is broader. it includes benefits when you're thinking about this from an hr perspective it doesn't stop at just true compensation or pay or wages. what i would argue as critical is having a fair assessment of what is compensable in some way and how those factors play a role. and match that specifically to a skill set and roles and responsibilities one might have in their specific role. whether or not that actually happens and whether or not there's a true blue classification system that fits that. certainly that's something that a centralized hr function could take up. >> anyone else want to address the issue?

>> just speaking frankly and this is at the end of my comments as well just with respect to there's aspects of compensation that will always be there. and what i do and what we frequently do as an organization is talk about missions. and for example i have a number of practitions who work for me now will be leaving the firm to go work for campaigns. so it's less been compensation. there are people who have been willing to make the sacrifices because they believe in governance and believe in what you do. >> i think people when you look at the research yes compensation is absolutely criteria. i think you just can't avoid that. but in addition to that you could have the greatest amount of compensation, you could be paying people an extraordinary amount of money, but if they're not seeing personal growth, they're seeing themselves being excluded naturally, they don't

seech stretch assignments being given to them, if they're not being meantered or sponsored, you get my point. so people will leave even in the face of good compensation. it is about a mix. it is a challenge, i don't think anyone's going to deny you that as a point. but i think there are other ingredients that can be put to play. >> we also give people crazy long hours too. that's an added benefit of the job. i think most people who seem to have an entry path just because they get exposure many people i talked to that's how they started first. it's been unpaid until now. now we have a small amount, but it's a pittance really what we have right now. we're really doing it based on financial need. we're still underpaying them significantly. can you address that since that does seem to be the most common intake facility, how we can maybe address that part of compensation?

>> you're the expert in this area. >> again, i point to what it is we want to compensate and how we go about compensating and what is truly value. we talked a bit about intrinsic motivaters and what drives versus extrinsic motivaters. in my mind i look to that compensation and what that starting compensation might be and say how do we offset that if that's not something we're happy with and find ways to hit that motivational sweet spot. >> thank you. >> thank you all for being here. i have several different categories i'd like to cover very quickly. dr. lonzo you spoke about talent management system and our philosophy around a talent management system, could you please give us an idea of what

that might look like here, very briefly. >> when i think about talent management systems how do we develop our human resources based upon confidence based systems. how do we give them the skills they need today as well as the skills they need in the future? how do we develop a centralized system so there's learning, development and people management across the board. and specifically with people managers how is it we develop them so they are able to lead from day one? >> is that something you could see us doing in 435 different offices or would that require some centralized place, it sounds like? >> i could see a scenario where it could be centralized but i also see a scenario it could be done at 435 different businesses as long as you set one common core standard. >> thank you. dr. mitchell, we've heard, you

know, about the importance of benefits and recruiting and retraining staff. but i also know that we often focus on the student loan repayments and the student debt that is accumulating and, you know, challenges that many young people have in even going to college. can you talk about any programs you know where the benefit of tuition payment up front -- because i used to be a community college system -- and, you know, sometimes even getting companies to invest in their employees, sometimes we get them to try to do the tuition up front rather than the benefit after because the individuals can't get the funds to start with. any comments or programs you know with respect to tuition payment up front and then retention afterwards when you invest in that employee or student? whether or not that's anything you could envision here. >> there might be a slight deviation from that. what is common has been tuition

reimbursement as people are taking their courses in and of themselves. >> it does involve people taking out loans and they're able to pay those loans back. it's becoming more and more common wouldn't to consultancies and in fact becoming more common to advance those payments further. >> and have you found is it working? is it helping with, you know, excellent staff retention? >> particularly you're allowing your work force as we've talked about a few minutes ago develop new skills and see a path for them going forward and seeing the investment you're making in them. >> is it helping with recruiting? >> it's just not something that's common enough to have a real read on what the trend is. what i would say is there's definitely evidence from an went

dotal perspective and quality perspective it is helping retention. i do think there's also some value as far as it relates for the employer in terms of being able to lock in reasonable approaches to retaining their top down. >> i would like to ask very briefly about mentoring programs, that you may or may not know that here we have run through the womens congressional policy institute, and brought 21 girls this year. i participated in taking your daughters to work. and so cayly from indianapolis came and sat with me in hearings and throughout the day. and she asked spectacular questions and i think got excited. i said she of courseshields like to maybe be president of the united states one day. so this is kayley of

indianapolis. only 21 girls came. and because -- i don't know if they paid for her or her parents or mother paid for her or her father. you know, but how do we get more young people to contemplate life here when if they've not had the opportunity to come here? she was amazing. >> i'm sure she was and what you did was give her the possibility of thinking of other things of what she could potentially be which she might not have had that. mentoring programs are extraordinarily important. i think bringing them to scale as you describe is sometimes limited by resources. nevertheless you can encourage your local constituency groups to create more mentoring programs so that within your own congressional district you've got mentoring programs going on.

i do want to make one small point around this in organizes where they have discovered corporations that women are overmentored and undersponsored. >> would you like to quickly define that just for everyone briefly? i know my time is up. >> mentoring is providing the ideas, the interactions you've been doing. sponsoring is basically i'm going to sign the check that says you could take, that i'm going to back you in a position, i'm going to be the one who endorses you to take that other position. i say we have to put mary in there and i will guarantee mary is going to be successful. so it's a guarantee program, if you will. and it's very different because mentoring is more like than not like potentially and sponsoring is more like to like. >> thank you so much. i yield back.

>> thank you to our panel. for the past 15 years i've been active in the movement to increase diversity and inclusion in the legal profession with the philadelphia bar association with the large law firm i've been at. so i'm trying to see what concepts we might use there that could translate. one of the big ones is that leadership had to come -- leadership had to be fully onboard. that if it was just talk or just words they had to walk the walk. dr. mitchell can you speak to your experience in how that might translate here? >> i think that statement you made is unquestionably correct, right, and particularly when you think about millennials in the work force. they sense absence of leadership or empty words very, very quickly and then immediately decide to do other things. what we've done internally

particularly from the standpoint of making sure that leadership walks the walk and tie our personal performance metrics to different diversity and inclusion activities. focused on mentoring people who look different than or have different backgrounds than yourself and a variety of other things. such as performance and evaluation it becomes much, much more deliberate. >> so that leads to my next question which is how do you measure success? what kind of metrics might we employ here? i'm new but i've been hearing there's been a bit of resistance to a lot of measuring. so what kind of metrics might be look at? i liked the one you just mentioned, actually demonstrated mentoring with people who do not look like yourself or have different backgrounds. >> so i would actually like to

address this question in large part because i think one what dr. mitchell has cited is a valuable point. and the leadership has to be involved in the mission of inclusion and diversity. in fact, one of the things we have seen is the rise of diversity officers and inclusion officers and offices as a whole. and one of it things we like to highlight is ultimately its your executive leader and your executive leadership that actually drives diversity and inclusion. when thinking about what it is one should look for, it's that ceo, that president who's really going to be your chief inclusion officer. relegating it to one office isn't effective. to your question of metrics i look specifically not just at what kind of candidates you attract but i would also recommend looking at what kind of usage rates there are around

professional development. what is it that you're seeing that is use mg rate based upon various diversity characteristics that make it clear you have an inclusive environment and that people are using all the professional development available to them. >> if i could add, obviously top leadership is most important around this, and they have to actually behave. they can't just say they're for diversity and then you look at their direct reports and then you see something that doesn't look like that. they also need to ensure their team, that their staff also is diverse so going down the organizational hierarchy. i think it's also important for senior leaderships to ask the right questions. be kind of the if not, why not questions. okay, i didn't see any women honestly as an example, why not? come back to me when you have a more diverse slate.

i think it's important for the senior leadership and top leaders to keep on top of what is the research on diversity and inclusion and say does this apply to our organization? some research around performance evaluations done by 250 companies, 65% of senior womens performance evaluations had some negative comment about their communication style. sharp elbows, whatever. 2% of the mens communication styles were evacuated in that way. now, what i would say to the ceo about that information, i want to know what my company looks like with that kind of data. are we better than that? are we worse than that? so having a very curious ceo i think is extraordinarily important in this area. >> we've got an issue where we have multiple ceos, but i guess i would urge, yes, each office had some kind of leadership looking at that, which leads me

to another tactic that seemed to work pretty well that might be replicable which is we might have some competitive individuals here. so if we have recognition for people doing the right thing, does that help? >> we've certainly found appreciation and recognition as a whole are a valuable tool. and also to make it clear to our potential staff members where they would like to go and who they would like to work with, we've seen that could be very, very useful. >> thank you. i yield back. >> thanks. i'm going to invite any of the member of the committee who have more questions to dive in. i have got a few. so congress is a little bit unique than a lot of agencies of the federal government that use the gs scale right where you have -- have a specific job title with a certain job description. someone may be able to either

work their way up into jobs that have different expectations and then also from a ten year standpoint pay and benefits often improve over time. congress doesn't do that. i want to get your reaction to whether that's a good thing, bad thing? something we should be looking at, not looking at? >> it all depends on how you want to use or employ that particular type of system. i would argue and when i advice employers or when i speak to federal agencies specifically about this particular topic whether it be formally back in the late 2000s, early 2000s and should we compensate based on pay for performance or some factors like that, i think it all speaks to what is your intended goal or intended purpose. if you think it will in fact help a retention issue or support a retention issue or

help someone be a better manager of a congressional staff as they cycle in and out, certainly that is a reason to follow that. but an estimation one way or another as to where it fits all depends on what the intended purpose really is. >> anyone else want to weigh in on that? not really, okay. i want to get your impression on the idea of an hr department or at least an hr kind of lead point of contact within the congress. your thoughts on that and the types -- you know, it seems like the types of functions that should be done if such an office exists are things like maintaining a résume bag and sharing best practices on, you know, everything from diversity to retention with the 435 independent contractors who work here or even mr. hoyer when he

came on member day testified a round, you know, offering certifications or compliance certifications on everything from ada accessibility to, you know, gold star for being a veterans hiring office or what have you to, you know, being a central repository for collecting some of this information around how we're doing. i've been struck by it's hard to actually figure out how to make improvements when we don't have great information on bench marks. thoughts on any of what i just said? reactions? what am i missing? good, bad, ugly? >> we've been thinking about having a tool add onto members. you could add that into the mix. >> i wouldn't be a good

consultant if i wasn't supportival of the that also comes with tool kit. but i think more so than anything else what you're talking about is being able to do some of these things and scale and share best practices which i think is key. >> i think for many organizations let's pretend it was an organization that had 435 divisions to it, they would potentially look at each of the divisions and their success or their failure and say, okay, why is this particularly enltty doing so well. you know, what is it that we can learn from to bring the others, obviously you can look at why the ones aren't doing well and do some audits around that. but i think one of the benefits of having so many different business units is that you have this opportunity, yes, giving people a tool kit but who's implementing it and who's implementing it well, and that's what a central group could help you do. >> at the end of the day i think a central group would be someone

that could help unleash potential for the 435 offs. i don't think of them as someone who's going to regulate or mandate or anything like that. but i think of them as someone who will help track the trends, help you assess whatever you're doing and at the same time help you institute a culture you're seeking. help you have better people managers. have people managers who can have difficult conversations which is really the hardest part when dealing with employees and employee relations. i think it's really a resource to the 435 offices as we're describing. >> ms. brooks? >> dr. allonzo started out mentioning, you mentioned five generations in the workplace. could you quickly just for the record at this point in time what are those five generations very briefly? and what are the challenges we ought to be thinking about because we have multigenerations of members. i think it's less so in the work

force, quite frankly for the most part. and what is it that we either can or could be recommending as a body as to how we deal with that? >> so i do not pretend to be a generational researcher by any stretch. but i will speak to what we know from census bureau data as well as work dup through the national academy of sciences. there's about 1% of the work force that consistent of traditionalists, the then baby boomers who are now moving in somewhere between 6% and 7% of the work force. >> wait, it's how much? >> 6 to% 7%? >> that's all.

>> by ige generation i mean those that were born with an iphone in their hand. >> there's some of them here. >> i have a few at home. with that in mind, what we see is really there's an opportunity to customize the employment experience for those individuals of it's not about dealing with differences amongst the generations but rather how do you customize the experience so that you better foster communication depending upon the generational realities, if you will? i think the other piece we see hr professionals as a whole really focusing on is how do we tailor what it is we offer whether it be benefits, compensation, what have you, jobs, to really fit the skill sets that best suit our diverse work force. >> thank you. and i would assume there are plenty of -- anyone else want to comment or anymore you'd like to share about the jen rations

pie piece of hr? >> it's what the, you know, senior people really think about the more junior people or what the more junior people really think about the more senior people. and to your point what people of a certain age think about other people and vice versa. and that will prmiate into how you interview people, who the candidates are you potentially choose. it's based on the unconscious beliefs about who people are. you can have the different generations but if i think this particular generation is entitled or impatient or this generation doesn't know anything about technology, i'm going to embed those things in my own head. and then i'm going to distinguish how i think about people, so i think it's a little bit more of a psychological element to this. >> anything, dr. mitchell?

>> no. >> okay. i didn't realize we were up to five, so thank you for sharing. and i'm in that umer and that's why i'm slowing down in 18 months. i yield back. >> two quick questions. thinking about dr. allonzo's comment that folks gear themselves towards compliance, we all want to be successful. has anybody modeled the -- we're not going to check fbi boxes but we want you to get two out of three here, two out of three here. i'm thinking about married single, you're going to have different opinions on tax policies, military service, no military service, single parent, dual parent.

the list goes -- the list is infinite and i need all of those opinions. i don't think of the folks in my staff necessarily as the deliverers of those opinions. i'm going to call folks at the census bureau for information. but when it comes to compiling my staff is there a checklist that isn't necessarily a checklist but try to get 3 out of 10 that recognizes if we start listing diversity, that list goes on forever? i want to do a good job but i can't tell how to measure success. >> i have not seen a checklist or a yardstick that would get exactly what you're targeting because so much of it is dependent upon what the ultimate outcomes are what you're driving for. and in many respects i think pushing towards cognitive diversity is much more critical

rather than trying to check that i have a black, male on the staff team. you know, on your staff. so i do think there are nuances there depending upon your outcome. but i don't think in my experience that's seen an over abundance of compliance culture in the organizations i've worked with. >> what is neuro diversity? >> neuro diversity, correct me if i'm wrong is more are you an introvert or extrovert. are you a rational thinker, that kind of thing versus the cognitive diversity, what's peoples world view, what are they bringing to you so you don't miss out on a decision? >> what i'd add to that is diversity in what your skill sets are and experience.

for many years we've seen research around bio data as an example or bigraphicical data that sets apart different information, experiences individuals have had that helps enhance your diversity or your inclusion. that's not to say we're looking specifically individuals that are black from a specific region in the nation but someone who has experience as law enforcement or someone who's got experience having been a pilot or something like that. that leads to different experiences and also leads to a different diversity, if you will. thinking about retention we are of two minds here, are our staff exceptional and different or are our staff just like any federal employee. 1995 we passed the congressional accountability act to try to bring more rules to bear here. but in 2010 we kicked all the congressional employees out of the federal health care system and said, no, you have to go into a separate health care

system because you happen to work for congress. is there a consensus as it comes to retention whether mimicking what the rest of the federal government does and being -- what word did you use earlier about a rigorous not top down but you said as a consultant i have to support a centralized process. thank you. you know, opium has such a centralized process and i could certainly turn to them. my natural bias is to say, no, we're doing something especially here which is why we're article one and not article two. we're going to have a completely different set of rules here to achieve our ends. is it obvious whether replicating what the rest of the federal government does helps with retention rather than providing some exclusivity on capitol hill? >> i would not say there's consensus. i would argue it has to suit what your strategic objectives

are and what it is you're looking for as an organization and as the house. >> so right now the situation in terms of employee health care they're all required to be on the d.c. exchange including the staff in our district office which is if you're from washington state finding a provider covered is challenging. do you have a perspective whether that's a good or bad idea? >> i'd wade into this one a little bit. what i would argue keeping in mind my experience is predominantly sector, what i would argue is every employer before a collection of 435 employers or a broader organization, what i would argue is you really need to look at what it is best suits the needs so it starts with actually serving congressional staff to see how you build the best possible health package for

them. when thinking specifically about what we recommend to private sector employers, that's where we begin and we start to ask them to consider what are the best brokered benefits that exist for them, and what are the best solutions given their strategic spending in this area. for the sake of discussion, you know, giving options like, right, if you come work in a congressional office you have the option of being on a federal employee health plan every federal employee is on or the d.c. exchange because there may be some districts where they don't have enough providers that are covered under the georgia exchange or there may not be a georgia exchange. or an option of being on the state exchange. so that type of situation where you could give them that option, is that -- any reaction to that? does that seem unreasonable or

you're bonkers? >> i would never say that you're bonkers. >> thank you, dr. mitchell. >> but i will tell you that's beyond my area of expertise. and i definitely could connect with staff on that. >> i would say it's very important to know what people leave some of the research shows when people leave they say i'm going to go for a higher paid job. and one third left for a high paying job, one third left for a the same paying job or one third left for a lower paying job. unless you really do that and to create those that allow you to really understand the dynamics of what's going on i think you're spitballing to use your terms. >> if you all would think of our committee, if you find someone with this parallel, we put our

staff on the d.c. exchange because we were trying to figure out was best for us politically and made that calculation. and we could talk about how we could do better for our staff if that was our goal. so knowing it really is our goal and our heart even if we can't live it out politically. if you stumble across those ideas that would give us the most bank for the least amount of political buck, i would say you're bonkers because my constituents at home don't have health care chois. i'm going to say you know what, these congressional staffers they need all the d.c. exchange it's great staff management. it's lousy re-election politics. i don't want our staff to be disadvantaged as they are because of election politics. so if you stumble across those

things that get us the most bang for our staff with the least amount of constituent hire, and i would expect you'd have a view on that, i would value that submission at a later date. >> you've been very helpful to me. but we have perhaps the most unique situation in the country because, you know, the staff sellers are connected indispensably to ours. the american public paid us, and so until we can figure out a way to make the american public at a minimum say we're just okay or

tolerate -- tolerate. that's a good word. tolerate us, then there's always going to be that hesitation to raise the congressional salaries, which means that the staff members are stuck. the federal courts -- the federal judges in this country had their salaries attached to us. they filed suit. i warned everybody, some of my close friends they were going to win the suit primarily because judges are the judges. and they did. so they get 15 years back salary court ordered. and the salary set 25% higher than ours. and so maybe the staff members need to sue us. i think we have a weird situation but the reality is we've got to figure out a way

for congress to function. you can't fix this, but to gain the respect of the american public. and maybe we quit talking about each other. you know, maybe we quit saying nasty things. i don't know. that might be going too far. i just think that the bottom line in all of this, none of this is going to be helpful if the american public hates us. >> you can always end it with don't you agree and then it's a question, but very good. seeing no other questions i'd like to thank each of our witnesses for their testimony today. each will have five additional days to submit questions to the chair for their response. i ask our witnesses to please respond promptly as you are

able. and without objection all members will have five legislative days to submit to the chair and with that, this hearing is adjourned. thanks, everybody. feel free to go cool down.

on capitol hill this week the senate resumes debate on the nomination. a confirmation vote is expected tomorrow. also tomorrow house on the votes pass 9/11 victim compensation fund. in the house members will consider a bill later this week to help secure retirement savings for workers and retirees. also legislation to address border security and accountability at the homeland security department. watch the house live on c-span, the senate live on c-span 2. and you can see both on c-span.org or listen to congressional debate on c-span's free radio app. and tomorrow fbi director christopher wray is expected to testify before the senate judiciary committee about

oversight at the fbi. live coverage tomorrow at 10:00 eastern here on c-span 3. live online at c-span.org or listen live on the radio app. tonight on "the communicators" we'll discuss roles venture capitalists play in startup companies with scott cooper, author of the book "secrets of sand hill road." >> members come in and often they have just a powerpoint pren presentation and it's really an opportunity for the entrepreneur to tell us about their expansive vision. what could this thing look like at scale if it gets there and ultimately why is this team the right team to go after that? it's a very fun and frankly intellectual process in which we get to learn things and ultimately make a decision whether this is team we should

be back. >> tonight on the communicators on c-span 2. robert mueller testifies to congress on wednesday about possible obstruction of justice and abuse of power by president trump and russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. our live coverage starts at 8:30 a.m. eastern on c-span 3. online on c-span.org or listen wherever you are with the freem c-span radio app. and before the hearing listen to the complete mueller report on c-span.org on your laptop or device. the audio is courtesy of timberlatimbe timberlane media. administration officials testified recently about the president's agriculture trade policy. the u.s.-mexico-canada trade agreement, trade assistance payments and the impact of tafrs on farmers and