One federal agency's advice to workers who received Elon Musk's email on productivity: treat it like an opportunity to highlight your accomplishments.
Legitimate Assignment, Not Spam
After the Office of Personnel Management sent an email to all federal employees over the weekend requesting five bullet points on what they accomplished at work over the past week, the Social Security Administration told all agency employees that the email is a legitimate assignment and should not be reported as spam.
Action Required by Deadline
"You must take the action requested by the deadline," SSA's human resources department told employees in an email, reviewed by Business Insider.
Identify Impactful Work Accomplishments
It added: "Review your work over the last week and identify the most impactful mission-critical work accomplishments that advance our public service mission, as well as the Administration's priorities. This is an opportunity to highlight the important work you do that helps impact the lives of those we serve."
Management Instructions
An SSA employee who received the email told BI that management told workers to respond to the email as advised, and that the agency's management will have a meeting this afternoon to get more information on the next steps.
Response from Other Agencies
Some other federal agencies, including the Department of Defense, have instructed their employees not to respond to OPM's email.
The email sparked mass confusion across federal agencies, leaving many workers frustrated to have received the email on a Saturday with minimal guidance on how to respond. One federal worker told BI that the email was "pure harassment;" another worker said that they did not plan to respond to the email.
Musk also posted on X that failure to respond to the email would be treated as a resignation. The email sent to workers did not include that claim, and Musk later posted on X on Monday morning that it "was basically a check to see if the employee had a pulse and was capable of replying to an email. This mess will get sorted out this week."
Deadline Extension and Guidance
The OPM gave employees until Monday at 11:59 p.m. EST as the deadline to respond to the email. The National Treasury Employees Union told its members that those who have not received guidance from their agency should wait to respond; those who have received guidance should follow it, whether that means responding or not responding to the email.
"This situation remains very fluid, and we are actively seeking out clearer information to pass along," the union said. "It is incredibly unfortunate that you were required to complete this wholly unnecessary request."
Are you a federal worker? Got a tip? Contact this reporter securely on Signal at the username asheffey.97 or email her at asheffey@businessinsider.com.
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By: asheffey@businessinsider.com (Ayelet Sheffey)
Title: How Federal Workers Should Respond to Elon Musk’s Productivity Email
Sourced From: www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-productivity-email-social-security-administration-federal-workers-accomplishments-2025-2
Published Date: Mon, 24 Feb 2025 15:43:04 +0000
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