The 2010 Best Places to Work in the Federal Government® rankings offer the most comprehensive assessment of how federal employees perceive their jobs and agencies, providing unvarnished insights into issues ranging from leadership and pay to teamwork and work-life balance.

The Partnership for Public Service and American University’s Institute for the Study of Public Policy Implementation use data from the Office of Personnel Management’s Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey to rank agencies and their subcomponents. Agencies and subcomponents are ranked according to a Best Places to Work® index score, which measures overall employee satisfaction, an important part of employee engagement and, ultimately, a driver of organizational performance. The Best Places to Work score is calculated both for the organization as a whole and also for specific demographic groups.

In addition to this employee satisfaction rating, agencies and subcomponents are scored in 10 workplace categories such as effective leadership, employee skills/mission match, pay and work/life balance.