The 2023 APS employee census results are in, with a fresh focus this year on how the next generation of public service leaders are tracking and some worrying bullying indicators.
According to the survey, working within teams and across agencies was a sore point for SES personnel. How effectively leaders communicated was also criticised by census respondents.
So what are the bosses of the APS doing about it?
At the highest levels, the Australian Public Service Commission (APSC) said it was responding to the gaps through a ‘breakthrough conversations’ program via the APS Academy. The program is designed to assist EL 2 staff and SES bands 1 through 3 with “conversation skills in complex situations”.
The close public attention being given to APS leadership capability follows a decision made last October to standardise SES performance across the whole service. This work complements initiatives including the secretaries’ charter of leadership behaviours, updated APS values, a SES performance leadership framework released three months ago.
The commission has been collating the census since 2012 to gain insights into what public servants’ experience of work is like, and to better understand the culture and performance in government agencies and departments. Findings of the census are used to inform the APS State of the Service report.
“APS employee census data indicates that, in general, SES leaders are perceived to be performing more strongly in some areas than in others,” the report read.
“Over the last three years, lowest ratings have been in relation to perceptions of the SES as a group within agencies working as a team, and effectively communicating with each other and with other employees (between 51% and 54%).”
“Comparisons using the SES manager leadership index show variations in the way SES behaviours are perceived across agencies. These agency-level variations are shown in the agency benchmarking section of this report.”
For SES manager index scores, agencies with fewer than two personnel of this classification as of June 30, were not included in the results.
APS commissioner Dr Gordon de Brouwer used his foreword in the report last week to underscore the government’s “deepening” interest in public service leadership performance.
The commissioner said the behaviours and results of rising stars of the bureaucracy were of particular interest, and that this was consistent with Labor’s new APS reform agenda.
“According to the APS employee census over the last three years, areas of strength for our SES include contributing to the strategic direction for the agency and APS, and clearly articulating the direction and priorities for a work area,” de Brouwer said.
“Critical areas requiring improvement are for SES officers to work well as a team within and between agencies, and to communicate effectively with each other and with other employees.”
State of the Service reported that APS had grown last financial year to a headcount of 170,332 – a growth of 6.9% on the year before.
SES Band 1 roles comprised 1.4% of the total headcount, while SES bands 2 and 3 made up 0.5% of the APS.
The gender split between men and women in these roles was 54.7% women and 45.2% men for SES Band 1 roles, and 49.6% women to 50% men for SES band 2 and 3 positions.
The commissioner went on to explain in his message that, for the first time since the bureaucracy has undertaken the health check exercises of the employee census survey and State of the Service report, government employers were asked to publish action plans to accompany their census results.
This year, 10.4% of public servants reported harassment and bullying and work. The perception was similar in small organisations (100 to 250 employees) with 11.4% flagging harassment and bullying issues, and in extra-large entities (with more than 100,000 employees) 11%.
Of the extra-small, medium and large government entities (with 20-100 staff, 251-1,000 staff, and 1,001-10,000 staff) reported bullying and harassment at rates of 9.3%, 9.5% and 9.6% respectively.
Of the largest government organisations, staff from Home Affairs, Services Australia and Defence reported harassment and bullying at rates of 13%, 11.9% and 10.8% respectively.
Other departments scored perceptions of bullying and harassment in a range from 12.8% at Veterans’ Affairs to 7.4% at Prime Minister and Cabinet (PM&C).
The worst five scores indicating alarming rates of bullying and harassment were at:
- Aboriginal Hostels Limited (23.2%)
- National Mental Health Commission (22.2%)
- Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (21.7%)
- National Emergency Management Agency (18.5%) and
- Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (15.8%).
“Workplace harassment entails offensive, belittling or threatening behaviour directed at an individual or group. The behaviour is unwelcome, unsolicited, usually unreciprocated and usually, but not always, repeated. Reasonable management action carried out in a reasonable way is not workplace harassment,” the report read.
“A worker is bullied at work if, while at work, an individual or group of individuals repeatedly behaves unreasonably towards the worker, or group of workers of which the worker is a member, and that behaviour creates a risk to health and safety. To avoid doubt, this does not apply to reasonable management action carried out in a reasonable way.”
The 2023 bullying and harassment scores fared worse than last year (9.7%) but were still marginally better than in 2021 (11.7%).
De Brouwer was appointed APS commissioner, replacing Peter Woolcott, in May this year. This is the first State of the Service report published on his watch.
The former secretary for APS reform, IPAA national president and senior mandarin said his five-year focus during his tenure as commissioner was fixed on integrity, capability and building public trust.
“The COVID-19 pandemic, and other recent challenges, have shown us that we are at our best when we support each other,” de Brouwer said.
“For those of you currently serving in the APS, please take the future of the APS personally and consider the impact you want to have, as well as how you can help others to achieve what they are trying to do.”
For the State of the Services’ SES performance category, large and extra-small agencies ranked highest with a manager index score of 72. This was followed by medium (70), small (67), and extra-large (66) entities.
The top five performing agencies according to the SES manager index were:
- Organ and Tissue Authority (89),
- Commonwealth Grants Commission (84),
- Office of the Special Investigator (81),
- National Capital Authority (80), and
- Safe Work Australia and Office of Parliamentary Counsel tied (78).
De Brouwer said the way the APS had shown up during the COVID-19 pandemic was an example of how the public service was at its best “when we support each other”.
To deliver a “world-leading service” for the government, parliament and Australian people, the commissioner appealed to the mission-driven purpose of current public servants.
“Please take the future of the APS personally and consider the impact you want to have, as well as how you can help others to achieve what they are trying to do,” he added.
RELATED EVENTS:
Join APS commissioner Dr Gordon de Brouwer and more to discuss integrity and the issues facing the APS. Learn more about the Mandarin’s ‘Rebuilding trust and integrity in the Australian Public Service’ conference here.
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