Improvement of Productivity in the Public Sector

Peter F. Drucker, professor of Social Science and Management at Claremont University, California, in his book titled “Management Challenges for the 21st Century” has specified that “the productivity of the manual worker has created what we now call developed economies”. “Fifty years from now (the book was first published in the year 2001), if not much sooner, the leadership in the world economy will have moved to the countries and to the industries that have most systematically and most successfully raised knowledge worker productivity”. Although Drucker has focused on the productivity of workers, the productivity concept applies to the entire Human Resource of any organisation, covering the top-level management up to the bottom-level workers.

Productivity means the ratio of outputs in terms of inputs of any organisation. The measures of productivity must be in ratio terms, such as the ratio of benefits to cost, output, or time, which represents the general form of these measures. Efficiency is the most appropriate synonym for productivity. The improvement of productivity means improvement of efficiency in the process of the procurement of products or services by any organisation. In that context productivity of Human Resources is considered as utmost important.

Output in public service is an accomplishment of any service or product delivered to the general public for their satisfaction. The inputs are man-power and all other facilities required to deliver the targeted outputs.

Some of the important amendments needed to improve productivity in public service are given below;

A. Depoliticising of Public Service

B. Trimming down the bulky volume of Human Resources to the level of effective and manageable size

C. Effective application of the Human Resource Development (HRD) process

D. Enhanced application of motivational factors

E. Reformation of Organisational Structures

F. Reformation of the Performance Evaluation System

G. Introduce sustainable modern management techniques 

Immediately after the formation of a government political parties and politicians had been accustomed to reshuffle almost all heads of departments, secretaries to the Ministries, Chairmen and Board of Directors of Statutory bodies and appoint in place of shuffled staff, supporters of the political party or those who affiliated to the political party which holds governmental power. This practice seems to be a setting up of the foundation for the politicisation of public service.

It is a fact that all such appointees are under an obligation to act as proxies of the appointing authority, the head of the political party in power. Those newly appointed heads of ministries, departments and statutory bodies have been under obligations to trickle down from top to bottom in public service the political agenda of the ruling political party, along with the personal agendas of the politicians affiliated thereto. They have been inclined to give priority to those agendas in the exercise of their duties, irrespective of the national interest of the country. The commissions and the authorities appointed to maintain the independence of public service as above referred to, namely, the Public Service Commission (PSC), Judicial Service Commission (JSC), Police Commission even the Constitutional Council, seemed to be helpless to prevent the politicisation of public service in this manner.

Ample instances are there to corroborate the practice of undue political influence on appointments, promotions, transfers and even in the decision-making process in public service. We have experienced political tussles that have emerged in the Constitutional Council in the past in the event of appointing the IGP and some Judges in the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court, and a dispute emerged between the Police Chief and the Police Commission on some abrupt transfers of police officers.

It is absolutely necessary to develop some effective mechanisms to depoliticise public service in order to ensure its independence and to enhance its productivity. 

At present, there is a man-power strength in the Public Service and statutory bodies for approximately 1.15 million personnel. How did they determine this cadre provision? They had done so purely on a hypothetical basis. It is a fact that every successive government is in the habit of tapping the public sector and the statutory bodies attached to each Ministry to provide employment opportunities for the youths who rendered their support to the politicians attached to each Government at the Parliamentary and Presidential Elections. This practice has paved the way for the appointment of a substantial number of misfits to the public service based on political allegiance over and above the merits and escalation of redundant man-power, which has caused deterioration of productivity in that sector. It is absolutely necessary to prune down or correct the sizing of the cadre in the public sector and in the statutory bodies based on workload analysis in order to determine the actual manpower needed to implement the projected workload, effectively.

Improvement of productivity is not possible without appropriate training of manpower to rectify performance deficiencies in the Public Service. Application of Human Resource Development techniques focused on the development of skills, knowledge and attitudes required for the performance of jobs or work assigned to the personnel effectively is extremely important to eradicate performance deficiencies and to improve productivity. In fact, the application of the correct methodology of training employees would be a solid foundation for the development of productivity in any organisation, whether in the Public or Private sector.

Trade Union Laws and operational mechanisms of Trade Unions should be restructured with active collaboration of all stakeholders, namely employers, employees and the general public, in order to ensure peaceful co-existence or industrial peace in the public sector, which is considered necessary for long-lasting productivity. Remember up to what extent such trade union actions have contributed to hindering the productivity of man-power in the public sector of this country by mobilising street protests, political strikes and misleading employees to sabotage development projects launched by successive Governments in the past.

Finally, the application of modern management techniques in place of traditional management methodologies would essentially be an important step that should be taken for the improvement of productivity in public service. Digitalisation of public service would be a commendable step launched by President AKD to intensify the development of productivity in public service. Digitalisation of public service had been commenced some years ago along with the mobilisation of information technology in place of traditional office management system. However, digitalisation is not a panacea for the gross inefficiency that appears in most of the government departments and statutory bodies. Lifting this country from the present crisis to the level of a sustainable economy would depend to a large extent on the substantial and tangible level of improvement of productivity, both in the public and private sectors as well.

The writer is an HRM Consultant on the Fiscal Reform Programme of the ADB (covering Sri Lanka Customs, Excise Department and Inland Revenue Department, 2005), and holds an MBA from SJU.