Best and worst Government departments to work for detailed in Public Service Census

Comments from staff at the five low-ranking departments have been released under the Official Information Act, but do not identify which organisation the comments came from.

Issues with management and leadership were a key issue for the five troubled departments, the Public Service Commission told the Herald.

Staff called for “less micromanagement”, pointed to a culture of “top down and do as I said” leadership, and claimed managers “rarely have the time to stop and check on the wellbeing of staff members”.

Others took issue with workplace culture, saying in some cases it has got so bad it’s caused a “continual exodus of staff”.

The Government’s cost savings initiative, which led to widespread lay-offs across the sector, was frequently cited as a cause of low morale.

“Last year’s restructuring gutted key areas of expertise. Key positions remain vacant and ongoing attritional vacancies are not being filled,” a public servant wrote. “The priorities have not changed; the deliverables have not changed, the size and aggregate capability of the workforce tasked with them has significantly reduced.”

Free and frank advice to ministers, a principal tenet of the public service, was seen by some as being compromised or “muddled” with the desire to remain onside with their political masters.

One person called for “freer and franker conversations with ministers instead of slavish devotion to not upsetting them”.

Another said departments needed to protect independent advice and that managers “must not muddle in ministerial advice in attempt of setting the ‘right tone’.”

Some government workers wanted more courses in te reo, tikanga and cultural competency, while others took a different view of the place of te ao Māori in the public service.

“We could dial back on matauranga Māori – it’s a proportional thing, like most of the public service we’ve overcooked it and are out of step with the public outside of Wellington. It’s also costly,” one wrote.

“When we’re learning karakia we’re not doing our day jobs or learning directly work-relevant skills,” they said.

“Less focus on Treaty and more focus on delivering for the taxpayer!” another said.

“Further extend key elements of a Māori-style interview beyond mihimihi and karakia ... Incorporate questions that assess the candidate’s understanding of the department’s Māori values, Treaty of Waitangi,” another called for.

Too much bureaucracy was bogging down productivity, many said.

“The number of process[es] that need approval from higher level has increased. Generally, the level of bureaucracy for internal processes has gone up a lot in the last year and staffing levels have gone down.

“Getting approval for funding can take weeks due to the number of people who need to sign off on it,” said one worker disgruntled with the lack of trust put in staff to make decisions.

Another person wanted processes to “make it easier to sack people, it’s so difficult to get rid of those just clipping the ticket”.

Just over 12% of public servants said they experienced bullying or harassment in the past year, including racial and sexual harassment.

This was slightly higher than the rate of bullying reported in comparable civil service workplaces internationally, with Australia and UK surveys reporting 11% and 8% respectively.

The most common sources of inappropriate behaviour were workers’ managers and colleagues. Some also experienced bullying or harassment from those they interact with in the course of their work, but that was a minority of cases.

Corrections has the worst result, with 19.8% of its staff reporting bullying and harassment, closely followed by Oranga Tamariki, which had 19.6%.

Runners-up were the Ministry of Māori Development Te Puni Kōkiri, Education Review Office, and the ministries for Ethnic Communities and Disabled People.

“The number of people who are distracted from being their best at work by poor management, inappropriate behaviour (including bullying, gaslighting, and sexual harassment), is consistently too high … The most hopeless aspect of it all is that the ones charged with setting the tone, or dealing with the problems, are often the worst offenders,” one staffer wrote in the survey.

“Public service needs to review how people who demonstrate bullying and poor leadership continue to get appointed into leadership positions. Leadership and basic management skills need to be strengthened and the routes into leadership positions need to be reviewed so that poor behaviours are not rewarded,” another said.

Corrections chief executive Jeremy Lightfoot said the department had started a “significant amount of work” to combat the troubling findings.

It included creating an action plan, a voluntary workshop, an awareness campaign and strengthening its complaints process.

The Education Review Office (ERO), which had the highest share of dissatisfied staffers, admitted the results were “disappointing”.

A spokesman for the office said the findings “reflect a period of significant organisational change for ERO which brought some areas of pressure to the forefront”.

It had taken steps to improve the underlying issues, he said.

Ministry for Ethnic Communities chief executive Mervin Singham said the survey showed the positives and negatives of the workplace, and both had been taken seriously.

He cautioned against reading into the findings around job satisfaction, saying it was important to be wary about drawing a “definitive link” from the responses to a single question in the survey.

“We are regarded as a high-performing organisation”, Singham said, noting that over half of its staff have been working at the ministry since its formation four years ago.

“We have also had no complaints or personal grievances in the past two years.”

Ministry of Transport acting chief executive Ruth Fairhall said senior leadership had established a working group to develop an action plan, plus a leadership action plan and an implementation group.

A Te Puni Kōkiri spokesperson said the job satisfaction score was a “culmination of many factors” and the ministry was “pleased with the percentage of kaimahi [staff] who reported they are enthusiastic about their work”, but was working to make positive progress.

Ministry for Women chief executive Kellie Coombes said the results provided “clear insights about what’s working and where we can improve”.

It was "focused on continuing to improve how we work together to deliver the best outcomes for women and girls".

Ethan Manera is a Wellington-based journalist covering Wellington issues, local politics and business in the capital. He can be emailed at ethan.manera@nzme.co.nz.