CS survey shows morale uplift
The 2012 Civil Service People Survey, published in aggregate last week, shows an overall improvement in staff engagement compared to 2011. The overall score was up by two points, from 56 to 58 per cent, and all the survey themes except ‘pay and benefits’ recorded improvements. Civil servants are happier with their work, which scored 73 per cent, up two per cent on last year. Both the ‘leadership and managing change’ and the ‘learning and development in the workplace’ themes showed small improvements, albeit from a low base.
Only 26 per cent of civil servants think their pay is reasonable – a fall of one point on 2011. Bob Kerslake, head of the civil service, told CSW that this was “unsurprising” given “quite tough decisions” from the government to manage the deficit. The government is “moving out of the pay freeze”, he added, “albeit with a fairly modest sum of one per cent.”
In the last year, the overall ‘leadership and change management’ score went up from 38 to 41 per cent. Although only 29 per cent of respondents agreed with the statement “I believe change is managed well [in my organisation]”, this represents a rise of two points.
Kerslake said leadership has to be strengthened at all levels – “but particularly team leader level”, where he wants to engage officials in the change process so that they feel they are “part of leading it rather than reacting to it” and in order to “increase their confidence” in managing change.
There were also concerns about performance management; Kerslake said a new performance management system will be rolled out next April.