Poll Results: My PS Renewal Priorities

From September 1 to November 5, 2008, I have administered a poll on my blog, based on a posting I made about what my PS Renewal priorities would be.

45 people took the poll. The results are shown below.


The results are pretty consistent with the ideas put forth in "An Inconvenient Renewal", the feedback I get whenever I make a presentation, and my discussions on PS Renewal with public servants:

• Not surprisingly, 42% of respondents have chosen "making performance management a top priority";
• It is followed closely by "making people management an overarching theme for the next five years", which was selected by 40% of the respondents.
• We have a tie between the next two priorities, which were chosen by 36% of the respondents: "putting in place a mechanism for employees to provide input and feedback on the issues that matter to them", and "focusing on the on-boarding experience of new employees during their first year in the public service".
• 14% have indicated that while the priorities above were good, some key one(s) were missing.
• Only 4% (2 out of 45 respondents) said that these priorities were totally missing the point.

Is your Department or Agency taking steps towards PS Renewal that are in line with the results of this poll? Please feel free to comment below!

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As you might have noticed, I am administering a new poll in which I hope to identify the top reasons for the low participation on PS Renewal-related websites (such as the ones listed here). These sites are characterized by a fairly high traffic, but the number of comments left by visitors or the use of interactive features (such as the possibility to attach documents, or recommend interesting links) is disproportionally low. Why is that?

Please take a moment to take the poll on the right hand side of this page and I will publish the result on this site.

Survey Result, Q8 &10: Ideas on How to Get Involved

For this post – the last presenting the results of my survey on PS Renewal – I will simply paste below the verbatim I received from the respondents .

Q8. How will you get involved in PS Renewal, or what are some of ways people like you could get involved in PS Renewal? (Note: wild ideas are welcome!)

Networking within my Department with our recently formed PS Renewal Committee chaired by our Regional Director General.

I will take ideas and implement them in my work as a manager. Also pass them along to my colleagues.

Advise managers & employees to challenge what they are being told to ensure policies, processes, etc. are based on the flexibility allowed for in the new legislation.

Relating to: 'Have the freedom to work on personal initiatives that would support PS Renewal.' - I'd love to see a Google-esque policy (the '20% of your time on your own projects') where eligible public servants could use a percentage of their time for self-directed projects on renewal.

I am Co-Chair of Youth Connect Nova Scotia, our regional youth network. Our committee has been involved in PS Renewal activities in the past and is an issue we continue to focus on.

I would like to get further involved by acting as an advocate/recruiter for the federal public service, promoting the benefits of the federal government to high school and university students all over the country."

I have been selected to the [departmental/regional] Public Service Renewal Committee.

Through National Council of Visible Minorities.

Am currently a member of the core team of the Future Leaders of Ontario (FLO), try to influence, sometimes challenge, policy and initiatives within my direction.

By doing my best to keep people motivated in programs such as the ileadership and the Management Trainee Program. Reading, MTP Conference 2008, applying the PS Renewal Principles.

Work with Bob Chartier to get his LeaderFest idea off the Ground. Bob has this great idea (actually he has many great ideas, but I am only referring to one here) of organizing a festival to focus on Leadership. The approach would not be your normal leadership conference, but would be akin to the rejuvenation for Blues and Jazz of the those festivals.

I really feel that attention needs to be paid to youth/new recruits - how we can make the PS more appealing to them, because as it stands (and I say this being a 20-something myself) it's pretty unappealing. Youth enter the service with great ideas and lots of energy, and I feel that that is sucked up when they realize all the bureaucracy and red tape that is involved in doing the simplest of tasks or exploring the most minor change. When other employers offer innovation, flexibility and creativity, my experience tells me that the PS stifles these qualities.

Identify a mentor and get into a management position. I know what I'd like to do and I want to take action.

I'm still reading. Need time for reading. How about thinking. Need more time for thinking. Actually, time is the big one. But, either way, I'm at year 3 of what I hope will be a 25-year career as a public servant, one that will see major changes in the ways Canadians and their governments make choices. I plan to be part of those changes, in whatever way I can.

Support 'infrastructure', 'planning', and 'development' in the broadest terms possible in day-to-day real ways.

Encourage recruitment by hiring based on potential - ensure they have the education, security, medical, do 2-3 proper references to ensure they are not liars or psychotic - then JUST HIRE THEM!!! Use the probationary period if they really can't do the job. Eliminate all the other nonsense - merit is that they can do the job, so stop wasting time and let them do a work-sample with all the tools, and be fair, transparent, but diligent in using the probationary period.

First I have to consult all the websites listed above to learn about the process.

Start by getting more info on PS Renewal
my expectations with PS Renewal are not so high

Find out more and (time/priorities/ opportunities permitting) see how I might be able to take a more active role in PS Renewal.

What we need is good infrastructure to facilitate renewal and maximization of potential of public servants. This means good career development and assignment programs on an interdepartmental level.

Involving learning and professional development in HR planning and as a way to attract new employees

Promoting Individual Learning Plans, Career Development, HR Planning, Business Planning and measuring our success in meeting the spirit of PS renewal.

I'd like to just begin integrating it in to regular discussion. It tends to get talked about at retreats, etc. and then put on the back burner for the rest of the year.

I will continue to be actively involved with the various Youth Networks/committees in my region !

Think nationally, act locally...Governexx and related intradepartmental committees...social networking sites...
Find out more, spread the word, connect with others when attending regional or national gatherings to discuss the details, subvert the system from within. Participate in a public service renewal summer camp/ retreat!

Setting up a national renewal network (a Champion's network)

Sharing ideas of what others are doing in their departments (via a gc.ca website)

I do it daily, both as a part of my job (HR Advisor) and as a public servant. I also serve on the NB Youth Network Board of Directors.

Do my job well, provide example for others.

I think it is critical that managers be given the tools to facilitate PS renewal. For example - education regarding employee development methods, budgets to support continuing education and training of their existing staff, training and tools to assist recruiting employees from outside the public service - beyond the PSR program.
Clearly these type of suggestions will need to be action and/or modeled by senior public servants more than myself.
But as for my sphere of influence - there could be a discussion forum for middle managers regarding staff development tools and experiences, lunch and learns for 'staffing managers' or a support network to share general HR tools and experiences.

My take is that you guys should explain to us how PS renewal (what does it means anyway?) can be important and useful for my fellow Canadian tax payers…
For me this is one more useless initiative in which too many public servants are wasting to much of their time. Tell me? Why should we (as Canadian) maintain the position you are in if in fact you are able to spend that much time such futile issue?
Let me renew PS for you and make it cost efficient: Let’s just abolish all positions that have been empty from more then a year (ok maybe two) and all position where the incumbent is busy else where working on some futile initiatives that have nothing to do with serving Canadians… Once that done we will have a nice and thin public administration, we will be able to staff back and create new position in priority sectors…
If you guys can make me a proud public servant, proud of the organization I work for, chances are that I will stay in the government. And you want to make me proud, help me make this

Volunteer to represent my department at recruitment fairs at university and colleges.


Q10. Please provide any additional thought or comment...

I have been a federal civil servant for over 35 years and am very pleased that I was chosen to provide input to this committee ... just the thought that after all these years I may still have something to contribute. I'm proud of the civil service and what we've done for Canada. I hope the Renewal Process will enable others to access and choose a rewarding career serving Canada.

Employees should get involved one way or the other (staffing, coaching, mentoring, etc.) in the PS Renewal but it takes time and we need some support from our organization.

We've heard about PS Renewal for years and the powers that be keep talking more than doing. I believe that the next generation will be ill-prepared to manage due to the limited opportunities we have been given to be mentored and gain management experience.

Keep the momentum

I am able to be proactive and to go find information I need if necessary. I don't want to receive too much emails on PS Renewal.

I am currently on assignment with CRA so I probably do not have access to many websites that I may have had if I were with my home org, PWGSC.

I think this is a great idea but keep in mind that anything that requires too much of a time commitment may not be conducive to peoples' hectic work schedules. If a formal network is set up with support from senior management across many departments this might lend more credibility to the process.

Just a note--Unfortunately I have not taken the time to read a lot of the information regarding PS renewal, including your blog. I am also new to the Public Service and I am not aware of all of the issues surrounding this subject yet. This is not due to lack of interest on my part, but perhaps workload and then just plain old forgetting to read up on it when I do have down time.

Overall I find there is a disconnect between what is being said in the Public Service and what happens. We state that we want to be a learning organization, but we provide neither the funds nor the 'risk tolerant' environment to support that development.
We maintain that we want new ideas and people in the Public Service but have created policies surrounding the area of selection for external advertised processes that discourage managers from recruiting outside of the Public Service.
We claim that under the new PSEA we have given new power and flexibility to the delegated manager, but we have undertaken a system of monitoring staffing which fundamentally undermines this flexibility.
Finally, we state that we want to ensure that our hires are the right-fit for the organization, without providing the formal training for managers or requiring formal designation for HR specialist. The result is that we do not have the knowledge or expertise that would allow for the creation of selection tools which… "

Survey Result, Q4-7: Getting Involved in PS Renewal

Today's post will be a quick one because the results to the questions I will present are self-explanatory.

Q4. How clear is it to you what PS Renewal is all about?


Good news here: close to two-thirds of the respondents say that it is either “clear” or “very clear” what PS Renewal is about, which reflects well on the communications effort around PS Renewal. I must however caution readers: the results may also be a reflection of the self-selection of the respondents. It can easily be assumed that those who saw the value in filling this survey did so in part because they already know what PS Renewal is about. I say this because if I asked the question to the 200 people in my organization (a very operational directorate based in a region), I would be pleasantly surprised if 20% could claim it is “clear” or “very clear”. In fact, next time I attend a staff meeting I will ask that question by show of hands.


Q5. How clear is it to you how you can get involved in PS Renewal?


I asked this questions because the Clerk has traveled all over the country telling public servants to “get involved, speak up, make suggestions, become part of renewal, be proud and make a difference”. Close to 40% of respondents have indicated that it was either “clear” or “very clear” how they can get involved. This is pretty good if you ask me. But it also means that there is close to 25% of respondents who are clear about PS Renewal, but don't know how to get involved. That represents a lot of people who need to be engaged right now. If we can't help them figure out where they fit and what they can, we are missing a great opportunity to turn the ship around. That 25% can be the difference between a public-service wide cultural shift and the status quo.


Q6. Are you interested in getting involved in PS Renewal?


Even with a group of self-selected respondents, I consider these results to be excellent given how early we are in the whole “renewal” process.

Only 15% are clearly not interested in getting involved (or at least not right now). 35% are interested but need to ask permission; to me this is an indication that these people just need a little encouragement, a small incentive, or just a straight-up question from their managers, such as: “Would you be interested in getting involved in PS Renewal?”.

1% said they asked for permission to get involved but it was denied, while 9% said they would have to do it partly on their personal time.

5% were given permission to do it entirely on their work time. 16% said PS Renewal was actually part of their responsibilities (a confirmation that the respondents self-selected to answer the survey!).

What astonishes me though is that 19% of respondents said they would get involved in PS Renewal on their work time without asking permission to their managers! Isn't that cool!?! I love that kind of “take charge” attitude! :-)


Q7. What would be most useful to you at this point in order to get involved in PS Renewal? (Select all that apply)


“Getting ideas of how to get involved” dominates the list. Next we have “interacting (in person or virtually) with other people like me who are interested in PS Renewal”, “receiving more information about PS Renewal” and “having my organization take a leadership role in PS Renewal and provide an opportunity to employees to get involved”, which all received similar number of responses. It is followed by “having the freedom to work on personal initiatives that would support PS Renewal”, and then “getting the support from my supervisor to get actively involved”. “Being told what to do next” comes last.

A couple of people have indicated “others”. Those ideas will be presented in tomorrow's post.