CHAPTER 4

HUMAN RESOURCES MANAGEMENT AND DEVELOPMENT

4.1 INTRODUCTION

4.1.1 The Global Context

In recent years, as noted in Chapter 3, many countries in both the developed and developing worlds have embarked on a thorough re-evaluation of the role, structure and functions of the state and public sector organisations in general, and human resources management and development in particular. This has been in response to a number of factors, including:

• The growing impact of global markets and competition;
• The increasing trend towards economic liberalisation and political democratisation;
• The increasing international spread of communications and information technology;
• The trend towards "knowledge workers," multi-skilling and multi-tasking;
• The growing pressure for equal opportunities in employment.

In the process a number of common themes in relation to human resources management and development have begun to emerge. These include:

• An increasing emphasis on quality, performance, efficiency and cost-effectiveness;
• The devolution and decentralisation of managerial responsibility and accountability (including the introduction of performance-related contracts to give senior managers the necessary "incentives" to perform in line with central policy directives);
• The introduction of new and more participative organisational structures;
• The development of new and less rule-bound organisational cultures;
• The upgrading of existing management information systems;
• An increasing emphasis on equal opportunities and employment equity;
• The introduction of more flexible staffing and recruitment practices;
• The introduction of effective forms of career pathing;
• An increasing emphasis on performance management and human resources development and training, designed to promote participative management and innovation, to build capacity, and to reward individual and team performance.

Underlying these trends has been the growing awareness that "investing in people" is the most productive investment a country or organisation can make.

4.1.2 The Domestic Context

The urgent need to develop South Africa's human resources has been stressed in a variety of policy documents, including the RDP White Paper (1994), the White Paper on the Transformation of the Public Service (WPTPS, 1995), and the Department of Labour's Green Paper on a Skills Development Strategy for Economic and Employment Growth in South Africa (1997). Underpinning this urgency is the fact that South Africa currently ranks last out of 46 countries (at a similar stage of development) in terms of its human resources development performance (World Competitiveness Yearbook, 1996), a fact that is attributable in the main to the legacy of apartheid.

With respect to the public service, the WPTPS stresses that the effective mobilisation, development and utilisation of human resources is not only an important transformation goal in its own right, in building individual and institutional capacity for good governance. It will also be critical for success in a number of the other key priority areas identified in the White Paper (especially institution building and management; representivity and affirmative action; improvement in service delivery; improved productivity and cost-effectiveness; and labour relations), as well as for the success of the transformation process more generally.

Accordingly, a coherent and holistic strategic framework for human resource development will need to be developed at both national and provincial levels. This will entail a number of related elements, including:

The pivotal role assigned by the WPTPS to human resources management and development is designed to counteract the tendency for transformation strategies to focus on the more visible aspects of change (such as structures, organisations and systems), whilst neglecting the equally important though less visible aspects (relating for example to employee morale, motivation, fears, aspirations and values). Historically human resource issues in the South African public service have been regarded largely as administrative or technical matters rather than the strategic management concerns that can, if properly managed, make a major contribution to the achievement of the goals of reconstruction and development.

Since the publication of the WPTPS, a number of additional policy papers and documents have been produced by the Department of Public Service and Administration (DPSA) which have an important bearing on human resources management (HRM) and development (HRD) in the public service. These include:

• The White Paper on Transforming Service Delivery (1997);
• The White Paper on Public Service Training and Education (1997);
• The White Paper on a New Employment Policy for the Public Service (1997);
• The White paper on Human Resource Management in the Public Service;
• The Green Paper on a Conceptual Framework for Affirmative Action and the Management of Diversity in the Public Service (1997); and
• The Green Paper on A New Law for a New Public Service: Policy Proposals for a New Public Service Statute (1996).

In addition to developing these far-reaching policy documents, the Government has also taken steps to clarify the role of key implementing structures in the human resources field, and notably the DPSA, the Public Service Commission (PSC), and national departments and provincial administrations. Under the 1997 Public Service Laws Amendment Act, as noted in Chapter 3, departments and provinces will assume much greater responsibility for human resources matters than previously. The details of the devolution of managerial responsibility and accountability for human resources matters are spelled out more comprehensively in the DPSA's White Paper on Human Resources Management in the Public Service. This sets out a framework under which departments and provinces will to a large extent determine their own human resources policies and practices, and under which line-function managers will be expected to take on much more responsibility than hitherto for the human resources function. Human resources management will therefore no longer be the sole responsibility of personnel practitioners, but rather will become a core competency for all public service managers.

4.1.3 Purpose

The purpose of this chapter of the Commission's report is essentially three-fold:

• To locate the evaluation of current HRM and HRD policies and practices within a broader assessment of the public service transformation process more generally;
• To assess how effective government departments have been in translating into practice the guidelines and recommendation relating to HRM and HRD contained in the WPTPS and other subsequent policy documents;
• To recommend changes and improvements in current HRM and HRD policies and practices.

4.1.4 Process and Approach

The material in this chapter of the report was derived from a study of relevant policy documents and the reports of the Commission's hearings, as well as an in-depth empirical survey of:

• Four national departments, two with national competencies (Justice and Home Affairs) and two with national and provincial competencies (Welfare and Housing);
• Three provincial departments in the Western Cape (Social Services, Housing, and Local Government and Planning);
• Two provincial departments in Gauteng (Housing and Land Affairs, and Welfare and Population Development).

4.1.5 Structure of the Chapter

The subsequent sections of this chapter provide an overview, assessment and recommendations in relation to the following key areas:

• The transformation process more generally, particularly as it relates to HRM/HRD;
• Human Resources Planning;
• Human Resources Provisioning (HRP);
• Performance Management;
• Human Resources Development.

In assessing all the above areas, an overarching focus will be the extent to which the requirements of representivity, affirmative action and institutional culture change have been met.

4.2 AN OVERVIEW OF THE TRANSFORMATION PROCESS

4.2.1 Differing Interpretations of Transformation

As noted in Chapter 2 most departments and provincial administrations have produced their own transformation documents. These range from the Department of Justice's Justice Vision 2000 to the Department of Welfare's White Paper on Social Welfare and Gauteng Province's Growth and Development Framework. A study of these and other similar transformation documents reveal two important, related and somewhat worrying things. In the first place, it is clear that there is no shared common vision and understanding of transformation, based on the general vision laid down for the public service as a whole in the WPTPS. In the second place, many departments seem to have a very partial view of transformation, rather than the holistic approach recommended in the WPTPS.

For some of the senior managers interviewed, change is believed to be adequately reflected in a more representative workforce, with organisational culture issues being ignored or seen as unimportant. For others, it refers solely to changes in service delivery, with little emphasis being placed on internal change. This illustrates the tendency to ignore the extent and complexity of the transformation process as a whole and how its most important indicators are often in the intangible rather than the tangible changes that occur in the working environment. Some of the personnel interviewed, however, did seem to have a far more complex understanding of transformation, seeing it not as an event, but as process that will continue to unfold over time.

Within the national Department of Housing, it was stated that the current structures and processes of the department are appropriate and that people needed to enter through lower positions and work their way through the organisation. Through a traditional process of career development based on seniority, the department would be consolidated and a common vision would be built. Similarly, in the Department of Justice the view was expressed that the kinds of fast track development programmes for new affirmative action recruits recommended in the WPTPS can be damaging to the levels of standards traditionally maintained by the department, and are therefore not appropriate. As indicated in Chapter 2, the PRC noted that in those departments where such negative views were adopted, representivity almost invariably was lower.

4.2.2 Management of the Transformation Process

In general, most of the national departments visited have established directorates or units to manage transformation, in line with the recommendation in the WPTPS. The location of the units varied, however. Within Justice, a Chief Directorate: Transformation has been established under the Deputy DG for Human Resources while in Home Affairs the Directorate is called Special Programmes and answers directly to the Director General. In the Housing Department transformation functions such as equity and gender are located only at a Deputy Director level and are not seen as priority areas of activity. In the Department of Welfare and Population Development the special programmes officer for Affirmative Action is responsible for transformation and is also located at Deputy Director level, reporting to the Director: Management Services.

Within the provincial governments, the situation is slightly different, with departments responding to transformation programmes both as they are defined by their national departments and by Corporate Services. In Gauteng, the corporate core is seen as playing a significant role in terms of policy development, within particular emphasis on the HR functions of employment equity, human resource development and gender. The Director General’s office has also spearheaded the Service Excellence campaign, designed to encourage departments to substantially improve on service delivery. In the Western Cape, a Central Transformation Committee in which all departments are represented has been established and is working on developing a strategic approach to transformation in the province. Departmental transformation units have also been set up. The Department of Social Services has both Office Transformation Committees and District Transformation Committees that work together with the central unit.

Despite the progress made in setting up such transformation units, a number of concerns were raised during the survey. In the first place, there was a certain amount of confusion in some departments/administrations about the respective roles of the transformation units and senior management in the transformation process. In some cases this had led to vacuum which was slowing down the process.

In the second and related place, concern was expressed in a number of the departments surveyed (and in particular the Departments of Welfare and Justice) that the deliberations and recommendations of the transformation units were not being effectively fed into either the strategic and budgetary planning processes of the organisation or the core management processes and line activities. This left some of the units feeling marginalised. Senior management clearly need to take corrective action in this regard.

In the third place, there was little consensus within the departments on the question on the question of whether additional dedicated capacity is required to support key areas of the transformation process. Some felt that the hiring of temporary experts (for example specialist gender or equity officers) was an unnecessary expense; whilst others felt that such temporary appointments were vital to the successful implementation of the transformation process. An indication of the success of the work of such specialists may be that in the long term such posts are no longer appropriate but at the present time they are.

4.2.3 Building Capacity for Transformation

The levels of skills exhibited in the people dealing with transformation differed widely. In part this relates to whether members of staff have been appointed specifically to deal with equity, gender, and other transformation issues or whether these functions have been given to existing staff members in addition to their "normal" duties. Where staff have been specially appointed, they are usually skilled in policy development and programme management and are able to run with the process. Senior managers responsible for transformation in the Departments of Home Affairs and Justice would fall into this category. Where, however, such staff have only been trained in personnel administration, they are often ill-equipped to take on the challenges of the new tasks given them, and tend therefore to give such tasks less priority than the routine ones with which they are more familiar. The provincial departments visited tended to illustrate this trend, although plans are being made in some of them to train such staff in broader HR and transformation functions. An interesting issue relating to capacity, that was raised by some of the people interviewed, was that they do not always find the policy guidelines of the DPSA to be accessible or easily understandable. Often they are not sure about how to go about implementing the recommendations contained in the DPSA's policy documents.

4.2.4 Transforming the Human Resources Management Function

With regards to policies relating to gender, equity and disability, the departments showed very different approaches and successes. The regulatory framework informing these areas has been clearly defined and in general the departments reflected a commitment to developing and implementing policy to address the issues. In some cases policy had been developed through long consultative processes and has been endorsed by the senior managers. The Department of Justice's Employment Equity and Representivity document and the Department of Home Affairs' Affirmative Action document have been registered with the DPSA and are good examples of well thought out policy frameworks.

In other cases the importance of the policy process has been subverted by its location at a very junior level. The officers left to deal with the process have been given the unequivocal message that it is not seen as being a priority. The national Department of Housing provides a clear example of affirmative action policy being developed at a junior level and then not being seen for several months after it was submitted to senior management for approval.

The content reflected in the affirmative action and equity policy documents differs quite widely, with some departments remaining strongly internally focused while others have chosen to embrace a far wider contextual understanding of the issues. The extent to which policy has been effectively implemented also differs widely from department to department, reflecting to a large extent variations in the degree of support received by senior management, as well as differences in the general implementation capacity of different departments.

Labour relations, while not a function that is generally located with other transformation programmes, has become prioritised due to the introduction of labour legislation that affords greater rights to employees. The trend seems to be that labour relations officers are being used as mechanisms to address non-performance, rather than as enablers who can empower employees and create better relationships between them and their managers. In the Department of Justice, for example, the performance management process has been given to the Labour Relations directorate to handle, rather than to the Directorate dealing with Human Resource Development. In the national Department of Welfare, Labour Relations is a sub-directorate under Management Services and has no clearly defined role in respect of the transformation process at all. In contrast, however, the labour relations officer in the Department of Home Affairs explained that he saw a significant part of his role being that of a trainer, assisting staff of the department to understand the Labour Relations Act and their rights within it.

4.2.5 Representivity and Affirmative Action

4.2.5.1 The Constitution and the WPTPS

The 1996 Constitution lays the basis for affirmative action (AA) strategies to increase the representivity of the public sector institutions. Section 195 [1] stipulates that:

"Public administration must be broadly representative of the South African people, with employment and personnel management practices based on ability, objectivity, fairness and the need to redress the imbalances of the past to achieve broad representation."

The WPTPS provides a convincing rationale for AA strategies, based on the need to reverse the systematic exclusion of Black people and women from positions of influence within the public service that had characterised the apartheid system; as well as the systematic exclusion of people with disabilities from positions at all levels within the service.

"With the new dispensation in South Africa, this situation cannot be allowed to continue. To meet the new and challenging tasks with which it is faced, and in particular to improve the quality and equity of service delivery, it is absolutely imperative that the public service draws upon the skills and talents of all South Africans, and derives the benefits of the broader perspectives that a more representative service will bring." (WPTPS para. 10.1)

The skewed composition of the management echelon of the former RSA public service, with an overwhelming predominance of White males, is demonstrated in Table 4.1. This shows the profile of the management echelon (Director to DG) of the former RSA Public Service by population group and gender in 1994. Representivity of Black people at such levels was higher at this time, of course, in the "Bantustan" administrations, although women and people with disabilities were still seriously under-represented. Although the situation has improved since 1994 (as Table 4.2 shows), the current level of representivity still leaves much to be desired.

Table 4.1: Profile of the Management Echelon (Director to DG) of the former RSA Public Service by Population Group and Gender 1994 - In Percentages

Source: Office of the Public Service Commission

The WPTPS recognised that in South Africa, as in many other countries, the introduction of AA programmes will undoubtedly be confronted by a number of potential problems and dangers. These include the dangers of "tokenism," reverse discrimination, and the possible alienation of non-target groups within the public service, as well as the danger of prioritising affirmative action at the expense of other transformation goals, especially efficiency and effectiveness. For this reason the White Paper stressed that AA policies and programmes should:

• be devised and planned in a feasible, sensitive yet unapologetic way, as part of a broader approach to human resources development and capacity building;
• address the specific and different needs of Black people, women and people with disabilities;
• be seen not just as a hiring policy or numbers game but as an holistic approach that empowers people hitherto marginalised and enables them to succeed;
• be devised and introduced in ways which complement rather than conflict with other transformation goals and programmes;
• be explained and communicated effectively at all levels.

Although the WPTPS steered clear of fixed quotas for departments and provinces, it did lay down a number of broad targets with respect to increasing representivity. These were:

The WPTPS also set out a number of guidelines to inform departmental AA plans and programmes. These included:

• The carrying out of an audit of the composition of departmental personnel according to race, gender and disability, at different levels and across occupational classes;
• The establishment of clear goals, objectives and measurable targets and outcomes for the affirmative action process; strategies and time-frames for their achievement; and methods for the annual monitoring and evaluation of progress, including the production and use of accurate management information statistics;
• The identification of the people and units designated as responsible within departments and provinces for ensuring the effective implementation of affirmative action programmes;
• The introduction of training programmes to promote affirmative action; new recruitment and promotion procedures based on non-discriminatory criteria of competency and performance rather than on formal qualifications and traditionally valued forms of experience; and awareness raising and training strategies designed to promote a positive view of affirmative action and to discourage tokenism and the stereotyping of beneficiaries.

The guidelines established in the WPTPS have been given more substance, inter alia, by the DPSA's 1997 Green Paper on a Conceptual Framework for Affirmative Action and the Management of Diversity in the Public Service, as well as by the Department of Labour's 1996 Green Paper on Employment and Occupational Equity and the recent Employment Equity Bill.

4.2.5.2 Progress with Respect to Race and Gender

With respect to the racial and gender composition of the management echelon (Director to DG), the Commission's investigations revealed:

• That a number of departments (particularly Education, Health and Welfare) and provinces had made quite encouraging progress towards the targets laid down in the WPTPS, as well as towards the introduction of the kind of holistic and integrated strategies for AA recommended in the White Paper;
• That a number of departments and provinces had made much less progress in this regard (particularly the Departments of Home Affairs and Justice, and the South African Revenue Services, and especially the Department of Housing which remains, disturbingly, an exclusively male and predominantly white preserve at the management levels);
• That progress in the area of race has generally been more noticeable than in the area of gender (with the Departments Home Affairs, Housing, Justice and Safety and Security, and the Free State, KwaZulu-Natal and the Northern Province, performing well below average in the area of gender representivity).

Such variations in progress were supported by the evidence of the HR Task Team, as well as by the Statistical Analysis of Public Service Personnel commissioned by the PRC (and attached to this report as Annexure 2). Table 4.2 (below) provides the most recent profile of the management echelon in selected departments and all provinces by race and gender. As the Statistical Analysis in Annexure 2 demonstrates, progress towards representivity in the professional and technical ranks of the public service has been even slower than in the case of the management echelon.

Departments and provinces provided a range of familiar explanations for slow progress with respect to AA and representivity. These included the lack of appropriately skilled and qualified Black and female applicants for posts, financial constraints (in terms of establishing new positions), and fears about "lowering standards." A number also mentioned that they were constrained by Chapter B VII of the Public Service Staff Code (PSSC) which provided a very mechanistic and conservative approach to representivity, at variance with the holistic and developmental approach recommended in the WPTPS, and in particular the WPTPS's focus on the importance of social redress (with the passing of the Public Service Laws Amendment Act of 1997, Chapter B VII will no longer apply, and hopefully therefore will no longer provide departments with either an explanation or excuse for delaying AA plans and programmes).

Table 4.2: Profile of Management Echelon in the Public Service by Population Group and Gender 31.10.97 (Selected Departments and All Provinces) - In Percentages

M = Male F = Female B = Black W = White

Source: Statistical Analysis of Personnel in the Public Service in South Africa, PRC 1998 (see Annexure 2 for more details)

Whilst the Commission appreciates some of the difficulties, noted above, we nevertheless feel that they do not provide a justifiable excuse for the disturbingly slow rates of progress towards representivity in a number of departments (especially as other departments seem to have managed to overcome such constraints much more effectively). They certainly do not, in the Commission's opinion, justify the deliberate avoidance of the AA guidelines laid down in the WPTPS by departments such as Justice and Foreign Affairs, as noted, for example, in Chapter 2 (Section 2.5.1) above. Action is therefore urgently needed to encourage such departments to accelerate the rate of progress with respect to AA and representivity. Recommendations for such action are included at the end of this section.

4.2.5.3 Progress with Respect to Disability

Due to the lack of reliable disaggregated data, the Commission was unable to assess with any degree of accuracy the progress that has been made with regard to the representivity of people with disabilities. The lack of data is itself a source of major concern for the Commission. Without the collection and evaluation of reliable statistics, it will be difficult if not impossible to formulate, implement and monitor effective strategies to promote increasing representivity. The evidence that does exist, however, suggests that people with disabilities, who constitute about 7% of the South African population, continue to be seriously under-represented at all levels of the public service, and currently comprise less than 0.1% of personnel.

In the past people with disabilities in South Africa have been seriously disadvantaged, discriminated against, disempowered and marginalised in the economy & society in general, in the public service in particular, and in terms of both employment opportunities and service delivery. Service delivery has been inadequate and in many cases non-existent, especially for those disabled people in disadvantaged Black communities. The serious under-representation of people with disabilities within the public service also impacts negatively on service delivery, by depriving the service of their detailed skills, knowledge and experience in the policy formulation and implementation processes.

Since 1994 there have been signs of improvement. The Government has committed itself to a more proactive, integrated and developmental strategy, based on the vision of a society for all and the premise that people with disabilities are a natural and integral part of society and should therefore have the same opportunities as other citizens to contribute their experience, talents and capabilities to national development. Evidence of recent progress includes:

• The 1996 Constitution, which in Chapter 2, Section 9 guarantees the rights of people with disabilities to be treated equally and enjoy the same rights as all other citizens;
• The emphasis placed on redressing discrimination in employment and service delivery for people with disabilities in the RDP White Paper and the WPTPS;
• The establishment of the Office on the Status of Disabled Persons in the Office of the Deputy President;
• The production and publication by the Office of the President of the White Paper on an Integrated National Disability Strategy (November, 1997).

If the recommendations contained in the above policy documents are to be effectively implemented, particular with respect to the public service employment, a number of important challenges and constraints, which currently inhibit the recruitment and retention of disabled persons, will have to be overcome. These include:

• Discriminatory Legislation, such as the health requirements in the 1994 Public Service Act, which has served to restrict the access of people with disabilities permanent employment within the public service. Whilst the 1994 Act has now been replaced, other legislative constraints persist. These must be clearly identified and addressed.
• Lack of Human Resources Development Opportunities. When people with disabilities are employed in the public service, special programmes should be implemented to compensate for their past disadvantage. Instead disabled employees are frequently denied access to programmes of in-service skills development and capacity building, and career pathing, particularly because many departments are unable or unwilling to cover the extra costs involved (for example, hiring signers for deaf people, or providing Braille facilities for the blind).
• Lack of Environmental Accessibility. Most public buildings and offices contain barriers that restrict the accessibility of people with disabilities. These include the lack of ramps and accessible toilet facilities; narrow doorways; the lack of interpreter services for deaf people; and the lack of Braille facilities for the blind.
• Lack of Assistive Devices. The work environments of disabled employees frequently need adapting. Such adaptations range from the lowering or raising of desks to adapting a telephone or computer. Departmental budgets very rarely contain provision for such adaptations.
• Lack of Effective Transport Facilities. Many people with disabilities have difficulty getting to work because the public transport system caters inadequately for their needs. Approximately 99 per cent of disabled people do not own their own transport.
• Lack of Awareness and Commitment. Many of the above problems are compounded by a lack of awareness within and outside the public service of the situation and special needs of people with disabilities, and a similar lack of commitment by public service managers to redressing the situation.
• Finance. The Government has committed itself to ensuring adequate funding for the Integrated National Disability Strategy. However, it has also committed itself to reducing the costs (particularly the wage bill) of the public service. Providing an appropriate work environment for people with disabilities (including training and development) does not come cheap. Care must therefore be taken to ensure that cost cutting exercises are not undertaken at the expense of introducing effective programmes for disabled employees.

In Chapter 2 of this report the Commission recommends that the Office on the Status of Disabled Persons (OSDP) be located within the proposed Office of Public Management within the President's Office (together with the Office on the Status of Women). An important task of the OSDP would be to design a specific strategy for addressing the above constraints. A number of suggested recommendations in this regard are included at the end of this section.

4.2.6 Representivity, Transformation and HRD

While the statistics in Section 4.2.5 above are of critical importance, they tell only half the story. If new recruits are placed in an organisational environment in which they cannot succeed, due for example to entrenched and pervasive prejudice, then equity and representivity become meaningless. The organisational culture issues to which this then points are critical. At present, despite all of the change processes being undertaken in the departments analysed, very few efforts have so far been made to undertake holistic organisational culture interventions, beyond the occasional management of diversity programmes seen, for example, in the Departments of Home Affairs, Justice and Welfare. While change in culture may be a natural consequence of overall organisational change, there surely is value in prioritising its integration into other change processes.

This points to the need for a strong relationship between transformation and training and development, in line with the guidelines and recommendations in the WPTPS and the White Paper on Public Service Training and Education (WPPSTE, 1997). Fast track programmes for new managers should be readily available, in addition to comprehensive induction processes. Mentoring schemes and ongoing capacity building programmes should also be put in place. With the possible exception of the Department of Justice (where HRD plans are being integrated into the overall transformation process), the evidence suggests that these processes are not happening in most departments, and that there is in fact little or no link between the transformation process and training. New managers are often not given the introductory training that they require and are therefore immediately disadvantaged. Sensitivity training, such managing diversity programmes, are being used more often, but often with varying results, precisely because they are not developed in line with the specific needs of the transformation process and practice. In the Department of Home Affairs, the Deputy Director of Personnel Development has not been consulted on the transformation process at all, and still refers to the section in the Staff Code dealing with Personnel Development as being the "policy" upon which she bases her training programmes. Yet the department’s draft Transformation Policy refers in specific detail to the principles that should be governing the education, training and development processes in the department.

4.2.7 Monitoring the Transformation Process

Beyond the monitoring of statistics relating to representivity (which are themselves flawed, particularly in relation to the effective monitoring of disability), few systematic mechanisms have been put into place in most departments to monitor and evaluate the transformation process more generally. This refers to indicators relating to changes in service delivery as well as to changes in internal organisation and culture. Strong monitoring and evaluation mechanisms clearly need to be put in place as a matter of urgency to ensure that when successes with regards to transformation are claimed, that they have some empirical foundation in actual changes in practice, behaviour and performance.

4.2.8 Observations and Recommendations

• Where transformation policy is not yet in place in departments, support needs to be provided to managers to enable them to both develop policy and translate it into practice.
• The nature of this transformation policy should relate directly to both external and internal change processes. Internal organisational transformation must be seen as a critical mechanism to enabling improvements in service delivery.
• The role of transformation units or separate structures dealing with transformation issues needs to be assessed within the context of individual departments to ensure that they are the most effective vehicles to enable change to take place.
• Where transformation units or individuals managing the change process are being marginalised through their position within the departmental establishment, or through their reporting structures, this situation needs to be reconsidered as a matter of urgency.
• The role of senior management in the transformation process needs to be reviewed to ensure that senior managers act as change champions and are fully committed to driving the implementation process throughout the organisation.
• Skills and capacity to manage the change process must be built into departments, by identifying gaps in capacity and introducing specific programmes to address them.
• Transformation of human resource practices is critically important, and needs to be given appropriate priority and to be systematically integrated into broader departmental policy and strategic plans, as well as into the budget cycle.
• A holistic HRD strategy need to be developed, with clear development planning, career paths, training opportunities, staff retention policies and accelerated development mechanisms targeted at the most disadvantaged within the public service, as well as at those who are being recruited to redress the racial imbalances at the more senior levels.
• A systematic review needs to be carried out (under a broad human resources development framework) of current recruitment, promotion, training and development practices in the public service, with a view to determining how these may discriminate against Black people, women and people with disabilities. This should form the basis for the formulation of more effective AA strategies.
• Human resources development and capacity building should be appropriately resourced, backed by new legal provisions, and effectively monitored and evaluated.
• Existing legislation needs to be revised and new legislation introduced to promote affirmative action. Effective mechanisms will need to be put into place to ensure that such legislation is adhered to.
• Laws against sexual harassment in the workplace should be enacted and implemented.
• All public service departments and agencies should be required to draw up effective affirmative action and employment equity policies and strategies for people with disabilities, in consultation with relevant stakeholders.
• Strategies specifically targeting the disabled as a disadvantaged group would have to include specific recruitment and selection strategies at different entry levels; staff development and training; career pathing; the necessary modifications and adaptations required to provide an adequate working environment for the disabled; as well as plans for improving service delivery to people with disabilities outside the sphere of public service employment.
• AA plans and programmes should be accurately costed and appropriate budgetary provision made, within the context of the new approaches to budgeting and costing proposed in Chapter 5 of this report.
• The introduction of performance-related contracts for Heads of Departments (as recommended in the WPTPS and strongly endorsed by the Commission) should include specific AA targets (particularly in relation to gender and disability), thus giving HODs the necessary incentive to take a more proactive approach to affirmative action and representivity.
• Awareness training for senior managers, should be introduced to enable them to plan and implement effective strategies for women and the disabled in particular. This should be part of a broader awareness campaign both inside and outside the public service.
• Special programmes, such as valuing and managing diversity, should form part of public service affirmative action strategies to prevent the "old" bureaucratic ethos perpetuating itself as new candidates are recruited to the service. A change in ethos is critical to changing the public service into an effective, efficient and representative arm of government.
• AA strategies should also address issues of social class. A wider focus is called for to address the needs of the most deprived and subordinate sections of the public service to provide them with more effective skills development, career pathing opportunities, and the means for upward mobility.
• Monitoring and evaluation of the transformation process should take place on a regular basis to enable departments to assess the extent to which change is taking place. This should go beyond the monitoring of figures relating to representivity by examining qualitative changes in the environment, practices and processes of the departments.

4.3 HUMAN RESOURCES PLANNING

4.3.1 The Importance of Human Resources Planning

The WPTPS stresses the need for a planned and coordinated approach to human resources management, as an integral part of the broader process of strategic planning and management of public sector institutions. Amongst other things, the human resources planning process will need to include:

• An analysis of key external factors impacting upon the department and HR requirements;
• An analysis of the key internal factors impacting upon the department and HR requirements;
• An analysis of the key strategic priorities of the department, in line with its policy framework, public service commitment, and prevailing budgetary constraints;
• An analysis and the human resources required to implement these priorities on a short, medium and long term basis;
• An analysis of the current HR profile of the department and the current HR availability in the market;
• A projection of the likely HR availability in the future and the manner in which this will address future HR requirements of the department (this is particularly important with regards to the high turnover of staff, shortage of skills and competition between departments, and between the public and private sector to attract the best people);
• Development of training and staff development programmes with internal and external service providers to address the gap between required and existing human resources.

4.3.2 Differing Interpretations of Human Resources Planning

The survey revealed that human resource planning is understood and approached differently in most departments. For some departments, it is clear that human resource planning refers to the current public service approach of either matching people to existing posts on the staff establishment or alternatively motivating for a handful of individual posts, as and when the need arises. For other departments, especially those who have undertaken a general strategic planning approach in some detail, there is an understanding that HR planning refers to a more detailed process of understanding both current and future needs and linking these to current and future staff availability. Where the latter understanding does exist, however, little has been done to operationalise it in practice.

In the Department of Home Affairs, for example, there is an ‘informal’ acknowledgement of the impact changing policies are going to have on the human resources of the department, but little has been done to address it. In the national Department of Housing, there is little strategic or integrated approach to taking on the implications of the new Housing policy for the management and development of the organisation, its components and staff and its implementation partners.

The provincial departments reflect different trends. This is evidenced, for example, in the Gauteng Department of Housing and Land Affairs, whose new organogram is an attempt to achieve the post levels they feel are required and to create the basis for more lateral teamwork to enable a more creative and problem solving approach. There is also a recognition that more integrated processes and programmes are needed and that this will require the development of the HR component beyond its current focus on personnel administration.

4.3.3 Links Between Strategic Planning and HR Planning

The current relationships that exist between human resource planning and strategic planning in the departments reflect some interesting trends. The first general comment to make would be that systematic links between HR and strategic planning are inconsistent. The strategic planning process itself is in its infancy in most departments and in others does not exist at all. Where it does exist, human resource requirements are sometimes reflected, usually through the identification of "capacity gaps." This term is used widely without apparent common meaning. In some cases it seems to refer to a lack of posts and the related lack of finance to fund additional ones. In other cases it seems to refer to the lack of skills and competencies, which may in turn translate into the need to employ more skilled staff, to train existing staff, or a combination of both approaches.

The strategic planning processes themselves are of interest. In most cases they are strongly linked to the budgeting cycle. In the past the public service generally planned on an annual budget and did not make many projections beyond those related to the coming year. The introduction of the medium term expenditure framework (MTEF) has resulted in departments being forced to undertake three year planning. Set in the context of stringent budgetary constraints laid down in GEAR, and with its focus on cost drivers, the MTEF seems certain to result in departments beginning to shift their emphasis in planning towards a more efficiency driven and quantifiable outcomes-oriented strategic approach. Departmental budgets in the future will hopefully be driven by strategic priorities, rather than policy being forced to meet predetermined fiscal constraints. While the relationship between strategy and budget is obviously a dynamic one, the focus on providing a framework within which delivery can be facilitated is an important shift in emphasis.

With regards to HR planning, the MTEF provides a useful format within which future HR needs can be predicted and costed. The introduction of a longer three-year perspective should enable HRD, for example, to be seen as a real investment that will ultimately yield sizable benefits for the department. For this to happen, however, departments will need to develop a much more systematic approach to HR planning than is currently the case. In most departments surveyed, the current planning processes, where they exist, fell well short of the kinds of processes outlined in 4.3.1 above.

Because of the lack of systematic HR planning issues like right-sizing have not been dealt with appropriately. As the recent Provincial Review Report (DPSA, 1997) demonstrates, national and provincial departments have suffered as a result of the impact of Voluntary Severance Packages on their skills base. This loss is attributable in large part to the lack of understanding around projected future capacity requirements.

4.3.4 Building Capacity for HR Planning

The survey indicates that in most departments the skills required for effective human resources planning do not currently exist. This is true in particular of the skills to develop comprehensive human resource profiles for the departments. Training programmes need to be developed to enable senior managers to understand the HR planning process and to be able to engage in it at a sophisticated level. Improved information systems are also critical for the process of planning. PERSAL is simply a data capturing mechanism and not a management tool. For managers to be able to engage in strategic HR planning, better quality information will have to be available for them to access readily.

4.3.5 Observations and Recommendations

• Clear guidelines as to what human resource planning entails and the kinds of issues that the departments should be looking need to be developed by the Department of Public Service and Administration.
• Human resource planning has to be focused on immediately with managers trained to understand its importance and to integrate it into overall strategic planning processes of the departments.
• Human resource planning needs to be linked to both national and provincial priorities, within a strategic framework that prioritises on service delivery. It should therefore be integrated into all planning cycles within the department and dealt with at an appropriate senior level in the department.
• Clear methodologies and approaches to HR planning need to be developed, which link in with the strategic approaches referred to above. Analyses of factors impacting on human resource planning have to be systematic and in line with policy developments.
• Programmes for skills development should be undertaken in line with human resource planning requirements, as should career pathing and succession planning.
• Processes of right-sizing have to be adequately planned for with departments developing a clear sense of their skills and capacity requirements in the future and restructuring around these, in line with fiscal imperatives.

4.4 HUMAN RESOURCES PROVISIONING (HRP)

4.4.1 The Nature and Scope of HRP

Human resources provisioning refers to those activities that take place within an organisation to ensure that it has the right number of people with the right skills, knowledge, qualifications, experience and attitudes to carry out effectively the various tasks that are necessary to meet organisation’s overall aims and objectives.

HRP involves a number of related processes which include:

• Job planning analysis and evaluation (the identification of staffing needs)
• Recruitment (through advertising and promotion)
• Selection through shortlisting , interviews, and other forms of assessment
• Placement and Induction
• Probation
• Promotion and career pathing

Human Resource Provisioning (HRP) was often referred to in the past as manpower planning or manning. Because of recent and understandable concerns about the use of gender sensitive language, the use of this term is increasingly being phased out in many departments and replaced by HRP.

4.4.2 The Importance of HRP

HRP is vital to the public service (and indeed for other organisations) for five main reasons:

• The staff of the public service are its greatest asset. Without them other resources such as capital and equipment will remain idle and unproductive.
• Staff costs form the largest expenditure item in most organisations. In the South African Public Service, the wage bill currently accounts for close to 60% of total consumption expenditure (although significant reductions in staff numbers are being planned and executed). Under such circumstances it is again important that the right staff are appointed.
• Sound policy and practice at the HRP stage provides an effective and indispensable platform for other important aspects of an organisation’s human resources strategy, such as career pathing, staff development and training, organisational development, appraisal and incentive systems, and managing diverse staff groups.
• HRP is clearly central to the Government’s aim of increasing the representivity of the public service, particularly through Affirmative Action recruitment strategies.
• The WPTPS stresses the need for more flexible and decentralised forms of recruitment and selection, as an integral part of the process of building more effective and responsive institutions and management systems. HRP will have an important part to play in this process.

4.4.3 Trends with Respect to Policy

All HR related departments and directorates are conversant with the objectives of the WPTPS particularly in relation to such issues as Affirmative Action, representivity, institution building and management. Few departments however have developed HRP policies, plans and procedures tailored to the specific needs of each individual department whilst at the same time complying with the norms and standards laid down by the Ministry, the Public Service Commission and the Provincial Service Commissions in co-determination with the public sector unions.

The production of such departmental policies, plans and procedures for HRP will need to reflect, among other things;

• The priorities laid down by cabinet, and communicated to ministries and premiers;
• The need for a new service ethos and orientation, where service delivery is prized more than blind conformance to rules and regulations;
• The need for representivity and affirmative action;
• The need for a leaner more productive and cost effective public service;
• The need for HRP procedures and practices that are open and transparent and that are operated in a fair and impartial manner.
• The need for training and capacity building in the field of HRP for a wider range of managers and staff.

With respect to the national departments surveyed, Home Affairs and Housing had not yet developed new policies with respect to HRP. The departments of Housing at national and provincial levels have been deliberately cautious and state quite categorically that new policies on HRP cannot be developed until the work of the department is properly defined.

At the Provincial level, the Western Cape Provincial Administration has used the concept of building a professional ethic and ethos as a guiding principle for its human resource management, development, planning and provisioning. Its aim is to develop a proud corporate image which provides excellent service delivery to people in the Province. It is nevertheless still using the inflexible prescripts laid down in the Staff Code as the basis for its HRP policies.

4.4.4 Trends with Respect to Strategy

Responsibility for HRP is vested by the Public Service Act (1994) in the Heads of National Departments and Provincial Administrations, subject to the advice and in certain cases approval of the PSC and Provincial Service Commissions (a role than has now been transferred from the PSC to the DPSA). In practice, however, much of the day to day responsibility for HRP activities has been assumed in most departments by personnel sections or human resources sections rather than line managers. Line managers seem not to be too concerned about this because it affords them the opportunity to concentrate on the actual running rather than provisioning of their divisions or directorates.

HRP is still not seen as a strategic management issue. It is still regarded in all the departments surveyed at both national and provincial levels as a special preserve of personnel directorates or sections. None of the departments had developed a comprehensive strategic plan for HR as a whole. While staff in senior HR positions have good technical skills, and demonstrate a clear understanding of the procedures and regulations relating to personnel administration, they have rarely had the opportunity to discuss with senior management the strategic role of HR, its position in the department and the kind of role it should be playing in the future.

Similarly, with the exception of Education and Health (which have their own personnel components), HR in the provinces is still located in Corporate Services (now known as General Administration in the Western Cape). The Departments of Social Services and Housing in the Western Cape Provincial Administration still play a peripheral role in developing their own HR strategies. The Department of Housing in Gauteng expressed the view that departments are not strong enough at the moment nor do they have the capacity to manage their own HR processes.

Most departments did, however, recognise the need for recruitment and selection to be based on principles of representivity and affirmative action as outlined in the WPTPS. Home Affairs, for example, places strong emphasis on representivity. Social Services in the Western Cape, however, argued that it was hard to implement AA strategies whilst still adhering to the Personnel Administration Standard (PAS) requirements which essentially strangle the flexibility required for an effective HRP strategy to promote AA and representivity.

4.4.5 Trends with Respect to Structure

Whilst the responsibility for HRP is situated in the main in corporate services or specialised personnel components, some departments have nevertheless taken a number of imaginative steps to align HRP with broader transformation imperatives, which in turn have been shaped by new policies and laws such as the Green Paper on Employment Equity and the Draft White Paper on a New Employment Policy for the Public Service. They have also created new structures to drive the transformation processes. In the Department of Home Affairs, for example, personnel management is being overseen by the Directorate, Special Programmes and Transformation, which was created in January 1997. One of its main functions is to ensure that all advertisements are checked to ensure that they reflect the department’s commitment to representivity and make use of gender sensitive language. On the other hand, some departments (Housing for example)have not as yet created a dedicated department to address transformation issues, including HR.

In the Western Cape, the Chief Director of the Department of Corporate Services and Acting Head of General Administrative Services has employed a Special Programme Officer to assist departments in developing their own Affirmative Action plans, in line with the AA policy that was agreed with the unions at the end of August 1997. This officer is also involved in a consultative process to develop a coherent AA plan for the provincial administration as a whole.

4.4.6 Trends with Respect to Process

4.4.6.1 Job Planning

Job planning is a set of integrated processes and activities designed to assist organisations such as the public service in fulfilling their aims and objectives by enabling them to call upon the right kind of people; with the right types of skill, knowledge, qualifications and experience; of the right qualities and levels; in the right numbers; in the right jobs; in the right places at the right time and carrying out the right functions.

To do this effectively the organisation has to carry out a range of related processes. These include environmental scanning, the carrying out of a thorough audit of current skills and competencies, and projecting future personnel needs in line with national and departmental priorities and budgetary constraints.

The survey revealed that there was little systematic long-term job planning taking place in any of the departments or provincial administrations. According to one of the officials interviewed, this was because the combination of political vagaries, changing priorities, fiscal constraints and the strong influence of the external social, political and economic pressures made job planning a virtually impossible task to accomplish.

Most of the departments surveyed emphasised that the urgency of the initial rationalisation process (whereby the previously fragmented administrations of the RSA and the "Bantustans" were integrated into a unified service) meant that longer-term job planning had to take a back seat. This situation was further reinforced by the introduction in 1996 of the Government's "right-sizing" programme, including the now flawed voluntary severance scheme. Cutting rather than recruiting staff became the order of the day. And, as the DPSA acknowledges in its Provincial Report, many of these cuts were carried out in an arbitrary manner without real consideration for the effects on service delivery, rather than in accordance with the more cautious and systematic guidelines for right-sizing laid down in the WPTPS (see Chapter 3, Section 3.2.2.1 for more details). The Government has now acknowledged that the right-sizing exercise to date has been ad hoc, poorly coordinated and communicated, and ineffectively implemented. As noted in Chapter 3, a right-sizing team has been established within the DPSA to work out a more systematic and consultative approach.

Despite the problems experienced in job planning to date, some of the departments surveyed recognised its future importance. The Department of Housing, for example, expressed the view that a scientific investigation of the competencies required by departments had to be made. To this end the acting Director-General had submitted a proposal to the DPSA for EU funding This was for a multi-disciplinary team of consultants to develop a generic management model, to carry out an audit of existing competencies and capacities, and to identify the gap between this and the required competencies. The Department of Housing has, however, to look seriously at its levels of representivity and also the quality of its management echelon.

4.4.6.2 Recruitment

In national departments recruitment is normally carried out by the personnel services sections within the departments. In the provincial administrations the work is split between the line department concerned and corporate services (or the personnel component in the case of Education and Health). Line departments first notify corporate services or their personnel component of any vacancy. Once this is authorised, they then specify the duties involved in the post and request corporate or personnel services advertise the vacancy. Job descriptions are based on the PAS for the post, and little or no use is made of detailed person specifications. Corporate or personnel services will then draw up an advertisement for the post and have this checked by the department concerned.

In advertising, most departments and provincial administrations still rigidly adhere to the regulations laid down in the Staff Code, whereby entry level and promotion posts are first advertised internally (with external advertisement only taking place if there is no suitable internal candidate), whilst senior management posts are simultaneously advertised both internally and externally. In the case of the Western Cape, candidates from the region are given first preference. Some departments, however, have tried to operate more flexibly, especially when trying to attract a more representative field of candidates. Whilst some department use head hunting and recruitment agencies (Home Affairs and Housing, for example), others do not.

The processes used for recruitment seem to be very uneven. Very seldom is enough information given about the requirements of the job and the expectations to enable applicants to self-select. None of the departments surveyed provide information packs to applicants. Nor have any of them carried out research to monitor how effective the current advertisement strategies are in attracting applications from previously under-represented groups. There is therefore little consistency in the application of alternative approaches to recruitment. The PAS and Staff Code rules and regulations are applied to the letter by some departments and provinces ,while others have attempted to work more flexibly outside them.

4.4.6.3 Selection

Selection involves two key and related processes, shortlisting and interviewing. Both should ideally be governed by the following principles:

• All applicants should be treated in an objective, equitable and consistent fashion;
• Successful candidates should be chosen on merit in terms of their ability to meet the requirements of the selection criteria;
• Selection procedures should pay strict attention to the AA guidelines laid down in the WPTPS;
• The shortlisting and interviewing processes should be carried out in such a way that decisions can be objectively defended and justified if challenged.

The overall impression of the survey was that hardly any good practice guidelines exist to assist selection panel members with the shortlisting and interviewing processes. These activities were wrongly assumed to be fairly simple and straightforward, which anyone can attempt without too much difficulty and without the need for specialised training. Similarly no guidelines exist for the selection of panel members in any of the departments that were surveyed. In many cases panel members seem to be selected at the last minute without being given much information about the nature of the job.

Although interviewing is the most commonly used method of selection, there are other forms of selection testing and assessment that can be used, either as an alternative to the interview, or more usually as a complementary form of additional information and evidence. Hardly any of the departments use psychometric tests or assessment centres as these are increasingly seen to be culture specific and indirectly discriminatory.

Scoring systems are generally vague and unclear and it is not clear how decisions are reached. Similarly, guidelines on the use of referees are vague. Interviews are often based on the "sell-and-tell" approach, but seldom on a problem solving approach, which could assess the judgement and decision making capacities of applicants. Selection decisions often seem to be made on the basis of the interview alone and without a clear linkage to the requirements of the job. Once the selection process is complete recommendations are made by the line departments to the Head of the HR Directorate for approval and appointment. Candidates are then informed by a letter from the HR Directorate with a copy to the appropriate department head. This entire process can take anything between 3 to 6 months and in some cases good candidates have been lost because the process has taken so long (A detailed survey of blockages and delays that affect the whole recruitment and selection process is provided in the Recruitment and Selection Process Study, which was specially commissioned by the PRC and is attached to this report as Annexure 5).

Departments in both the national line departments and provincial administrations lack clear guidelines for the recruitment of AA candidates. AA appointments have been particularly rare in the Western Cape, with the PAS and fiscal constraints frequently being used to explain or justify this situation.

4.4.6.4 Placement and Induction

Induction is an important process which seek to integrate new members of staff into the organisation in such a way that they quickly become active, cooperative and productive members of the work force. The main aims of the induction process are to ensure that new staff feel welcome and valued; to provide them with the necessary information, advice, tools and equipment to carry out their work effectively in as short a time as possible; and to identify if they need any immediate forms of training or staff development to enhance their performance.

Most of the departments and provinces surveyed paid little attention to good induction and offered new staff members the barest minimum in terms of orientation. New staff are usually thrown in at the deep end and expected to learn on the job. The main exception was the Gauteng Department of Housing which has prepared an induction and orientation pack which includes information on benefits, the structure of the organisation, and other relevant pieces of information.

4.4.6.5 Probation

A probation period of one year is standard in the public service and is included in most permanent contracts of employment. The purpose of the probation period is to enable the organisation to monitor and evaluate the performance of staff and to take corrective action in the case of under-performance; to provide opportunities for staff who are under-performing to improve so that their work reaches satisfactory levels; and to enable the organisation to terminate their employment if they fail to reach acceptable work standards without recourse to complex and often time-consuming dismissal procedures. Quarterly probation reports are supposed to be completed in detail by supervisors and signed by the supervisor and employee.

In practice, probation does not seem to be taken very seriously in most of the line and provincial departments surveyed, in part because of the time constraints affecting busy supervisors and also in part because of the lack of training for supervisors. The result is that new staff who under-perform are very rarely weeded out at the probation stage.

4.4.6.6 Promotion and Career Pathing

Most of the departments in the study use the formal rules of the Public Service to reach out for promotion and a different career. The text book approach is preferred because of the nature of the work of the public service. It is considered to be specific, and staff need to work their way up the ranks to be really effective and gain the necessary knowledge and expertise.

4.4.7 Observations and Recommendations

• The importance of HRP should be more widely recognised and acknowledged within departments, and its current "Cinderella" status significantly enhanced.
• The systematic planning of HRP should be improved and linked to broader strategic policies and plans for HR, service delivery and representivity.
• HRP should not be regarded as purely a personnel issue; line managers should be integrally involved along with HR specialists.
• National policies that affect the staffing of the public service at a national or provincial level must be designed and communicated in ways that are clear, understandable and capable of effective implementation.
• Clear HRP policies and procedures should be developed by departments and communicated to staff at all levels.
• Recruitment and advertising policies should be designed to attract the best candidates possible from the widest pool, whilst at the same time enabling departments to promote a possible external image of themselves as progressive and caring employer. This will involve, inter alia:
  • Writing and placing advertisements in ways which encourage all eligible and potential candidates to apply (including a special encouragement to applicants from previously under-represented groups);
  • Providing more information to candidates about the nature of the job and the department;
  • Providing candidates with a detailed job description, as well as a person specification setting out the key skills, knowledge, experience and qualifications needed for the job.
• Departments should move away from requesting candidates to submit old Curriculum Vitae which frequently do not respond to the selection criteria required for the job;
• All actual and potential recruiters (including line managers where appropriate) should be trained how to recruit, interview and select candidates in a way that empowers rather than disempowers candidates.
• Clear guidelines on the shortlisting of candidates should be developed.
• A common scoring system understood by all panel members needs to be developed within departments.
• The same panel members should be involved from the start to the end of the recruitment process.
• Comprehensive induction processes should be developed and introduced for all new staff.
• Probation should be more actively managed to enable new incumbents to familiarise themselves quickly with their environment and their jobs.
• The retention of capable staff should be a priority in all departments.

4.5 PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT AND DEVELOPMENT

4.5.1 The Policy Context

The need to improve the quantity and quality of service provision in South Africa, whilst at the same time moving towards a leaner, right-sized and more cost-effective service, places a premium on productivity and performance. These issues have been discussed at some length in recent policy documents from the DPSA. The Green Paper on Policy Proposals for a New Public Service Statute (1996) calls for new and more effective forms of performance management. The White Paper on Public Service Training and Education (1997) and the White Paper on a New Employment Policy for the Public Service (1997) call for such systems of performance management to be dynamically linked to more effective systems of performance development. Acknowledging the importance of such a linked approach, this section of the report will nevertheless focus primarily on the management of performance. The next section will focus more specifically on issues to do with performance development.

The central themes of the new policy towards performance management, as outlined in the Green Paper on Policy Proposals for a New Public Service Statute (paras 2.6 and 2.7) are as follows:

• "Replacing the excessive centralism of the current system of public administration with an approach that permits maximum departmental autonomy and managerial responsibility within a coherent national public service."
• "Replacing a rule-bound culture of work with one that is goal-orientated and promotes efficiency, development and the effective delivery of services."
• "The creation of a systematic approach to accountability in which indicators are developed for measuring, monitoring and evaluating the quality of performance of institutions and employees."

These new decentralised systems and processes of performance management will be based on accountability for specific, measurable outputs within defined time frames, and will also will be incentive-linked, specifically to remuneration and promotion. This involves an important shift in the focus of management processes from how something is done to what is achieved. This shift, from a rules-based to an results-based system, will be based on a prior process in which predefined objectives are specified in a mutually agreed performance contract between supervisor and employee. This new system will be supplemented by a more general stress on the need for work to be mission-driven and on the importance of staff development and training processes.

4.5.2 Existing Systems of Performance Management and Appraisal

To date the main system in place for performance management and appraisal has been the system spelt out in the Public Service Staff Code (PSSC), involving the quarterly recording of critical incidents an annual appraisal. In the past this was tied to the system of merit awards for promotion purposes. At the higher (management) grades the critical incident reports are completed by the employees themselves.

Although a number of departments are still making use of this system, very few of the officials interviewed felt that it provided a reliable or effective means for assessing performance. Nor did it provide a useful basis for determining future staff development and training needs. Where the system is used today, it is therefore regarded more of an administrative chore than a useful management tool. Criticisms voiced about the PSSC system include the following: