No money for performance based pay in CS

| 26/10/2012

pay_packet.jpg(CNS): No matter how well civil servants do in fulfilling their roles there will not be any bonus payments because government does not have the money. Although civil services heads have been working for some time to set the targets that will form the basis of performance pay in future as provided for in the public service management law (PSML), there is no sign of its implementation any time soon as there is no money in government coffers to boost any public servants’ pay packets. In a memo circulated by Acting Deputy Governor Dax Basdeo yesterday, civil servants were told that until the Cabinet approved the performance related pay system, there would be no bonuses.

The PSML provides for civil servants to be paid based on the things they achieve in their day to day roles based on specific targets. Depending on how well they do, public servants will, once the system is in place, be able to earn themselves extra cash. Those that do not perform will not lose money but would be closely monitored and they could be dismissed if their targets are consistently missed.

However, even though the law had called for this performance based pay system to come into effect in 2009, Cabinet has not yet issued the necessary order and so the system is not yet in place.

Nevertheless, the deputy governor has overseen a programme to develop a system in preparation for the eventual implementation of the performance pay structure and to foster a “more robust performance culture within the civil service”, Basdeo said in the memo.

Performance agreements have been drawn up and the acting deputy governor said that chief officers were working with staff to execute them. However, they will not impact salaries until such a time as Cabinet makes the order.

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  1. Anonymous says:

    More to the question.

    If we have bonuses in effect for superior performance then we need salary reductions for inferior performance

    How much non-performance do you need before you get fired?.

    For example:

    "A 54-year-old police officer has been charged with a number of traffic offences, including careless driving and leaving the scene of an accident, following a single vehicle smash in George Town last month. A police spokesperson said that while the officer has been suspended from driving police vehicles, he has not been suspended from the service"

    Should not this person be fired?  Does the public really want such a person working for it?

    There must be many civil servants who are not pulling their weight, and who are strong candidates for salary reduction or firing.

    How come that we never hear of this happening?

    • Anonymous says:

      Innocent until proven guilty. Unless of course you're a civil servant. Because we all know the private sector is perfect.

  2. Anonymous says:

    All government departments must produce accurate financial statements that when audited do not require a qualified opinion.This is so that the public know how much revenue government received and where it went. To the extent that hardly any department has achieved this objective,the question of whether government can afford bonus payments is irrelevant as none of our civil servants qualify for them.

  3. The lone haranguer rides again! says:

    Yeah the bonus is there all have nice safe jobs that are low stress and almost impossible to get fired from and a gold plated health and pension plans that Hardley anyone in the private sector could afford to pay their employees, they know what they got they are not going to leave that gravy train..

  4. Anonymous says:

    i think this has been taken off the table because…

    very few would qualify for bonuses

    and alot would be sacked for non-performance…..

    either way we lose……

    for anything to do with the civil service….please read miller shaw report first

  5. Old Sea Captain says:

    A good place to start with performance pay would be the 15 MLA's. In a couple of years we could use the savings from this exercise to payoff the national debt.

  6. Caymaniann says:

    The performance pay system is just another way of reducing the size of the Civil Service, so I am told. If a worker gets a 3-point score and above for his/her performance, that worker stays. But if he or she continually makes a 2 or 1, that worker has to go. I remember they were talking about cutting the size via 50 each year until 300 to 400 were eliminated. Manderson is smart, because although it is a way of weeding out those who are not performing, it becomes an incentive program to those who are working hard, that's IF it is passed in the LA. On another dimension, the morale of many Civil Servants have came to an all time low, the question remains, will this system be a fair one to those who are so rock bottom that it will take a considerable time for them to get on top and once again be able to work harmoniously with those who are competent and untouch by hard econonic times, and just "who" will do the evaluation of these servant's performance? I can see Manderson has a huge challenge. He has to be a leader yet at the same time be able to show to the servants the value of what true government service is against the backdrop of MLAs and Chief Officers representing the government their own way. 

    • Anonymous says:

      "…and just "who" will do the evaluation…"

       

      Good question. There is a very real danger that the "who" will be a bunch of sub-standard middle managers who will do their best to "game the system" in such a way as to protect their own phoney-baloney jobs.

       

      Mr. Manderson, you have your work cut out for you. I wish you good luck as I would like to see the system work to the benefit of the country; however, I am not hopeful.

  7. Anonymous says:

    The civil service cannot produce auditable financial statements. This is a well known fact. Given this ongoing failure, what makes you think that the civil service can produce honest, realistic, and fair personnel evaluations?

     

    I believe that performance pay raises will be grossly abused by those who are in their current positions by virtue of nepotism and cronyism.

     

    Let's put performance based pay on the back burner until the civil service starts producing reasonable quality financial statements on a timely basis for, say, three or four years running.

     

    Sorry to be so cynical; but…

  8. SSM345 says:

    Some of your bonuses just funded a pointless trip for x amount of people to go to a postal conference in the middle east, and we all know where the rest of it has gone.

     

  9. Anonymous says:

    Can’t we pay the ones that don’t perform less money? There are a lot that would qualify.