Friday 27 November 2015

Guest Blog 48

Staff Survey - 'Oh Dear!'

I was very bored, so I took a look through the data for the 2015 Civil Service People Survey. I really can't explain why, other than general nerd-ery, as I work for a CRC and so I wasn't even involved in the survey!

I made some notes as I went, so please feel free to use the below as a guest blog (anonymous, naturally), if you want. One important caveat: although I got an A in GCSE Maths when I was 16, I remember very little about statistics and make no claims about the accuracy of my judgements, which were formed by looking at the responses from NPS staff and then comparing them in a very broad sense with the answers from other departments.

 
The questions were grouped together into 15 themes - I missed off the last two ('discrimination, bullying and harassment' and 'subjective wellbeing') because I wasn't sure how to interpret the responses. My take on the remaining 13 was as follows:

My work: these questions were about the respondent’s level of interest in their work, but also whether they found it challenging. There were generally positive answers here, particularly to the question “I am interested in my work” – 94% responded strongly agree or agree, which is just about the highest score across all civil servants in all departments. However, only 38% agreed/strongly agreed with question B04 “I feel involved in the decisions that affect my work”, which was amongst the lowest across all departments.

Organisational objectives and purpose: these questions relate to an understanding of the organisation’s objectives and how well the respondent feels their work fits in with those objectives. There appeared to be high levels of positive responses to all three questions.

My manager: these questions relate to the manager’s ability to motivate staff but also recognition and positive feedback. Generally the answers were positive, in the 60-75% range, but concerningly only 34% agreed with the statement “Poor performance is dealt with effectively in my team”. However, looking at the scores across other departments this appears to be a Civil Service-wide problem – most of the responses were in the 20-40% range.

My team: three questions about how well the individual feels their team works. Pretty positive answers here, particularly about the reliability of people in the team to help when things get difficult.

Learning and development: a lower scoring section, with only 30-40% agreeing that they had access to the right L&D opportunities , and particularly poor for questions about career development. From my cursory look at the data for other departments, I’d say these scores were generally lower than for other civil servants. Across the Civil Service as a whole, about 40-60% gave positive answers to these questions.

Inclusion and fair treatment: Most people felt they were treated fairly at work, with 86% responding that they were treated with respect by the people they work with, although only 56% agreed that they felt valued for the work that they do.

Resources and workload: a mixed bag of responses to a mixed bag of questions. Respondents felt that they were clear what was expected of them and had the skills to do their job effectively, but only 50% agreed that they had the tools to do their job effectively (OASys/nDelius anyone?) and even fewer (48%) felt their workload was acceptable. Those scores were quite substantially below the Civil Service benchmark (the median score across all departments).

Pay and benefits: Ouch. 28% agreed that “I feel that my pay adequately reflects my performance”; 25% agreed that “I am satisfied with the total benefits package”; and 27% agreed that “Compared to people doing a similar job in other organisations I feel my pay is reasonable”. Having said that, the median score for these questions across the whole Civil Service were 31%, 33% and 25%, so this is not much different from the national picture. There are a lot of unhappy civil servants out there still stuck in the pay ice age – “we’re all in this together” still clearly doesn't cut it.

Leadership and managing change: Double ouch. The questions in this section look at how well senior managers are doing, and this should make uncomfortable reading for them. Only 27% agreed that “I feel that the NPS as a whole is managed well”; and only 19% felt that there was a clear vision for the future. Only 16% agreed that change is managed well, and – perhaps most damningly – only 9% agreed that “When changes are made in the NPS they are usually for the better”. Only 15% agreed “I have the opportunity to contribute my views before decisions are made that affect me”, and only 21% said “I think it is safe to challenge the way things are done”. These scores were all well below the overall Civil Service benchmark median. Pretty damning stuff.

Employee engagement: an interesting split in the answers here, with 50%+ agreeing that they felt proud to tell others they were part of the NPS and that they felt a personal attachment to the organisation; but only 31% agreeing that they would recommend it as a great place to work. Only 35-40% felt inspired or motivated by the organisation to do their best.

Taking action: 20% said they believed that senior managers would take action on the results from this survey, although 36% felt that managers where they worked would do so. Only 12% agreed with the statement “Where I work, I think effective action has been taken on the results of the last survey”. Did someone say something about the best predictor of future behaviour being past behaviour? Worrying.

Organisational culture: on the whole pretty positive answers here, with 89% agreeing “I am trusted to carry out my job effectively”, though only 58% said they would be “supported if I try a new idea, even if it may not work”.

Leadership statement: really interesting split in the answers here – the questions make a distinction between middle and senior management, and the responses for questions about the ability of senior managers to inspire and lead their staff were 30%+ more negative. This pattern is repeated across the Civil Service as a whole (although the responses from NPS staff were well below the median in general), suggesting that senior managers have a real image problem.

Civil Service Code: as a poor private sector drone the words Civil Service Code mean nothing to me – however it appears that only 66% of NPS staff agreed that they were aware of the Code, only 37% were aware of how to raise a concern under the it, and only 45% were confident that it would be investigated properly. These scores are well below the median level for the Civil Service as a whole – although as relatively new members, this may not be all that surprising.

Overall these responses look like trouble for senior managers. They have a staff group who generally enjoy their jobs and feel skilled and confident in what they do, but who don't feel like they have any say in the direction of travel of the organisation as a whole, or have any confidence that their concerns will be listened to. A comment on yesterday's blog put it more succinctly than I have: "staff survey was grim. To summarise: Do you love your job = YES. Do you have any respect for your leaders = NO. Oh dear"

17 comments:

  1. Because of what they did to us with TR and what they're planning to do with E3, it's safe to say none of us respect our leaders or their decisions. I've not yet met any NPS PO that feels part of the Civil Service, that's except for the weasely NPS directors.

    In my NPS office not a single person completed the survey because we know they don't listen to us, and that's despite managerial emails telling us to JFDI. If it wasn't for the apathy the stats would have been much worse!!!

    / Probation Officer

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    1. Exactly! It's the same I my office management don't give a damn about us or how their dictats impact on us waste of time filling in survey but chief tried everything to get us to do it !

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  2. O Dear indeed - Sodexo the multi national company have moved South Yorkshire CRC staff into their flag ship office at hawke street. Two days later they moved admin staff back out to the old office because the ICT was not fit for purpose. It's hard to believe that the company has been commissioned to manage the regions offenders. Chaos reigns - Oh Dear

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    1. Not to mention overlooking clients reportin there on first day causing chaos! It's all an absolute shambles but all is good according to managers ha ha

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    2. LDU's don't fair any better, but don't panic we will not be held accountable for the time being as it's not our fault!!! ummm...

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  3. It makes you wonder why staff bother with these surveys when only 12% believe the outcomes will lead to any changes. The majority of staff in the NPS in fact did not bother.

    The median response rate to the survey across the civil service was 75%. At 48% the NPS recorded one of the lowest response rates.

    Isn't there a bit of a disconnect between the 'organisational objectives and purposes' (its direction of travel?) and views about senior management? On the one hand staff are positive about the former but not about the senior managers who are strongly associated with organisational objectives.

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    1. My gut feeling about that disconnect is that when staff express positive views about organisational objectives and purposes, they're thinking about about the purpose and objectives of "probation". Other responses in the survey reveal that people still feel very strongly about the job and are dedicated to it, but see senior management as making changes which move away from the principles that staff hold dear.

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    2. Exactly. ONLY reason I am still here.

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  4. Senior Probation management will treat the staff survey with the same indifference they adopted when staff were shafted into the NPS and CRC regardless of work record etc.They have much to show the rest of the civil service in how to mismanage staff.

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  5. Corbyn is destroying the labour party. Get over a bloody staff survey and keep your eyes on the ball. Get this corbyn out of government otherwise the conservatives will rule for a long time

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    1. Corbyn is representing the values of the 59% of the Party membership that voted for him rather than that of the Parliamentary Labour Party. His position on Syria mirrors that on a dozen Western nations. The anti-Corbyn position is the establishment representing itself instead of its constituents.

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    2. Yes those blairites are disrespectful to the huge manadate Jeremy won by. It's those blairites that are destroying the party. If he gets ousted out thousands will leave and there will be trouble

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    3. http://new.spectator.co.uk/2015/11/jeremy-corbyn-is-more-sensible-about-syria-than-david-cameron/

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    4. when sickly survivors are staggering through the bombed out devastated ruins of the planet, will they look around and say - 'we should have listened to Jeremy' ?

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  6. Just simply take a look at the NOMS organisational chart . The distinct lack of diversity among the senior management cabal is only matched across the country by the paucity of leadership demonstrated by deputy directors. Have you been inspired locally in your division ?. Part of the failed story is poor translation and conviction that fails to connect sufficiently with staff, while career development, progression and advancement takes precedence as opportunities dwindle based more on networking, alliances and local preferences than sound technical, competence and leadership skills. The survey as it currently stands is a profane indulgence of many secret Herod's. The biblical Herod arrested John the Baptist but nevertheless took pleasure in listening to John in his prison cell.

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  7. There is an equal lack of diversity amongst the 6 regional Deputy Directors, who are all the same gender.

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    1. Don't forget fast track bully boy Jim

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