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Output 2 score and performance description: A Outputs met expectation
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Progress against expected results:
Fourth year targets were:
- service delivery reviews completed for 6 departments in response to the 18th amendments and £2.5 million savings realised.
- average time between vacancy and appointment (1-3 years*) cut by 50%
- efficiency savings of £1.5 million from payroll audit.
1. Job descriptions of civil servants have not changed since pre-partition days. For the last 65 years, civil servants have been adjusting roles on an ad hoc basis and had no performance indicators. This is a major obstacle to improving the quality of service delivery. Work to improve human resource management, though led by the Establishment Department, has been a cross cutting one, linking PFM, M&E and Planning and Coordination in setting out annual targets and performance indicators for staff. This work fed into an analysis of training needs and identified over 1000 budgeted but unfilled posts amongst 375,000 employees on the KP payroll. A performance based job descriptions pilot has been successful in creating efficiency savings and will now be rolled out to all 32 departments. The draft JDs have been agreed with individuals and are awaiting departmental approval. The Government’s key priorities as defined by the CDS, OBB and BSP have been embedded into the JDs and will form part of the annual appraisal for civil servants. This is crucial to turning policy into better service delivery.
2. The Establishment Department is keen on this strand and has made good progress despite some resistance from civil servants. The challenge will be to ensure that momentum is maintained behind this output if there is a different political scenario. The JDs are with departmental Secretaries awaiting signature but are approved by Establishment as part of the Rules of Business. These will replace the existing generic Job Descriptions for officers (including at the district level) up to grade 20. There is a mechanism to review and revise JDs when a post becomes vacant. A series of induction trainings have taken place to roll out the new JDs. Sufficient capacity has been embedded within government to sustain this activity.
3. The 18th Amendment to the constitution devolved the functions and powers of a number of Federal Ministries to the provinces. There is no mechanism to obtain information from federal government on resources or assets to be devolved to the provinces. Federal level personnel have been relocated and institutional memory has gone with them. For this reason service delivery reviews (an activity behind one of the log frame targets) have proven difficult in the PRP. There is little appetite to continue with this activity in the provincial Establishment Department. The Steering Committee of the PRP has decided to take this activity back to the Chief Secretary in order to ask him to pursue this further with the Federal Government. Request for assistance on this activity came directly from the Chief Secretary.
4. The new Human Resource Information System (HRIS) has proven effective in bringing transparency to the recruitment process across the civil service. Now job applications are made on-line and tracked till the end of the process. Feedback is automatically given to the applicant throughout the process. The HRIS generates evidence that recruiters can use to deter political interference and ensure that recruitment is based on merit. This evidence has been used on two occasions by Secretary Establishment where there was interference from very political senior level. When presented with the evidence the senior politicians stopped interfering.
5. Prior to HRIS the timeframe from vacancy announcement to filling a post was 3 years. The recent example of filling 105 vacancies of Junior Clerks through online application and electronic sifting of 15,000 applicants demonstrated a reduction in appointing timeframe for permanent positions from 3 years to 11 months (the log frame target was 50% reduction from a 1-3 year baseline - permanent positions take up to 3 years). This has encouraged the government to roll out HRIS to all departments. The government also commits to further reducing the timeframe from job identification to vacancy filled to within 6 months.
6. JDs for grade 17 and above have been completed for 3 departments. About 85% of work has been completed for the rest and is likely to be done by end of March 2012. This will reduce overlaps; provide clear roles and responsibilities and reduce staff in the long run.
7. HRIS has also proven useful in identifying overlaps and ghost workers and duplication of allowances. Result so far is a £1.5m annual saving in the government payroll. It has also helped to remove 1000 unfilled positions which were budgeted for but left vacant and where funds were being used by departments for allowances and other ad hoc expenditure. These fund flows have now been stopped and will be reallocated in line with service delivery plans. The IT Audit of pensions has identified employees who were being paid by provincial government on behalf of other provinces and government entities. This has resulted in a further 28 million rupees savings in 8 weeks of the audit. As part of the rollout, OPM will carry out a pilot spot-check sample of 400 employees across the province to see if they exist where pensions are being claimed. The pilot will be completed by 31 March 2012. Chief Secretary and Secretary Finance are eager to generate evidence from this pilot to make it part of the regular system.
Recommendations:
The targets for this output have been exceeded or are on track. Even without the service delivery reviews, savings of more than the target £4m have been identified. DFID should inform the Chief Secretary that given the challenges being faced on the reviews, that activity will be dropped from work plan.
Impact Weighting (%): 15%
Revised since last Annual Review? No
Risk: Medium
Revised since last Annual Review? No
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