Attracting Future Employees

1. Reality is that the APS is competing with private enterprise for good staff. As distasteful as it may sound, money is a factor for specialist jobs.
2. Not many employers (public or private) wants to train staff anymore. The APS should be generous in this respect and offer not just jobs, but distinct career paths.
3. Australia has a large number of parents trying to return to the workforce after raising families. Many are professionals with a lot of experience who are simply a decade or so behind-the-times with the latest technology due to their time off. Create paths to get them up and running again.
4. Create a lot more entry-level jobs.

The above said, there are two issues: recruiting staff and retaining them. Personally I think that the latter is the more difficult. I believe that more effort needs to be put into monitoring and mentoring people from the moment that we get them. I definitely see talent being wasted and lost.

Update the Public Service Act so that government can compete in both attracting and retaining people. The timeframes for public service recruitment are simply too long. Good people are often employed elsewhere before the government finishes its processes.

Equally, enable the ability to hire and fire within the Act. Too many jobs advertised have been filled by people for an extended period that do the job well. Any other business would simply promote them. Enable that and have processes to deal with nepotism should it occur. The amount of time and money spent on promoting people across government into positions they are already performing well in would send any business into bankruptcy.

The biggest problem currently is that the APS is mixing two quite distinct processes: recruitment and promotion. Recruitment means getting someone from outside into the organisation. A promotion means providing more responsibility to someone with a record of performance and leadership. By combining the two and trying to create a level playing field we removed the performance part from promotions. It means past performance has no influence on the outcome of a selection process. As long as someone is able to play up a few examples in an application and an interview, they may be able to get promoted. Separating the two would mean past performance could provide a much stronger basis for promotions. It would also make it fairer for external applicants as they would know they are only competing against other external candidates and that positions will be filled with externals.

The STAR model, ILS, selection criteria and/or the one-page pitch are not the problem. They do not per se favour an internal candidate, on the contrary, they provide a structure for an application and that does level the playing field somewhat. It also opens the possibility of including transferable skills. The problem is that many applicants, internal and external, forget about the R in STAR. Applicants are very good at describing what they did but not what that work achieved. I was able to observe this in many recruitment processes and yet the number of applicants who think they wrote a great application when there was actually nothing tangible in it is staggering.

To attract future employees the APS should become more flexible. I hear a lot about the APS wanting to value external experience and increase mobility in and out of the APS. But in reality that's hard to do as all the structure and incentives still presume ongoing employees, who should stay in for their entire career. If they leave, they lose a lot of benefits accrued (sick leave, long service leave, super etc) and may not be able to come back in easily, having gained experience elsewhere. It means that, once in, it's a big decision to leave. One possibility would be to grant some sort of expedited re-entry for a period (3 years? 5 years?) after leaving that doesn't guarantee an APS job, and pays out accrued entitlements, but preserves those benefits that aren't paid out (eg sick leave) and exempts people from elements of the selection process if returning at level. Without something like this, if the APS genuinely wants a more mobile and diverse workforce, it will need to offer leave without pay, which maintains a liability, or rely on short term non-ongoing staff who don't feel valued.

The APS needs to keep pace with what they are spruking. They talk about flexible & dynamic workplaces & yet almost all EOIs and job opportunities that are adverstised out of Canberra, do not consider accepting remote work. There are many employees in the regions who are highly skilled and motivated to succeed and produce outcomes for the APS, but are declined the opportunity due to positions not offered in a remote capacity. Are we so primative that we can only do things in in person? Out in the regions, you have employees (& I include myself in this category) that are acitvely involved in University degrees and post graduate studies, that are coninually stretching their minds, skills and insights & yet, we have limited scope to develop professionaly in the APS as we are confined and defined as 'in the regions'. So if the APS is truly looking to employ progressive merit based recruitment decisions, then looking beyond Canberra based people only would be a good start. To attract employees, we need to keep up with the research that atraction & retention goes beyond the amount you are paying your people. The APS needs to find better ways to incorporate job satisfaction, autonomy and make more improvements to flexible work practises. Managers need to be held to account as to why they continue to refuse to embrace flexibility in their workers, ie, continue to see presenteism as the measure of good outputs. As well as asking for reports on project milestones, who is asking these managers to demonstrate how they are supporting their staff in real terms, such as flexible work, automony, etc.

My proposed solutions to these problems are:

• Enable agencies, at their discretion, to conduct an internal process to fill roles where suitable internal candidates are available. Where there are not any available internally, agencies would then need to conduct an external, merit-based process. • Incorporate the use of internal performance data into promotion and selection decisions. This would appropriately reward performance and provide key information to selection panels in the case of internal applicants. • Selection criteria should be fewer in number, briefly, yet clearly, articulated and preferably be job-specific. Candidates should be expected to respond to them in a short cover letter, not a separate essay. • Agencies should be expected to use a variety of tools to assess applicants, such as assessment tasks based on the work the applicant will be doing in the team. Members of hiring panels should also be required to receive training on how to conduct STAR-based interviews.

To balance the effects of the first two proposals, which would tend to increase internal appointments, senior agency executives should be expected to measure and meet targets on external hires. This would be a more effective way to ensure that suitable external candidates are considered for positions, and encourage managers to seek out non-APS candidates with diverse skills and experience.

Problems (2nd 2 of 4)

• Selection criteria for roles are routinely extensive, with many capabilities listed. These are often articulated in highly general, yet also highly detailed terms. (Yes, it is apparently possible to be both at once!) Some agencies expect candidates to respond separately to these criteria, which creates work for both the candidate and the hiring managers (assuming they properly read and consider the responses.) This practice duplicates what a CV and cover letter should be doing, and does for most other jobs. • As other commenters have mentioned, the STAR system has weaknesses and could serve to advantage applicants who are familiar with the process, rather than those with appropriate skills and experience but who may not be as used to articulating them in the right form. An effective panel that asks probing questions can help ameliorate this, but the frequent reliance on this model as the key input in selection could be reconsidered.

I have been on both sides of APS recruitment at my agency over several years, and am familiar with the approaches of some other agencies from colleagues and friends. I consider reform to the APS hiring system could be an “easy win” for the Review that would please people both within and outside the APS. (This is an extensive post, so I will need to do it in three parts.)

The problems with the current system include (2 of 4):

• An expectation that agencies publicly advertise for permanent roles, even when there are suitable candidates available internally – who may even be acting in the position. This seems to be a case of process for its own sake and is extremely unfair to external candidates who may spend significant amounts of time on an almost certainly futile application. I do not believe the requirement to advertise externally has the effect of actually ensuring “merit-based” appointments in practice, instead, it simply means lots of unnecessary work and delayed outcomes. • The supposedly merit-based approach to recruitment also serves to sever the link between performance management appraisal and promotions. In my experience, HR managers are very reluctant to use performance history as a consideration in promotional decisions (for example, where an applicant is in a different team). This is perverse and does not accord with objectives, such as encouraging high performance in the APS.

The merit process in trying to be 'fair' often ends up being unfair at times. It costs a lot to advertise and go through the interview process. Sometimes people acting in the position miss out on the roles due to personalities, nerves at the interview etc. There is no reward for stepping up into a larger role and taking a risk. Sometimes it would be great to be able to promote people into a role to recognise their good work, leadership, effort etc. This would also save time and money in the recruiting process.

Of course this has to be balanced out to stop people 'promoting their mates'. I understand that no system is perfect but the current system in aiming to be fair to all, it often ends up being unfair to those who most often deserve and have earned the promotion.

The merit selection process often finds people with great technical ability but doesn't capture leadership and people skills very well as these are the softer skills and often don't come through in an interview.

If somehow the public service could show how it will support promotions and reward the right behaviour and collaboration it will help attract future employees.

I think a long hard look should be taken to unify the pay and conditions across the public service.

The salary disparities between departments are a real barrier to the movement of talent back and forth. I have just paid my own way through Law School. I am not vounteering for a potentially permanent pay cut to move to another department on top of that.

The employee benefit package has significantly degraded over the years and if the work of the Public Service is to be valued, the benefit package must improve. Merely degrading non pay conditions for increases less than the consumer price index has absolute limits.

If you want talent it costs money and that includes the return of defined benefit pensions.

I, like 20% of my colleagues in the government 'agency' I work for, are contracted through an employment agency that is costing the public and service more than it would cost to employ us directly. In order to keep the lid on employing public servants government agencies are forced to employ contractors like me. However, in order to be seen to reduce costs a paltry hourly rate is paid that would not stack-up in the private sector and hence not attract the best candidates. Employment agencies are gaining from this ridiculous 'political' policy by way of fees and get to keep the use of contractors super for three months. This has a tremendous impact on us as individuals by way of uncertainty in employment, lack of share market gains through regular super contributions (dollar cost averaging), lack of sick-holiday-education-military/SES-long service leave etc.? With the hope that permanent positions become available there is really no certainty for people who join the public service to make a difference through public service. They accept that the remuneration is less than the private sector on the basis that it is balanced in some way by those things I list but really at the end of the day there appears to be no future for contractors working under the current system unless their is a real ability to transition into permanent employment by way of performance.

I have taken the opportunity to consult with other public servants in various government departments. Nepotism seems to be a problem. Those in relationships or married to a partner in the same government agency often team up to obstruct those they don't like. Often candidates are selected during recruitment because someone knows their relatives, parents or partners. This is not ethical. Job applications are often completed by those already in the public service. We need to ensure this does not happen.

The sacred cow of the APS recruitment process, the "Merit-based system", gives large weighting towards APS employees with long tenure. This is because they can just list of the hundred tasks they have completed over their years. As mentioned by others it is a barrier to talented people from private sector backgrounds or those early on in their careers but with loads of great skills and potential. This is further reinforced by the over emphasis on STAR model examples. In my experience in the recruitment process through the merit system is a synonym for 'quantity over quality', largely becoming merely a tick box exercise.

It also doesn't give much room to consider cultural fit or vibe of an interviewee. Many experts say cultural fit is equal to or more important than simple work history to a org's performance. In the private sector (where I have also worked) the general trend is - cultural fit first - transferable skills and learning potential second - and technical / content experience last. The merit system is the inverse to this.

The best recruitment I have been involved in the APS gave me an actual task to complete. Yes there was still an interview but actually doing the task successfully gave the interviewers a better insight into my skills. This was for an EL2 level role and the task was a real example of something I would have to do in the role.

I think that an assessment center focused on tasks relevant to each level would be a better way to gauge skills. Then the interview becomes more of a chat to see if the person fits the culture. It would also allow people to get feedback on the tasks and use that for their development plan.

If this was done for all levels on a twice a year basis, I think it would still be cheaper than the current way of recruiting and would give better outcomes.

I think to attract the best and brightest employees the recruitment methods need to be fair and unbiased. To this end I think you should get rid of assessment centres as they are biased towards dominant personality types and extroverts. When I have done them in the past I found it was a very competitive environment with everyone desperate to have their say and be noticed. I found it hard to get a word in edgeways without talking over the top of others. This does not reflect the workplaces I have been in at the APS, where everyone is much more democratic and people take it more in turns to have their say.

I also have to disagree with PP on the work environment. I have worked both with my own office, and in open plan offices with partitions. I found having my own office (outside of the APS) meant that I could concentrate a lot more easily on intellectual or difficult tasks, and my colleagues were just next door if I needed to collaborate. I cannot concentrate with music on and headphones do not cut the noise unless there is something playing through them. I don't feel my relationships with colleagues are any better in the open plan office jobs compared to the single office jobs, so I think it is a myth that the random small talk foster relationships any better than random small talk in the corridor. I definitely think the APS could be improved by providing offices for its knowledge-based workers, at a minimum.

It is also possible to block Facebook and the like on office computers - we have this at my current APS agency. If you mean staff are checking Facebook on their own phones, well they do this in open plan offices too.

Advancement or lateral movement shouldn't be contingent or selection criteria. If someone wants to move within the service, let them. If they do a good job, let them stay.

1. As I enter my department I always note how shabby and badly dressed many employees are. Public servants do not seem to grasp they represent the country and should dress in a professional and self respecting way.

2 Political correctness needs to be challenged. Some subjects remain private matters and should not be promoted forgetting something may be immoral yet legal. The government has no role in deciding morality. It is objective, relies on truths something beyond the caprice of parliaments and bureaucrats.

I think that if the APS wants a workforce that reflects the people of Australia then it requires employees from varying backgrounds. Predominantly we see employment being focused on graduate intake; this invariably means people with little life experiences but are very knowledgeable in their field of learning. If recruitment was along the lines of focusing on ability to achieve or learn and applying knowledge then breadth of the public service would be more relatable. The lower levels of the APS that seem to have disappeared could be the training ground for staff with lower skills in different areas. For example the entry level is currently in many agencies either APS 3 or 4 with little or no advancement after probation. Hardly rewarding. If a probationer was brought in at a lower level and could demonstrate the required skills then progression would occur. Consider a longer Probation which included a period which was deemed selection appropriateness i.e. does this person meet culture, knowledge, skills, values of the APS?

Its a different and difficult approach but it could produce a stronger APS.

Recruitment processes need to be drastically reviewed and streamlined. It can take some APS organisations more than 6 months to finalise recruitment for a position. This is far too slow to have any hope of getting the best talent, as you can be certain that all of the capable applicants have applied to multiple places, and will have found work long before they receive an APS offer.

APS agencies need to adopt modern ways of working including workspaces, technology and remuneration.

In the modern workspace, staff are encouraged to collaborate and work together to find common solutions to common problems, rather than working individually on specific tasks at their desk. The culture of the public service needs to be transformed so that it embraces regular catch ups and meetings from staff within a team, a willingness to speak up, and a collaborative environment that embraces technology. Even simple things such as working on the same Word or Excel document together is not possible in the public sector due to old technology and a risk averse culture towards modern software solutions.

It is hard to do this where we have partitions where you cannot see your fellow colleagues sitting directly across you, nor communicate that easily. I have also seen instances where members of the same team are sitting next to each other, yet communicating through instant messaging (IM). Such practices would not be discouraged in the private sector where instead you would have to talk face to face.

Remuneration practices in the APS are no longer reflective of the modern working environment where staff in the same team perform the same work, yet are paid differently according to rigid APS levels. The 6 APS levels should be in reality be broken down to 3, with fixed salary bands that are open to negotiation, depending on the role. This suggestion will be controversial, and so I would encourage further debate about how best to determine pay and salaries in the APS.

The merit principle as defined by the Public Service Act 1999 is not only causing huge amounts of time and money to be spent on the recruitment process, it is actually putting off many potential recruits from applying. The process takes way to long, places the private sector applicant in an awkward situation when referees comments are sought but that person does not get the job, and often ends up as a huge waste of time when the person acting in the job is finally promoted to it.

The merit principle needs to be redefined to allow for direct promotion of a person to a position if they have already demonstrated the skills and attributes required for that position. This would eliminate the need to advertise the position and conduct a selection process in such circumstances. In time this would give applicants from outside the APS the confidence that positions advertised were real vacancies worth the effort of applying for.

This change would also save the APS a huge amount of time as well as money. In 2016-17, well over 8,000 positions were advertised in the APS Gazette. An estimated 50% of these could be eliminated by redefining the merit principle, resulting in tens of millions of dollars’ worth of productivity improvement, not to mention the money saved on advertising or employing scribes to “write-up” the selection process.

If a true vacancy exists and a department needs to advertise a job, the merit principle needs to allow for a more streamlined recruitment process. This could include identifying the two most important selection criteria on which to distinguish candidates, not the 6-8 that is currently is the norm, and only interviewing the top three candidates.

4. In my experience, the lack of induction and training for all employees is very telling within the public service. Staff do not recognise regulatory capture or systemic discrimination. When I approached senior management to discuss the systemic barriers that affect women of colour - something that was being acknowledged at the CALD network meetings (where the CALD women sat around lamenting the fact that there were NO CALD women beyond the Director level (and only 2% at the Director level), I was pushed away and referred to the HR Manager who told me my complaint 'scared the hell out of him' and he wanted the problem to go away. That was the sum total of his engagement, other than to help manage me out. General managers do not understand breaches of privacy or unconscious bias, and are blatantly defensive of their privilege and superiority. There are a lot of unspoken conventions and practices that are definitely very 'unique' to the APS and perhaps more so at the Redacted because it operates on its own. People who have not absorbed or understand those conventions are treated as outsiders or with suspicion from staff who have been there much too long and are far too embedded in the structure.

3. Merit selection is also meaningless when you have an internal recruitment system based on 'try before you buy' that was designed to give internal staff a career path. At the Redacted, and unbeknownst to me, people 'network' and align themselves with other senior personnel socially, in anticipation of applying for a temporary role. This process does not require a formal interview or selection process. Just references from your current supervisors. So more than producing good work, you need to suck up to your immediate boss and spend a good deal of time sucking up to the next boss and networking your way around social events. This embeds racial and gender bias. In our division, that meant a very easy ride for the young white Melbourne based boys and an almost impossible proposition for CALD people since, by the time we even get a look in to the APS, we have family or carer commitments. I started at the same time as a young, single white bloke from Treasury who had no background in competition law, let alone any legal expertise, just vaguely a degree in law. In the six months that I was there, he moved up two acting ranks, while I battled through 40 applications and got nowhere. The process of then initiating formal recruitment when someone has already been performing at the job in a temporary capacity, sometimes for months or years, is a waste of public resources and a systemic dishonesty. In all of the jobs that I applied for, I discovered that the person acting in a temporary capacity got the permanent position. Why waste my and everyone else's time going through the motions of a formal recruitment process. This is exactly the kind of administrative waste that the public would barely tolerate if they knew this is how things worked.

2. Merit is absolutely meaningless when you are allowing the recruitment process to be determined by peers in ranking. For externally advertised interviews, I was interviewed by people who were half my age, half my intelligence and half my legal experience, who were also middle class and white. It was obvious at every interview that the weight and the significance they gave my legal expertise and my lived experience (having started university as a homeless kid) and my private legal practice for the very vulnerable was minor or of little interest - they simply didnt understand because their own life experience is so limited. When peers are allowed to interview and shortlist people who are just beneath them in rank, they are motivated by 2 primary concerns. First, whether they will get someone who will reflect them in their own image (ie another white, middle class person) and not threaten them (definitely cannot be smarter or more capable) and secondly, someone who will do as they are told without asking any questions about the way things work. It is a recruitment system designed to embed the status quo and stagnation within the APS.

1. Yes it is especially difficult for people of colour to join the APS mid-career. I had a short stint at the Redacted, which also utilises the public sector model of employment. There is an almost parochial resistance to highly intelligent, private sector trained commercial lawyers - too ambitious, too loud, too efficient. It is even harder when you a coloured woman and I was the only one on my floor! My intelligence was treated as arrogance and my private sector experience and knowledge treated with suspicion. I have a degree in law and economics, came first in law at Syd Uni, and am now doing a phd (with a double scholarship) in competition law at Syd Uni, but was allocated a rank that was beneath those who had "been there 15 years" because they apparently knew better than the legal practice experience I had from both Allens and Freehills. I put up with it and a supervisor who had neither a law or an economics degree but was very good at "managing" those around her, for a little while. After six months, I pointed out that there were no women of colour on my floor, there were no people of colour in senior management roles in my division, that I had applied for 40 jobs internally and not received one response despite my skills and expertise, and that I had a lower rank despite being more qualified than any of my white colleagues, and surprise, surprise, I was asked to leave. The executive GM avoided me as soon as I mentioned the statistics on CALD representation. And then I realised recruiting me was part of a deliberate plan. Every few months, more highly qualified CALD people are brought at very junior levels and left to their devices until they leave. Nothing changes but at least the Redacted can maintain the perception that they can work with everyone.

ILS framework and selection criteria need a re-think. Many agencies are moving to a "one page pitch" but within that you are supposed to address the five ILS criteria and often a related but different selection criteria. It may be a better approach to recruit against a specific job description and the role you will be performing, rather than generic criteria.

The APS needs to develop a dynamic culture within the constraints of the legislative world in which we work. Staff joining the service in many instances see antiquated computer systems, processes that are rigid, slow policy development and lack of background information to enable a broader concept approach.

We need to move away from the Management / Factory floor approach and build a consultative structure that encourages, rewards and develops ideas from all levels.

The adoption of technology for our customers should be similarly applied to the technology our staff use to fit in with the tech skills of the next generation of APS employees.

In regards to recruitment, we should be seeking the experience of the private sector and attempt to fit squares in square holes. Essentially creating a fit for purpose workforce that may be on shorter contracts will provide benefits to adopt changes whilst supporting a broader skilled workforce for ongoing operation of the APS departments. Our customer person to person contact levels will continue to reduce as the population demographics and technological changes evolve. So a fit for purpose workforce will be more essential and our recruitment will need to reflect this.

I joined the APS about a year ago. I applied for a number of positions across different departments and agencies, so I have recent experience of the variety of application processes and recruitment.

In order to attract the best employees, the APS will have to stop insisting that its staff be based in Canberra. Many agencies/departments now offer a choice of locations, but many do not, especially those related to national security, defence and foreign affairs. That may work for recruiting graduates who are unattached, but anyone who has a family will find it very difficult to relocate mid-career. There is no point in having family friendly policies like flexible working hours once you have joined the APS, if the recruitment process is not family friendly by insisting on relocation.

APS recruitment should be done by people, not algorithms. I experienced a mix of direct recruitment, agencies and algorithmic selection in my APS applications. My experience was that algorithmic selection led to recruiting people who fit a certain mould, rather than considering each person on their merits. It reduces diversity of background, skills and personalities, worsening the problem of risk aversion and group-think within the APS.

Another issue I found confusing was the overlaying of multiple evaluation models. Applications often required the applicant to address APS values, the Integrated Leadership System, agency/department capabilities and role specific skills. It made it very confusing as to what the requirements of the role where and how the application would be evaluated.

Also, let's ditch insider terminology like "delegate". It makes no sense to anyone outside the APS.

Graduate programs are the typical form of entry into the public service, but they need improvement.

Graduates should be able to preference the areas of the department they want to work in. If the purpose of the program is to give graduates a pathway to skilling that will cover an initial generalist purpose with opportunities to develop into specifically skilled staff, then preferences should be taken seriously to enable those outcomes to come into fruition.

There is scope for having streams within graduate programs. Existing streams are typically the legal stream, the policy stream and the IT stream for graduates with those capabilities and interests. Graduates generally see this as a positive means of ensuring that people interested in pursuing those dedicated skills can do that whilst avoiding other staff, who have no interest of pursuing certain work, from ending up in those areas.

Mobility of graduates, as well as the public service broader, should be seen as a high priority. There is great benefit to short term mobility placements throughout the APS and the private sector. This serves to increase both private sector and public-sector skills without losing staff to other opportunities. In addition to picking up skills between departments, people pick up more institutional knowledge and networks that better connect staff and break down departmental silos.

I think recruitment should ditch the STAR model and focus more on selection criteria which relate to a job description describing what the new employee will have to do. The STAR model is a problem because you need to have examples of already having had the same experience as the job will give you - this makes it hard for someone coming from the private sector, and difficult for talented people to move up according to ability, rather than past experience. Job applications should focus on what the candidate is ABLE to do, not what they have already been doing.

I also think salaries need to be higher in the public service - it's a sad but not surprising fact that people always want to earn a good wage, and jobs in the private sector currently pay significantly more for similar roles, meaning that the most talented people often just go straight to the private sector. I have observed this phenomenon amongst my fellow students who graduated law school with me about 10 years ago.