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"The new Public Service environment: Challenges and opportunities"

Helen Williams AO
Public Service Commissioner
Workplace Diversity: Innovation and Performance Conference
Tuesday 10 February 1998

The Commission's biennial EEO Conference has provided us with valuable opportunities to hear first-class speakers and to share our experiences on a subject of great importance - both to Australian workplaces and to the broader community.

The difference in 1998, of course, will be the greater emphasis on the broader, more expansive concept of workplace diversity.

And the change in name is more than just a matter of words.

As Minister Kemp said earlier this morning, a workplace diversity approach encompasses but goes beyond the traditional concept of EEO.

It goes beyond the EEO concept of rectifying disadvantage (important though this is), to focus on the very positive contribution that diverse skills, talents and perspectives can make to the output of the APS - to improved client service, to more effective output at lower cost, and ultimately to increased international standing and competitiveness.

Coming from the Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs, I have become increasingly conscious of the advantages that Australia's linguistic and cultural diversity can provide us in competing in the global economy. Hence our use of the term 'Productive Diversity'. Similarly, it is important for APS managers to recognise the advantages that all diversity can bring in terms of greater innovation and creativity in the workplace.

What I'd like to do today is to talk about the current state of play of workplace diversity and EEO agendas in the APS, and what those arrangements will mean in the agencies themselves.

As Minister Kemp has indicated, the Government had intended to include provisions for managing workplace diversity in its Public Service Bill 1997, as part of its public sector reform package.

The Government's decision to proceed to implement much of the policy provided for in this Bill through administrative measures, means that Workplace Diversity Programs will be developed and implemented in all APS agencies, while, at the same time, the EEO provisions of the current Act will continue to operate until the new Public Service Bill is enacted.

On the surface, this arrangement may sound somewhat cumbersome. It has some advantages in practice, however, in providing us with a valuable transition phase; and both requirements will be met through the establishment by agencies of Workplace Diversity Programs.

In a sense we will be able to move incrementally towards managing the broader and more proactive workplace diversity concept, while weaving EEO into this concept as an integral component.

We should take time here to recognise that equal employment concepts, although starting slowly in the APS, have generally served us well.

The APS has been at the forefront of change in developing and implementing EEO initiatives. Women were admitted to the clerical/administrative structure in 1949 followed by the removal of the restriction on the permanent employment of married women in 1966. Initiatives to assist people with disabilities began in 1971 and those to assist Aboriginal people in 1973. An EEO Bureau was established in 1975 and an increasing number of programs for APS employees, including ones for people of non-English speaking backgrounds, have been introduced since then. The Public Service Act was amended in 1984 to place a positive obligation upon heads of APS agencies to develop and implement EEO Programs and upon the Public Service Commissioner to report annually to the Prime Minister.

Our successes need to be acknowledged. The outstanding work carried out in a number of agencies which have been nominated for Equality awards to be presented tonight provide just a few examples.

The statistical evidence is also there. There has been a marked increase in the employment of women in the Service since 1984, increasing from 39% to 48% of the total APS workforce. The representation of women in the Senior Executive Service has increased from 7.2% of staff in 1987 to 19.7% in 1997. In comparing retirement and appointment of SES officers last year, only 13% of retirees were women while they made up nearly 30% of appointments. Women now comprise nearly 20% of the Senior Executive Service, although I think we are all aware of the variation in performance between agencies, with some doing well and others lagging behind the APS average.

The representation of people from a non-English speaking background has grown 2% over the last decade and now lies at 15% of the total permanent workforce.

There has also been improvement in the representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people over the last decade to 2% last year.

Our achievements in employing people with disabilities, however, have been less than satisfactory, with a continuous (although slight) decrease in their representation from 6% to 4.5%.

Also worrying is that employees in the EEO groups remain clustered in non-management positions. These are issues that require further attention in the future.

I believe that we must now focus on how our conceptual framework can be expanded and be made more persuasive; on the fact that, despite its undoubted value, EEO has some limitations in the environment of the modern APS.

First, EEO is perceived in many quarters to focus primarily on a social justice perspective and there are limitations to such an approach in the change management environment of today.

Secondly, there has been a strong focus in the APS on procedural fairness through legal compliance as the main driver of EEO Programs, with a resulting emphasis on redress and correction.

And third, there is the problem of resistance. Two years ago in this forum, various speakers drew attention to the shortcomings of EEO in Australian workplaces. They spoke about the impact of resistance from those who do not believe that anti-discrimination and EEO principles have anything to offer them. They also spoke about the risk of tokenism with EEO being viewed as an add-on to mainstream human resources management. I think I am on fairly safe ground in saying that most of us in this theatre today, through a process of self selection, would not fall in to either of these categories. At the same time I do think any of us would underestimate the impact of this resistance or perceived tokenism.

It is through its capacity to address these perceptions that the value of workplace diversity lies.

It is directed towards persuading organisations to acknowledge the positive contribution that a diverse workforce can make to improving productivity and generating new ideas and ways of doing things.

The new environment that adoption of this concept could make would, I believe, be an exciting and promising one for the APS.

In closing, I would like to spend a few moments outlining the broad responsibilities of agencies in the new environment.

Agency Heads will be responsible for the development and implementation of Workplace Diversity Programs (incorporating EEO requirements) in their organisations by the end of August 1998. The Programs should take account of the particular corporate goals of the agency as well as the broader legal and policy framework.

It is Government policy that Workplace Diversity Programs include measures to ensure that:

• the program is available to all agency employees;
• all employees are encouraged to develop their work skills and contribute to their maximum potential;
• the diverse skills, cultural values and backgrounds of employees are recognised and used effectively; and
• workplace structures, systems and procedures assist employees to balance their work and family responsibilities effectively.

The Commissioner will hold copies of all Workplace Diversity Programs and, as necessary, seek further information and advice from agencies on the effectiveness of their programs.

Agency Heads are required to evaluate and report on the effectiveness and outcomes of their Workplace Diversity Programs in their agency annual report, and provide performance information to the Commissioner for the State of the Service Report which is to be tabled in Parliament each October.

The Public Service Commissioner's major role will be to monitor EEO and diversity outcomes and to report, through the Prime Minister and Minister, to Parliament. For monitoring and reporting purposes, the PSMPC regards the EEO Program required by legislation and the Workplace Diversity Program required by Government policy, as a single integrated entity. The Commissioner's legislative and policy responsibilities in relation to reporting to Government and Parliament on Workplace Diversity Programs and EEO Programs will be covered in a single document - the State of the Service Report. There is no need for two separate reports.

To reduce the reporting burden on agencies, the basis of the Commonwealth's monitoring will be an agency statistical data consolidated centrally on an ongoing basis. It will be necessary for the PSMPC to work closely with agencies to ensure that there is maximum consistency between agency data collection and to obtain any additional information required by the Commissioner to fulfil its reporting functions.

It is envisaged that data collection will be supplemented from time to time by more detailed surveys, studies and evaluations of emerging issues and concerns which impact upon employment equity and the management of diversity in the APS.

The Public Service Commissioner's Guidelines on Managing Workplace Diversity have now been launched. A practitioner handbook will be issued shortly to provide more detail to agencies on developing, implementing, reviewing and reporting on Workplace Diversity Programs. This handbook will reflect many of the ideas and views put forward by agencies during the consultation process.

Altogether, I believe that workplace diversity is a central plank in providing the sorts of policies that best nurture, and best harness, the skills, talents and perspectives of all APS employees, and will produce a more innovative, professional and outward-looking service, and one that can claim the status of world best practice in public sector management.