State of the Service at a glance

From the Acting Australian Public Service Commissioner

At a Glance provides a summary of highlights from the State of the Service Report 2008–09. It offers an insight into Australian Public Service (APS) workforce trends and capabilities, and areas of focus for the APS in addressing future challenges. The report is underpinned by two surveys—one of APS agencies and the other of APS employees. I would especially like to thank some 6,000 APS employees who took the opportunity to have their say this year. Due to your support, this year’s employee survey has been the most successful so far, with a response rate of 66%.

This year’s report provides valuable insight into the capacity of the APS to meet the challenges facing Australia in the 21st Century. This assessment is particularly important given the Prime Minister’s recent announcement that a blueprint for APS reform will be developed by early 2010.

The report indicates a high level of commitment by APS employees who embrace the vision and direction of their organisation, and are motivated to make a difference. It also highlights key areas that will need to be developed further, if the APS is to be well positioned to meet future challenges.

The areas of focus in this year’s report are:

• improving workforce planning
• building leadership capability and improving employee engagement
• working with others to shape a stronger future
• further embedding the APS ethical framework.

The report offers APS employees and their agencies a better understanding of how to improve their performance to meet the emerging challenges for the APS. It is clear that the pace of government decision-making is accelerating and policy problems are more complex and global. It is imperative that the APS focuses strongly on its most important asset—the people—to enable it to meet these challenges.

Carmel McGregor
26 November 2009

APS workforce statistics

		2007	2008	2009
Total employees	No.	155416	159789	162009
Ongoing employees	No.	143812	147729	150155
	%	92.5	92.5	92.7
Non-ongoing employees	No.	11604	12060	11854
	%	7.5	7.5	7.3
Full-time (ongoing)	No.	127014	129728	130725
	%	88.3	87.8	87.1
Part-time (ongoing)	No.	16798	18001	19430
	%	11.7	12.2	12.9
EEO groups (ongoing only)
Female employees	No.	81392	84442	86291
	%	56.6	57.2	57.5
Indigenous employees	No.	3183	3148	3176
	%	2.2	2.1	2.1
Employees with disability	No.	4913	4765	4566
	%	3.4	3.2	3.0
NESB1 employees	No.	8696	8918	9067
	%	6.0	6.0	6.0
Age groups (ongoing only)
Under 25 years	No.	7159	7235	6903
	%	5.0	4.9	4.6
25–34 years	No.	35803	36295	36627
	%	24.9	24.6	24.4
35–44 years	No.	41860	42500	42680
	%	29.1	28.8	28.4
45–54 years	No.	42840	44159	44918
	%	29.8	29.9	29.9
55 years and over	No.	16150	17540	19027
	%	11.2	11.9	12.7
Classification (ongoing only)
APS 1–2	No.	7084	6041	5638
	%	4.9	4.1	3.8
APS 3–4	No.	49823	49849	49266
	%	34.6	33.7	32.8
APS 5–6	No.	48512	50495	51903
	%	33.7	34.2	34.6
EL	No.	34210	37033	39143
	%	23.8	25.1	26.1
SES	No.	2538	2698	2845
	%	1.8	1.8	1.9
Graduate/Trainee	No.	1645	1613	1360
	%	1.1	1.1	0.9

Key report findings

• The APS continued to grow in 2008–09 (1.4%), although more slowly than in previous years; there were 162,009 APS employees as at 30 June 2009.
• Diversity remains an issue with the proportion of employees with disability falling to 3.0% (compared with 3.2% in 2007–08). Representation of Indigenous employees remained steady at 2.1%.
• The trend towards a higher classification profile continued, along with that towards a more feminised and educated workforce.
• The majority of employees (85%) were motivated to do their best possible work, and almost all (97%) were willing to put in extra effort to get a job done, when needed.
• Overall levels of job satisfaction remained relatively high this year at 81%.
• The proportions of employees who agreed that they are proud to work in the APS and their agency increased this year to 82% and 73%, respectively.
• Seventy-one per cent of employees agreed that their workplace culture supports people to achieve a good work-life balance.
• The top four important actions that employees felt would assist their agency to prepare for future challenges were:
  • a culture within their agency where leaders engage with and mentor employees (42%)
  • more effective leadership (42%)
  • more streamlined administrative processes within their agency (34%)
  • the recruitment of high quality, talented employees (34%).

Areas of focus

1 Improving workforce planning

To meet the demands of the future, APS agencies will need to improve their ability to attract and retain appropriately skilled employees.

• Around one-third (32%) of agencies had a formal workforce plan (covering 53% of APS employees), and just over two-thirds (68%) of agencies had identified key workforce risks.
• A small number of agencies reported having active talent management strategies in place (8%, compared to 6% last year); however, the number of agencies reporting they are developing talent management strategies rose this year (to 36%).
• There was a greater focus on succession management; 36% of agencies had succession plans in place, an increase of 10 percentage points on last year.

2 Building leadership capability and improving employee engagement

The Prime Minister has indicated the need to ‘build strategic leadership across the APS’, as well as a greater sense of cohesion and esprit de corps. These demands reflect the increasing expectations being placed on APS leaders to meet the strategic challenges of greater economic uncertainty, increased citizen expectations, globalisation, policy complexity and rapid technological change.

• There were 2,845 ongoing SES as at 30 June 2009, or 1.9% of the total APS (a 5.4% growth in 2008–09).
• Thirty-nine per cent of SES employees identified themselves as being part of a broader APS-wide leadership cadre, similar to last year.

Senior leaders’ performance was one of the 14 strong drivers of employee engagement and overall APS productivity.

3 Working with others to shape a stronger future

Across the APS, employees indicated they received more support when suggesting new ideas.

• Almost all employees (94%) agreed they want to learn about new things and ideas.
• Sixty-six per cent of employees felt that they receive support from their manager when suggesting new ideas.
• More than half (54%) of employees agreed that their agency encourages employees to examine what they do and find ways to do it better.

Broadly similar levels of cross-government collaboration to previous years were reported. The majority of SES and EL employees (72%) indicated their job requires them to deal directly with people from other agencies.

SES and EL employees identified some continuing challenges in working across government.

• Only 27% of SES and EL employees agreed that current financial and accountability arrangements facilitate whole of government work.
• Twenty-nine per cent of SES and EL employees agreed their agency’s ICT systems are sufficiently compatible to support whole of government work.
• Thirty-five per cent of SES and EL employees considered their agency’s performance management system adequately recognises whole of government work.

4 Further embedding the APS ethical framework

SES and EL employees were managing well in terms of balancing the need to be apolitical, impartial and professional, responsive to government, and openly accountable when dealing with Ministers and/or Ministers’ offices.

• Twenty-four per cent of SES and EL employees agreed they have been faced with this challenge, around the same level as last year, but considerably lower than the corresponding 41% agreement in the 2003–04 and 2004–05 surveys.

Misconduct in the APS was at very low levels—about three in 1,000 APS employees were determined to have breached the Code of Conduct in 2008–09—and this was overwhelmingly characterised by acts of poor individual judgement rather than systemic misbehaviour, maladministration or corruption. However, a number of APS employees indicated a reluctance to report misconduct. It is important that agencies do not disregard the importance of striving to embed an ethical culture, including by facilitating reporting of misconduct in their organisation.

Abbreviations used

• APS Australian Public Service
• No. Number
• EEO Equal employment opportunity
• NESB1 Non-English speaking background
• EL Executive Level
• SES Senior Executive Service
• ICT Information and communications technology

Related publications

Publications in the 2008–09 State of the Service series are:

• State of the Service Report 2008–09
• State of the Service Employee Survey Results 2008–09
• APS Statistical Bulletin 2008–09.

Further Information

These publications are available on the Commission’s website at <http://www.apsc.gov.au/publications>. Hard copies of the State of the Service report can be obtained by calling our distribution service on 02 6293 8383.