The Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC) has rolled out a framework for rewarding public service workers with bonuses up to double their salaries should they exceed their performance targets.
But based on the latest data from the Public Service Commission (PSC), more than half of public servants would miss out on the bonuses since they performed below expectations in FY2021/22.
SRC on Friday last week launched the Framework for Recognising Productivity and Performance in the Public Service, which proposes bonuses up to 100 per cent of a worker’s basic salary for surpassing targets, as one way of boosting performance, ensuring employee retention and attracting talent.
“Whereas organisational success thrives on higher productivity, employees become more productive when they are recognised for their contribution. Recognition improves employee productivity, performance, retention, organisational culture and acts as a catalyst for efficiency and effectiveness in production and service delivery,” said SRC chairperson Lyn Mengich.
Head of Public Service Felix Koskei welcomed the move.
“To motivate employees to perform to their best, it is important to tie productivity to rewards, whether in form of promotions, bonuses, recognition letters or other forms of recognition,” he said.
The framework links financial rewards to measurable productivity and performance for state and public officers, SRC stated.
“In rewarding employees in the public service, SRC shall consider the degree to which an institution achieves its productivity and performance targets will determine eligibility and quantum of financial reward. Thus, SRC shall take into consideration performance targets and the productivity index achieved,” the commission stated, adding that Financial rewards will also consider existing contractual obligations.”
The framework proposes financial rewards for institutions and employees who achieve at least 101 per cent of the annual performance ratings, improved productivity index and for commercial and revenue-generating state corporations that demonstrate cost efficiency, growth in revenue and profit and make the necessary budgetary provisions for the performance-based bonus.
“The productivity and performance-based bonus shall be prorated based on corporate score, and anchored on the basic salary of state officers, other public officers, or accounting officers, in the case of board members.”
But as the SRC plans goodies for public workers, PSC’s report on compliance with constitutional values and principles indicated more than two-thirds of public institutions, and more than half of staff did not meet their targets.
The PSC report noted that more than half of disciplinary cases handled in the public service in the last financial year arose from negligence of duty (27 per cent) and absence from duty without permission at 882 (26 per cent) cases.
“It was established that 108 (33.1 per cent) of 326 public institutions met their targets and their performance was rated as (“excellent” or “very good”) while 218 (66.1 per cent) did not achieve their targets and were rated as (“good”, “fair” or “poor”),” PSC stated.
It further noted that more than half were lazy as they did not achieve targets.
“At least 61,040 officers were appraised, out of whom 5,319 were rated ‘Excellent’, 24,418 were rated ‘Very Good’, 21,887 were rated ‘Good’, 7,345 were rated ‘Fair’ and 2,071 were rated ‘Below Average’. Those rated ‘Very Good’ and ‘Excellent’ were 49 per cent,” the PSC stated.
At least 2,654 staff (4.3 per cent of those appraised) were either put on performance improvement programmes or sanctioned for poor performance last year, while 17,042 (28 per cent of those appraised) were rewarded.
“It was established that 434 (91 per cent) institutions had a staff appraisal tool while the remaining 43 (nine per cent) reported that they did not have an appraisal tool,” PSC stated.
The SRC explained that the framework is meant to instil productivity mentality in the public sector, where half of the 26,664 complaints received in the year to June 2022 related to delays in service delivery. BY DAILY NATION