In the first article of my Perfect Storm series, I referenced the wave of retirements set to affect most public sector organizations. Many agencies expect to lose 20 percent or more of their work forces this year. In this article, I will dive deeper into the influencing factors and resulting challenges of the staffing exodus.
Let me begin by saying I am convinced governmental organizations are full of smart, energetic, and well-meaning people. Why, then, is there a commonly held perspective of governmental employee performance being less than positive? I believe the root cause of this perspective directly affects a number of important factors. These factors include the three Rs of survival:
1. Retirement:
When and why do retirement eligible people retire?
In opposition to what’s occurring in the public sector, current trends in the private sector are actually moving in an opposite direction, where people choose to delay retirement even when eligible.
2. Retention:
When and why do employees choose to leave their jobs?
The high number of resignations from people not retirement eligible implies a low level of job satisfaction. The turnover rates in environments where employees are happy are low.
3. Recruiting:
When and why do candidates choose an employer?
The ability of public sector organizations to fill vacancies with talented individuals is directly competing with the private sector.
In a nutshell, many of the reasons people leave public sector employment are the same reasons why it will be so difficult to attract talented new hires.
I have worked with and interviewed people across many federal, state, and local public sector organizations. From these interviews, I have learned the popularly held view of poor employee performance is actually a judgment of process efficiency.
It is not very intuitive to consider the possibility that these same processes are just as frustrating to the public employee who has no option but to work within these processes.
I mentioned in the first article of this series that this year might offer the best opportunity in decades to begin transformational process improvements within public sector organizations. If process transformation does not occur, the tide of people exiting public sector jobs will swell and cripple service delivery capabilities. Additionally, without transformational process improvement, the ability of public sector organizations to hire and retain quality talent will be virtually impossible when you consider the drivers of today's workforce and private sector employment opportunities.
A well-proven Lean adage states performance problems are primarily a result of processes...not people. This is evident in most public sector organizations. Read my blog Green Lamps for an additional discussion on the causes of governmental process bloat.
Other than typical factors like retention rates, which provide no root cause insights, using Lean concepts like process efficiency will provide root cause insights into retention and hiring challenges. This is based on the large body of evidence confirming people prefer to perform work they feel adds value and is meaningful; work with no meaning is also, in Lean terms, non-value add and creates employee dissatisfaction. Employee dissatisfaction creates turnover.
Thus, the root cause of many talented people leaving is frustration. Any time you force talented people to follow processes with no value the outcomes are predictable. Good talent leaves first. Apathy will likely overtake the remaining staff. If you are really lucky, you may have a phoenix or two who rise from the ashes of clearly broken systems, but these will be few and far between and insufficient to perform the service mission of the public organization.
Calculating process efficiency and developing Value Stream Maps are activities I highly recommend. However, for purposes of this discussion, I would like to focus on the calculation of Process Inefficiency, which is representative of employee frustration. The Frustration Factor can easily be estimated, even by the faint at heart.
To estimate the Frustration Factor simply ask your employees two questions.
Now simply divide #2 by #1 and multiply by 100 to determine the Frustration Factor. If the answer is greater than 25 percent, your employees are frustrated and poised to leave for a better opportunity.
Talented potential new hires will also intuitively recognize high Frustration Factor environments and promptly run away. For example, how long did it take to schedule their first interview? Did the interviewer have a deep understanding of their resume and prior experiences and contributions; were career advancement opportunities discussed? Were they one of a select few based on specific skill match, or were they one of a hundred corralled blindly through a cattle chute? Did an offer letter arrive within a days of the successful interview or many months later?
Throughout this article, I have been describing the effects of poor processes on the three Rs: retirement, retention and recruiting. I have not even begun to delve into the cost implications these processes impose on a public sector organization’s ability to provide services. Today’s environment offers the best opportunity in decades to begin transformational process improvements within public sector organizations. Begin to optimize your processes today!
- by Kent James, Principal
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