By Jaimie Kaffash
23 November 2009
Cutting pay and pensions in the public sector will result in reduced productivity and will increase resistance to change, a think-tank report claims.
The Work Foundation’s Good jobs report, published today, says that good employment practice is essential for the wellbeing of the economy. It adds that ‘poor quality of jobs’ – including workers being given a lack of autonomy, little staff development and a lack of appreciation – results in lower productivity. It also calls on the government to set up an advisory body that will establish good practice guides for public and private sector employers.
Managing director of the Work Foundation Stephen Bevan told Public Finance: ‘The public sector is being asked to do more with less. But you need to engage the workforce to achieve this. If you overload jobs, there will be no improvements in services – more people will be going off sick, workers will be demoralised. If you are asking workers to change practice, job quality is one of the things you can do that will make then more responsive to change.’
He added that work can be ‘organised more effectively and more imaginatively’, which would ‘not necessarily’ require more resources. He gave the example of changing centre workers targets to focus on customer satisfaction rather than volume of calls, citing Revenues and Customs as a department that could adopt these practices. He said that giving workers more say in the running of the organisation would help
Bevan advised against cutting public sector pay and pensions, arguing that this would prohibit necessary reforms, which would save more in the long term.
‘If you start debating whether to cut pay and pension benefits there will be a problem with not only lack of morale but the public sector’s ability to attract the best people,’ he said.
23 November 2009
Cutting pay and pensions in the public sector will result in reduced productivity and will increase resistance to change, a think-tank report claims.
The Work Foundation’s Good jobs report, published today, says that good employment practice is essential for the wellbeing of the economy. It adds that ‘poor quality of jobs’ – including workers being given a lack of autonomy, little staff development and a lack of appreciation – results in lower productivity. It also calls on the government to set up an advisory body that will establish good practice guides for public and private sector employers.
Managing director of the Work Foundation Stephen Bevan told Public Finance: ‘The public sector is being asked to do more with less. But you need to engage the workforce to achieve this. If you overload jobs, there will be no improvements in services – more people will be going off sick, workers will be demoralised. If you are asking workers to change practice, job quality is one of the things you can do that will make then more responsive to change.’
He added that work can be ‘organised more effectively and more imaginatively’, which would ‘not necessarily’ require more resources. He gave the example of changing centre workers targets to focus on customer satisfaction rather than volume of calls, citing Revenues and Customs as a department that could adopt these practices. He said that giving workers more say in the running of the organisation would help
Bevan advised against cutting public sector pay and pensions, arguing that this would prohibit necessary reforms, which would save more in the long term.
‘If you start debating whether to cut pay and pension benefits there will be a problem with not only lack of morale but the public sector’s ability to attract the best people,’ he said.
