Agency Health and the State of the Service Report 2006–07

Overview

• Monitoring the health of your organisation is just as important as monitoring the health of employees

• Broad overview of Agency Health publication

• Present data on a limited number of agency health indicators from this year’s State of the Service Report

• How you can monitor the health of your agency

Agency Health

What is agency health?

“The ability to deliver high quality and timely outcomes”

Seven key areas:– Organisational direction– Leadership– Organisational capability– Corporate governance processes– Relationships and integrity– Organisational culture– Public service factors.

Key areas of Agency Health

• Organisational Direction

• Leadership

• Capability

• Governance processes

• Relationships and Integrity

• Organisational Culture

• Public Service Factors

Agency Health Indicators

• Organisational structure is not related to organisation direction and is hard to understand

• A disconnect between senior and middle managers

• Excessively high or low staff turnover

• An absence of evaluation measures and a lack of staff and stakeholder surveys

• High incidence of, or level of tolerance for, harassment and/or bullying

Agency Health Indicators

• Low levels of employee engagement

• Poor work-life balance

• A low commitment to collaboration internally or with other agencies

• A failure to anticipate and respond to changes in government priorities

• An ineffective approach to managing geographically dispersed offices

Leadership Capability

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

Achieves results Cultivatesproductive working

relationships

Exemplifiespersonal drive and

integrity

Shapes strategicthinking

Communicates withinfluence

2005-06 2006-07

Per

cen

t

Source: Employee survey

Relationships & Integrity

• 84% of employees agreed that their organisation actively encourages ethical behaviour by all of its employees

• 15% of employees indicated that they had been subjected to harassment or bullying in last 12 months

• Job satisfaction– Four out of five employees were, on average, satisfied with the

workplace attributes they see as important– Top three attributes (good working relationships, flexible working

arrangements, salary)

• High levels of service user satisfaction

Unscheduled Absence

Retention

Top seven issues impacting on retention:– Work-life balance (74% satisfied)– Satisfaction with current job– Career and development opportunities (62% & 68%

satisfied)– Working relationships– Quality of senior leaders– Remuneration (61% agreed)– Recognition (50% satisfied)

Checking Your Agency’s Health

• Mix of objective and subjective judgements

• Consider the whole picture– Take account of the contextual environment– Assessments need to occur at a number of levels in the agency

• Strategies to assist in monitoring corporate health

• External review