Commitment

Commitment to embedding the Values and the Code is measured through evidence of the leadership activity of agency heads and through the integration of the Values into learning and development programmes.

Leadership

The 2005 employee survey found that the percentage of SES employees who had been advised by their agency head during the year of the importance of acting in accordance with the Values continued to remain essentially unchanged at around 77% from the previous two years. The percentage of SES employees who reported that they had been told by their agency head that it was important that they develop in their staff an understanding of the Values decreased (although not statistically significantly) to 70% in 2004–05 from 77% in 2003–04. There is a need for continued vigilance by agency heads in these areas, given their statutory responsibility for upholding and promoting the Values (s.12 of the Act) and their role in fostering an effective values-based culture within their organisations and across the APS more broadly.

SES employees continue to have a high level of awareness of the relevance of the Values to their daily work. A very high percentage of SES employees (99%) reported that the Values were at least moderately relevant to their daily work. For EL employees this figure drops to 96%. These are comparable results to last year. Ninety-two per cent of the SES reported that the Values were highly relevant to their daily work, an increase from 88% last year. For EL employees the result is 80% compared to 78% last year. The increases between last year and this year for both the SES and the EL group are not statistically significant.

Learning and Development

Commitment to the Values is also expressed through their integration into learning and development activities that address employees’ responsibilities under the Act. Responses to the agency survey suggest a consistent level of effort to promote the Values and the Code amongst employees during the past year.

Over the last three years there has been an increase in the proportion of agencies using online training in relation to the Values and the Code (15% in 2002–03, 17% in 2003–04 and 21% in 2004–05). There has also been a relatively stable effort to promote the Values and the Code in other learning and development areas as measured by the proportion of agencies using induction and/or orientation (96% in 2002–03, 97% in 2003–04 and 98% in 2004–05), and the proportion of agencies conducting sessions on how the Values and the Code should operate (55% in 2002–03, 60% in 2003–04 and 61% in 2004–05). Factors that stand out in Table 7.1 include an increase in the proportion of small agencies using promotional material and an increase in the proportion of medium agencies conducting sessions on how the Values and the Code should operate in practice. This may reflect shifts in the mix of learning and development activities used by individual agencies.

Table 7.1: Agency learning and development activities on the Values and the Code by agency size, 2002–03 to 2004–05

Source: Agency survey

The percentage of APS employees who reported that they had received training that included an emphasis on the Values during 2004–05 was about the same as for the previous year (41%).

Responses to the employee survey continue to show a high level of variability between agencies in relation to the proportions of employees who reported having received training in the Values during the last twelve months. In the 21 large agencies the percentages ranged from 22% in one large agency to 88% at ASIC in 2004–05. In nine of the large agencies fewer than 30% of employees reported receiving such training (down from 10 agencies in 2003–04).

Variability has also been reflected in the comments in the employee survey.

Learning and development has been recognised in other jurisdictions as an important means of improving the integration of values into an organisation’s culture. The Victorian Commissioner for Public Employment’s 2004 report, Ethics at Work Research Project,² for example, suggests that training in the code of conduct needs to be focused on making the values and principles within it a part of everyday work practices so that when employees are faced with ethical dilemmas the principles of conduct in their organisation, and not their own values and beliefs, are their point of reference. This is consistent with the evidence supporting the Commission’s publication, Embedding the APS Values.³

Last year’s State of the Service report noted improvements in 2003–04 against a number of indicators in the degree of agencies’ success in embedding the Values. The indicators this year remain relatively stable compared to last year. In 2004–05, some 93% of employees continued to report that they had felt that their agency had a clear set of values about the behaviour expected of employees. Similarly, 85% of employees continued to report that they were familiar with the Values, 14% reported that they were partially familiar and 1% that they were unfamiliar. Of those employees who were either familiar with the Values or had heard of them but were not fully familiar with their detail, 56% rated their levels of familiarity as high. Some 39% rated their levels of familiarity as moderate. Both figures are comparable with last year’s.

The proportions of employees in the 21 large agencies who reported that they were familiar with the Values continued to vary quite widely, ranging from 65% to 93%. The five large agencies with at least 90% of employees stating that they were familiar with the Values are ASIC, CSA, FaCS, Finance and DIMIA.

This year’s employee survey reveals that almost 100% of employees were either familiar with the Code or had heard of it, but were not fully familiar with its contents. The proportions of employees in the 21 large agencies who reported that they were familiar with the Code ranged from 71% to 95%. The large agencies, in which at least 90% of employees reported that they were familiar with the Code, included ASIC, CSA and DIMIA. The Code is discussed later in this chapter and in Chapter 6.

There is no conclusive evidence that familiarity with the Values is linked with an employee’s length of service. In 2004–05, about 85% of employees with more than five years of service in the APS reported that they were familiar with the Values compared to 78% of employees with less than one year of service. However, in 2003–04 some 88% of employees with less than one year of service reported that they were familiar with the Values compared to 86% of employees with more than five years of service. This may suggest that employees learn about the Values very early in their careers.

Classification level may influence an employee’s familiarity with the Values. For the third consecutive year reported familiarity with the Values increased with classification. In 2004–05, some 84% of APS 1–6 employees, 89% of EL employees, and 98% of SES employees reported that they were familiar with the Values. These figures are comparable to last year’s. Given the inconclusive data on length of service, this finding may suggest that the complexity of jobs and the associated decision-making may affect an employee’s awareness of, and familiarity with, the Values.

The Values are intended to provide consistent guidance to employees in an environment where there are fewer rules and increased scope for discretion in decision-making. As with last year’s findings, most employees (78%) continued to rate the Values as highly relevant to their daily work. However, there was a slight increase in the percentage of employees who rated the relevance of the Values as low (from 3% to 5% between 2003–04 and 2004–05).

The relevance of the Values to the employee’s daily work was rated highly by the majority of employees in each of the 21 large agencies. The variation ranged from 57% to 87%, with only two of the large agencies falling below 70%. This is consistent with last year’s range of 59% to 83%. When the percentage of employees within large agencies who agreed that the Values are highly or moderately relevant to their daily work is considered, all large agencies fit within a range of 90% to 99% employee agreement, with 16 of the 21 large agencies recording agreement levels of 95% or above.

Views on the relevance of the Values to daily work continued to vary by sex. A higher percentage of women (81%) than men (74%) rated the relevance of the Values to daily work as high. Views also differed by age, with those aged under 25 years (64%) less likely than employees in other age groups (ranging from 76% to 80%) to rate the relevance of the Values to daily work as high.

For the second consecutive year the proportion of employees who rated the relevance of the Values to daily work as high increased with classification level. In 2004–05, some 77% of APS 1–6 employees, 80% of EL employees and 92% of SES employees rated the relevance of the Values to their daily work as high.

Although not significant, the data indicates that employees in small agencies were not as likely to agree that the Values were highly relevant to their daily work. This may be linked to the training history of small agencies. Table 7.1 shows that in each of the last three years a smaller proportion of small agencies have used various learning and development options in relation to the Values and the Code compared to medium and large agencies. For further discussion on learning and development in small agencies see Chapter 10.

This year there was no significant difference between ACT-based employees and other APS employees in their estimate of the relevance of the Values to their daily work (79% compared to 76%—although not significant, an improvement since last year in the result for employees located in the ACT).

Consistent with last year’s results, views about the relevance of the Values to daily work were positively correlated with familiarity with the Values.

The level of agreement of employees that other employees act in accordance with the Values remained quite high. Levels of agreement that ‘colleagues’ and ‘immediate managers’ act in accordance with the Values continue to remain similar to each other and across years (around 87%).

The difference between the proportions of employees in large, medium or small agencies who agreed that in their experience the most senior managers acted in accordance with the Values was not significantly different (i.e. 69% of employees in large agencies, 72% of employees in medium agencies, and 71% of employees in small agencies).

Responses continue to indicate lower levels of confidence that the most senior managers act in accordance with the Values compared to levels of confidence in colleagues and immediate managers. Although the change is not significant between 2003–04 and 2004–05, employee confidence on this issue has steadily increased over the past three years from 63% in 2002–03, to 68% last year and 69% in 2004–05. The results for the individual large agencies show:

• higher rates of agreement (i.e. 75% or more) were reported in Centrelink, DFAT and CRS —a substantial reduction from the seven agencies in this category last year
• responses from employees in 18 of the 21 large agencies were clustered between 63% and 76%—in one large agency the result was less than 50%.

2 <http://www.ssa.vic.gov.au/VictoriasPublicSector/PreviousResearch/>

3 Australian Public Service Commission, Embedding the APS Values, August 2003, <http://www.apsc.gov.au/values/values.htm>

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