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Chapter 1: Overview

The State of the Service Report 2004–05 identified attracting and retaining Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees as a critical challenge facing the APS as a whole. The report found that in 2004–05 there had been a reduction in the representation and numbers of Indigenous employees, despite an increase in ongoing employee numbers. The representation of Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders still compared favourably with that in the broader Australian workforce, in which 1.9% of all Australians aged between 15 and 64 and 1.4% of the Australian labour force identified themselves as Indigenous.¹ However, the representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees in the APS has fallen steadily in recent years, from a high of 2.7% of ongoing APS employees in 1998 and 1999 to 2.2% in 2005. In addition, Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders have higher rates of separation from the APS than non-Indigenous employees, and separations of Indigenous employees are considerably higher than they were 10 years ago.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander APS Employees Census

To obtain further information about the employment of Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders in the APS, the Australian Public Service Commission (the Commission) conducted the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander APS Employees Census Survey in November 2005. This report presents the results of that census, along with further data from the Australian Public Service Employment Database (APSED) on the employment of Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders in the APS.

The census survey is the first of this scale and significance undertaken by the Commission into the views of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander APS employees. The results of the survey present a valuable insight into the nature of employment and issues affecting this group.

The survey, conducted by ORIMA Research on behalf of the Commission, sought the views of all Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders employed in the APS who were recorded on APSED as being Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander. In addition, advertising for the survey allowed Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees who had not identified as Indigenous to choose to participate. In all, 1554 valid responses were received, representing a response rate of 59% of the identified population. It is important to note, however, that except for those who contacted the Commission directly to participate, the survey could not be sent to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees who had not identified as Indigenous within their agency. Information on the survey methodology is contained in the appendix to this report.

Where possible, the report compares results from the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employee survey with results for the APS as a whole from the 2005 State of the Service employee survey. In making comparisons, the different nature of the two surveys needs to be borne in mind. In particular, while the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employee survey is a census of all employees identifying as Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander in the APS, and therefore not subject to sampling error, the State of the Service employee survey is a sample survey, based on a sample of 6160 APS employees.

In addition, the different demographic and classification profile of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander APS population compared to the overall APS population is likely to account for some of the differences observed between the two groups. In particular, as discussed in more detail in Chapter 2, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees have a lower classification profile than other APS employees, are less likely to work in the ACT, and have lower levels of educational qualifications. Differences in results between the two populations may be affected by these issues as well as issues specific to Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders. The six month difference in the timing of the two surveys may also account for some differences.

APS Employment and Capability Strategy for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Employees

The census and this report are part of the APS Employment and Capability Strategy for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Employees. This strategy has been developed in response to challenges arising from emerging demographic and social trends and the continuing decline in Indigenous representation in the APS, and to support the new arrangements for the administration of Indigenous affairs. The strategy aims to:

stabilise numbers over the next two years, and then increase Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employment in the mainstream APS
contribute to increased social equity by improving Indigenous people’s income levels and employment opportunities in the wider Australian employment market
increase the extent to which government agencies are able to use the existing and potential skills and capacity of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees in order to meet their business needs for skilled employees, including in areas of specific skill shortage and recruitment difficulty
build the capacity of the APS generally to provide more effective service delivery to Indigenous people.

The strategy seeks to address these national interest concerns through a number of different initiatives. These include:

Assisting agencies to address key barriers to the employment of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees, by identifying pathways to employment that allow Indigenous people to develop the required skills and capacity to work within the APS. The Commission is running a pilot school-to-work programme and APS-wide Indigenous graduate and cadetship programmes, promoting the APS as an employer of choice, identifying and promoting pathways for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees, and developing better practice guides on the recruitment and management of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
Supporting Indigenous employees to develop relevant skills that allow them to contribute to business goals and build successful long-term careers within the APS. Existing initiatives include targeted career development programmes for APS 1–6 and EL Indigenous employees, Indigenous employee networks, and an Indigenous exchange programme. New strategies include the provision of career development opportunities through an Indigenous Capability Fund, as well as offering career development workshops Australia-wide at no cost to APS Indigenous employees, the expansion of Indigenous employee networks and the establishment of a central agency and general secondment programme to provide short-term exposure to other departments.
Supporting agencies to align strategies that promote Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employment with their broader strategies for achieving business outcomes through workforce planning and capability development. New strategies include encouraging more agencies to develop and implement Indigenous employment strategies.
Encouraging partnerships with other jurisdictions and organisations (including Job Network members) to develop innovative employment solutions that meet agency skill requirements. The Commission has established the position of Indigenous Liaison Officer to provide advice to agencies on the development of their Indigenous employment strategies, and provided support to agencies seeking to participate in other recruitment and retention programmes.
Ensuring that employees working in whole of government service delivery to Indigenous Australians have the skills they need to deliver effective outcomes. The Commission has, for example, coordinated the delivery of training in working in a whole of government context to all Indigenous Coordination Centres (ICCs)² and is identifying additional training and development requirements to support the new whole of government operating environment.

The strategy concentrates on recruiting Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees to the APS and developing existing Indigenous employees so that they have broadly-based APS skills that will equip them to gain jobs anywhere. It also focuses on provision of supportive work environments. The census survey will contribute to the strategy by providing further information about the nature of existing Indigenous employment in the APS that will assist in the development of initiatives to support Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees.

Key findings

The findings from the census survey reveal several important positive features of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employment in the APS that could be built on in encouraging Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders to join the APS and to develop productive long-term careers.

In particular, job satisfaction rates for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees are generally high. The survey found that 74% of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees were on average satisfied with the job satisfaction factors that they had nominated as most important to how satisfied they are with their job, compared to 71% for APS employees overall.

In addition, 74% of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees agreed that they are proud to work in the APS, compared with 71% for APS employees overall. Sixty-five per cent of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees felt that they have been able to contribute positively to the improvement of outcomes for Indigenous Australians as part of their work.

The majority of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees believed they have the same opportunities to develop their careers as non-Indigenous employees (65%) and have the same opportunities to access learning and development as non-Indigenous employees (78%).

A large majority of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees (82%) were satisfied that their supervisor would support the use of flexible work practices such as flextime, personal leave, flexible working hours, and part-time work, a result similar to the overall APS result. Fifty per cent of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees rated their supervisor as highly effective at managing people, a similar finding to APS employees overall (51%), and 84% of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees rated their supervisor as either highly or moderately effective at managing people.

While results from the survey were generally positive, there are still some areas of concern. Only 49% of respondents agreed that their agency actively supports the employment, development and promotion of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees. This finding is lower than the 58% result for APS employees overall. In addition, 80% of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees felt that their agency should be doing more to support the employment, development and promotion of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees.

There is also some concern among a minority of Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders about their treatment in the workplace. Twenty-three per cent of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees indicated that they had been subjected to bullying or harassment in the workplace in the last 12 months, compared with 17% for APS employees overall. In addition, 18% indicated that they have been subjected to discrimination in the workplace in the last 12 months, compared with 6% of APS employees overall in the 2004 State of the Service employee survey.³

Other key findings from each chapter are reported below.

Indigenous representation in the APS (Chapter 2)

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees are more highly represented than other employees at the APS 1–2 levels, making up 4.4% of all APS employees in these classification groups. Around 10% of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees are at the APS 1–2 levels.
With the exception of 2003–04, when Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders made up 3.0% of all engagements to the APS, Indigenous representation among engagements has generally fallen over the past 10 years, accounting for only 2.3% of engagements in 2004–05.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees were more likely to separate from the APS than other employees in 2004–05, with 13.6% of all ongoing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees separating, compared to 8.5% for the APS overall.⁴
At June 2005, only one-quarter (25.5%) of Indigenous employees had a bachelor’s degree or higher, compared with the APS average of 49.9%.

Go to chapter 2

Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders working in the APS (Chapter 3)

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees are more likely to work in service delivery positions (78% compared to 55% for all APS employees).
A high proportion of overall Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employment is in identified positions, where some selection criteria relate specifically to knowledge and understanding of, and ability to communicate with, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people (43%).
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees are more likely to consider themselves to be primarily APS employees, rather than employees of their agency, than APS employees overall (50% compared to 40%).

Go to chapter 3

Recruiting Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders to the APS (Chapter 4)

Forty-four per cent of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees commenced at the APS 1–2 levels.
While most Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees were recruited through general recruitment processes (53%), a substantial number were recruited through Indigenous-specific recruitment processes (37%).
There was a high degree of support for both Indigenous-specific and general recruitment processes to facilitate the employment of Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders in the APS. There were mixed views about the type of vacancies that individual respondents would prefer to apply for (identified positions, positions open only to Indigenous Australians, or general recruitment processes).
Only 42% of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees agreed that overall recruitment and promotion decisions in their agency are fair, but this compared favourably with the figure for APS employees overall (36%).

Go to chapter 4

Managing, sustaining and engaging Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees (Chapter 5)

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees were less likely to express an intention to stay in the APS for the next three years than APS employees overall (51% compared to 60%), with the difference largely reflecting a higher proportion of employees unsure about whether they will leave (32% compared to 25% for APS employees overall).
Of those who foreshadowed leaving the APS, the top five reasons were to pursue job opportunities outside the APS (38%), lack of job satisfaction (36%), feeling undervalued (33%), lack of workplace support (29%), and poor management (28%).
The top five job satisfaction factors for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees were ‘good working relationships’, ‘chance to make a useful contribution to Indigenous Australians’, ‘flexible working arrangements’, ‘duties/expectations made clear’, and ‘opportunities to develop my skills’.
The top five attributes that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees would like to see in their supervisor were ‘demonstrates honesty and integrity’, ‘works with staff to find solutions’, ‘respects employees as individuals’, ‘sets realistic performance expectations’, and ‘works effectively and sensitively with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders’.
A lower proportion of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees report having received formal individual performance feedback in the last 12 months than APS employees generally (76% compared to 85% for APS employees overall).

Go to chapter 5

Career progression and learning and development for Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders in the APS (Chapter 6)

In the 12 months prior to November 2005, 43% of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees applied for a position and, of these, 76% applied for positions at a higher classification. This is similar to results for APS employees overall.
Forty-six per cent of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees would be willing to leave their home location and/or their extended family to further their career.
When asked to nominate factors that may have prevented career advancement, respondents were most likely to nominate personal factors (lack of confidence in self, lack of qualifications and/or experience, and concerns about balancing work, family and community responsibilities), or agency-specific factors (limited numbers of vacancies at higher levels and a concern that selection processes might not be fair).
The top learning and development priorities identified by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees were communication skills (62%), leadership skills (60%) and management skills (58%).
When asked to indicate whether they learned more in development programmes that are targeted at Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders, general programmes that are open to everybody, or both targeted and general programmes, most respondents selected the response ‘both targeted and general programmes’ (52%), with general programmes (25%) a more common response than targeted programmes (14%).

Go to chapter 6

Relationships and behaviour in the workplace (Chapter 7)

While generally agreeing that their colleagues behaved in accordance with the APS Values (the Values), Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees were less likely to agree with this statement than APS employees overall (79% compared to 87%).
Forty-five per cent of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees had faced a challenge in the last 12 months in balancing family and/or community obligations and being professional and achieving the requirements of the job in accordance with the APS Code of Conduct (the Code of Conduct). Of these, 65% reported that the challenge they faced had been resolved to their satisfaction and 24% reported that it had not been.

Go to chapter 7

APS agency commitment and support to Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders (Chapter 8)

Where respondents indicated that their agency had a formal Indigenous Employment Strategy, only 30% believed the strategy had been effective in improving employment outcomes for Indigenous employees.
Sixty-nine per cent of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees indicated that most of their colleagues in their immediate work area work effectively and sensitively with Indigenous Australians.
A third of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees indicated that they had cultural or community obligations that take them out of the workplace and, of these, 74% reported that they are satisfied with the support provided by their workplace in meeting these obligations.
Fifty-four per cent of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees were satisfied with their overall say in decisions that impact on their work, compared to 44% for APS employees overall.

Go to chapter 8

¹ ABS 2002, Census of Population and Housing 2001, ABS, Canberra.

² Indigenous Coordination Centres (or ICCs) operate in 30 locations around Australia. They look after most of the Australian Government’s Indigenous programmes and negotiate Shared Responsibility Agreements with local Indigenous people and communities. ICCs are managed by the Office of Indigenous Policy Coordination (OIPC) within the Department of Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs (FaCSIA)

³ This question was not asked in the 2005 State of the Service employee survey.

⁴ The 48 ongoing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employees transferred to Commonwealth employment outside the Public Service Act 1999 are not included as having separated for the purpose of these figures.