ACT PS doesn't know why its hiring

stillflying said :

PantsMan said :

People in the ACT PS are just giving out higher duties for acting positions of as little as a week? What kind or organisation cannot live without some First Deputy Assistant Strategic Coordinator for five days?

And the engagement of people on revolving short-term contracts? No process. No scrutiny. Probably no actual job to do.

It all sounds like jobs (and money) for mates.

ACT PS – Winning!

I do hate this stereotype. Don’t get me wrong there are people in my office who get in at 8AM, clock on and then proceed to have breakfast in the common room and have their morning chat and coffee for the next half hour.

But the number of people at their desks working hard and long hours all the time to get reports done on time vastly outnumbers the few who don’t.

I’m so sick of having people throw the “Oh so you barely work then” attitude at me any time I say I’m in the public service. No. I care about my job, I care about my standards of work.

Very well put. The few bludgers ruin it for the majority.

Not surprising. Despite all the reforms, Hawke and earlier, it is still amateur ville. A poor cousin to the Fed PS, itself an average organisation in HR and peformance management terms.

devils_advocate said :

NoImRight said :

Let the clichefest begin.

Your comment seems to refer to cliche’s in the perjorative, but I would just point out that often things become cliche’d for a reason.

True. Often not a good reason though.

NoImRight said :

Let the clichefest begin.

Your comment seems to refer to cliche’s in the perjorative, but I would just point out that often things become cliche’d for a reason.

PantsMan said :

People in the ACT PS are just giving out higher duties for acting positions of as little as a week? What kind or organisation cannot live without some First Deputy Assistant Strategic Coordinator for five days?

*sigh*

many, many things in the public service run on these things called “delegations”. Whether it’s a delegation from the agency head, or a delegation from the minister, basically it ensures that decisions are made, or at least reviewed/confirmed, by a person at a particular level, if not in a particular position. This can range from routine things like approvals to spend money or permit/deny access to documents held by an agency; to fairly serious regulatory decisions.

Often these kinds of decisions are subject to clearly specified statutory deadlines. So it’s not desirable, appropriate or even sensible to defer these decisions for a week or more because someone has gone on leave.

In these cases, people are appointed to acting positions, in part so they can carry out the role generally, but often so they can exercise these powers. This needs to be documented appropriately (even if by email – eg “I’m sick today, [name] is acting for me until I return) otherwise it can affect the validity of decisions. It’s probably relevant to note here that in the Cth APS (I can’t speak for ACT or states) people don’t actually get acting pay unless they’re acting for 2 weeks or more.

For these reasons, my view is that acting arrangements for a week or even a day are justified.

Let the clichefest begin.

PantsMan said :

People in the ACT PS are just giving out higher duties for acting positions of as little as a week? What kind or organisation cannot live without some First Deputy Assistant Strategic Coordinator for five days?

And the engagement of people on revolving short-term contracts? No process. No scrutiny. Probably no actual job to do.

It all sounds like jobs (and money) for mates.

ACT PS – Winning!

I do hate this stereotype. Don’t get me wrong there are people in my office who get in at 8AM, clock on and then proceed to have breakfast in the common room and have their morning chat and coffee for the next half hour.

But the number of people at their desks working hard and long hours all the time to get reports done on time vastly outnumbers the few who don’t.

I’m so sick of having people throw the “Oh so you barely work then” attitude at me any time I say I’m in the public service. No. I care about my job, I care about my standards of work.

People in the ACT PS are just giving out higher duties for acting positions of as little as a week? What kind or organisation cannot live without some First Deputy Assistant Strategic Coordinator for five days?

And the engagement of people on revolving short-term contracts? No process. No scrutiny. Probably no actual job to do.

It all sounds like jobs (and money) for mates.

ACT PS – Winning!