Government leaders should be working to elevate employee satisfaction and potential

To keep government going through the disruption and uncertainties of the past 18 months, many public sector agencies and their workforces adapted in extraordinary ways; for instance, through rapid shifts to remote working arrangements. Now, as we emerge from the pandemic, it’s a watershed moment for the public employee-employer relationship.

Public sector workers have always been driven by purpose. And the pandemic means that, for many, this sense of purpose has grown. They’re proud of their work serving citizens and communities. It’s fulfilling and meaningful. But that’s far from the whole story. The majority feel they have more to give. Recent research found that less than half of public sector workers surveyed thought their potential was being fully realized at work.

What this means is that government organizations have an opportunity, building on employees’ sense of purpose and trust in the value of their work, to unlock more of their people’s potential to contribute and thrive at work. The benefits can be far-reaching, from strengthening organizational resilience and delivering more value to citizens, to making government more attractive as a career-of-choice.

Leaving people ‘net better off’

So, what actions can public service leaders take to make employees more satisfied and productive? At a high level, they need to rethink responsibilities to employees. More specifically, they should be striving in an organized, consistent manner, to leave employees what we call “net better off” by focusing on key dimensions of employee needs beyond the traditional focus on pay and benefits.

Right now, there’s work to be done. Our research found that while 57 percent of public sector workers believe their employer has a responsibility to help them become “net better off,” only 28 percent of public sector leaders agreed.

It’s essential to bridge this gap, both to support employees today as we emerge from the uncertainties and hardships of the pandemic, and to enable government to reap the benefits of more fulfilled and motivated workforces tomorrow.

Five sweet-spot practices
Here are five strategic practices for public agencies to build trust and performance in their workforce by leaving people net better off:

1. Enable continuous learning: Simple research and data analysis can pinpoint current skill gaps and help anticipate future needs. Leading agencies deconstruct and reconstruct roles to determine which tasks are best suited to machines and which require uniquely human skills. And they use technology and innovative methods to make people’s learning more effective and accessible. This is in tune with what employees want. Sixty-four percent say remote working during the pandemic has made them more interested in reskilling/upskilling.
2. Listen to what your people need: Many agencies can more effectively tap technology to anticipate, predict and rapidly respond to their people’s needs. They can use two-way applications to flag workforce trends while giving their people a voice. Doing so builds trust, by applying insights to create clear benefits to individuals, not just to the organization.
3. Use technology to enable flexible working: As demonstrated widely during the pandemic shift to remote and hybrid work arrangements, there are growing opportunities for agencies to take advantage of intelligent technologies to automate tasks, improve productivity and enhance service delivery. In this way, they can also support flexible work, and open new channels for creative collaboration.
4. Champion workforce wellbeing and equality: Leaders should continually fine-tune well-being initiatives to reflect employees’ changing needs. In the pandemic, that meant moving fast to safeguard employees’ physical and mental health. Moving beyond the crisis, we see many agencies striving to nurture cultures where people feel included, equal and free to bring their best selves to work. The research indicates that public service employees who experience this practice put significantly more effort into their work than those who don’t.
5. Set and share people metrics: Workplaces that advance inclusion and diversity overall help build employee satisfaction and raise potential for innovation and collaboration. Leading agencies showcase their commitment to fairness and diversity by ensuring people metrics are in place and communicated to employees. The objective? Employees should feel free from bias and prejudice and see and experience their organization striving for those basic values as well.

As hybrid work arrangements spread and government agencies face an ever-intensifying competition for talent to respond to citizen demands for faster and more efficient digital services, there has never been a more pressing time for public sector leaders to rethink employee satisfaction and how they attract and retain talent.

The “net better off” approach provides a pathway for agencies to help inspire new workers to join public service, better meet needs and priorities of existing workers and ultimately to better serve citizens through more satisfied and productive workforces.

Ryan Oakes is Accenture’s Public Service global managing director.