Performance review, employee transfers, and meritocratic promotions planned

The reforms will begin to be implemented on October 15, according to a report in the daily Ethnos, when a bill will be tabled regulating the appointment of supervisors, and a host of other reforms will be tabled by the end of the year.

The plan provides for sweeping evaluations of employee performance on multiple levels, with civil servants being called upon to grade both their subordinates and their supervisors, while citizens will also be asked to fill out evaluations of the services provided at various civil service bureaus.

The new system aims to recognise the performance of the best civil servants, who will then have an edge in applying for promotions to supervisory positions, in the framework of a point system that involves objective criteria as well as applicant interviews, and possibly written exams.

There are also plans for a broad-based electronic civil service registry, which will provide details of employees' qualifications and responsibilities. The registry will serve as a basic tool in the appointment, promotion and transfer of civil servants when there are jobs to be filled.

The registry will also be used to pick the permanent general secretaries at ministries that the government plans. The permanent secretaries will theoretically ensure policy and organisational continuity free from the partisan appointments of successive governments.

By the end of the year, the government plans sweeping transfers of civil servants to cover job openings in understaffed bureaus and wants to rationalise the organization of various services. The first wave of transfers will be on a voluntary basis. The existing and new job openings will be publicly announced and employees will be able to apply for between three and five jobs. The selection will be made by the state's supreme civil service hiring council (ASEP), based on a point system.

The reform plan also entails wage cuts for MPs, general secretaries, and elected local government positions. This will lead to cuts for other civil servants whose salary schedule is linked to that of the above categories.

The government plans to upgrade the National Centre of Public Administration, now a training school, so that it can serve as the state's central advisory council that will evaluate the effectiveness of policy implementation.

As for 2016, the administrative reform provides for the streamlining of salaries that fall under special wage scales with higher wages or stipends such as judges, the state legal council, coroners, university staff, technical school professors, national health service doctors, police, the coast guard and the military.

The government hopes to reduce the current 20 professions entitled to special wage scales to only ten by next year.

The aim here is to reduce the payment of traditional stipends and bonuses in a host of categories and professions to just four types of bonuses in the entire civil service – the bonus for "positions of responsibility", for jobs with occupational health hazards, family related stipends, and a bonus for motivation to achieve targets.

The remaining bonuses and stipends will be incorporated into the civil servant's core salary, which is expected to result in wage cuts of 3-5 percent, due to the employee's higher insurance contribution on the increased core salary.

thetoc.gr