Chapter 10: Human Capital

human capital

basic strategies for matching the skills of government employees with the jobs to be done

accelerating pace of change

• World Economic Forum assessed workforce and government and private sectors around the world - they concluded by 2025 that 44 % of skills needed by employees will change

• machines are replacing humans

workplace revolution

• technology has fueled new possibilities in how to accomplish government’s work

• tight budgets have fueled the need for greater efficiency

the struggle to hire workers

• in the first 2 years of the pandemic, state/local governments lost more than 600,000 employees

• workers want competitive compensation, work that produces impact, and workplace flexibility

• however it is hard for government agencies at all levels to change compensation levels (pay is locked in by grade and step levels)

partnership with partners

• at all levels government depends on creating, managing, and leveraging partnerships with many partners that government needs to get work done

• these skills are essential for solving problems, improving interpersonal skills, working across boundaries, etc

technology and reskilling

• reskilling is the process of helping workers update the professional training they bring to their job

• nature of work is evolving quickly so skills of new workers can become obsolete within a short time (big challenge for existing workers who’ve worked a long time at a government agency

effect of automation on jobs

• 5% of the jobs in overall workforce are likely to disappear completely

• if government is going to stay relevant, it needs to ensure it makes the best use of technology with the appropriate employees

• government will need to develop strategies to help workers stay current with rapid pace of change

revolution of financial transactions

• ex paypal, apple pay, zelle, venmo, etc

• stores sue these systems to make payment process easier, track inventory, purchases, sales, and more

• also allows for individuals to quickly send money to each other

financial management systems

• individuals have become used to financial websites for accounts, kiosks, tap credit cards, etc

• government agencies will probably move to financial systems that require less human intervention

artificial intelligence

the use of machine learning and information technology to enhance the learning of organziations and to improve their service delivery

the human capital challenge

• where can the government find the new generation of workers that they need

• what are the implications for losing workers after they are recruited

• as the workforce grows older, the rate of retirement rises, and the importance of finding new workers to bring fresh talent into the government rises

recruiting the next generation of workers

• growing challenge

• government hiring process is so complex that prospective workers sometimes give up before public process can produce an offer

• younger workers tend to be more passionate about jobs in government (issue is getting them into those jobs to begin with)

• its also hard to match skills of government workers with changing tactics of government operations

knowledge society under peter drucker (a management consultant/educator)

• according to him, the largest working roup will becomes what he calls “knowledge workers”

• defining characteristics of these knowledge workers is the level of their formal education

• believes that people are an organization’s most powerful resources and that a manager’s job is to prepare them through continuing education, development, and training

• also thinks workers should be free to perform in networks, rather than strict hierarchies

key ideas for the future as outlined by the Center for State & Local Government Excellence

• taking the initiative to seek feedback from employees and elected officials

• seeking candidates who have diverse experiences and backgrounds

• focusing on how to get “yes” wuth other agencies/departments

• examining business processes to find efficiencies

• developing great managers who are committed to their teams

• developing greater cultural competence

• providing supervisors and employees with the tasks and resources they need to achieve goals and improve performance

cognitive automation

• electronic document processing can help attorneys sift through vast amounts of case ans background photos needed for a case

rules based system

AI systems have become more sophisticated in responding to citizens questions/problems

speech recognition and machine translation

AI is becoming increasingly sophisticated in translating human speech and words at high speed

computer vision

• more sophistication in identifying and tracking info ranging from individual faces to license plate numbers

• the government has also been experimenting with the replacement of paper based identification like passports with human face scanning

robots

capable of flying over disasters to identify problems and track new responses as well as are assistants in home healthcare

chatbots

allow citizens better access to info they need while freeing agency staff for complicated cases

telework/remote work/hybrid

• an important element of creating the workforce of the future is not only defining the what of work, but also its where

• employees who use telework tend to be happier and more engaged in their work projects and they find greater satisfaction in having the flexbility to improve work life balance

• improving work life balance is likely to improve government’s ability to recruit and retain the skills it needs

• telework does not work for all jobs though (ex police)

building human capital through leadership

• developing human capital begins at the top with organizational leaders who focus on building a workforce with the capacity to accomplish the organization’s goals

• big policy without the capacity to make it work is worse than no policy at all (raises citizen expectations only to later disappoint them)

strategic human capital planning

every new policy idea needs an implementation plan and every implementation plan needs a careful assessment of the skills it requires

approaches to reforms

for Democrats

• often means protecting the jobs of government employees, since public employee unions have often been strong supporters of generative campaigns

for Republicans

• often means trying to reduce the number of government employees and weaken the unions that have supported the Democrats

result oriented culture

• As American government at all levels develop more aggressive performance management systems, it becomes easier to use those systems to drive the personnel system and to reshape them to support missions

principles of reform

create a unified civil service, operating under principles while providing agencies flexibility to meet the needs of their missions

job classification reform

• collapse the 15 levels of the current general schedule into 5 work levels that match the knowledge federal employees perform and allow them to advance by improvements in what they know rather than how many people they supervise

pay reform

create a pay system matched to occupations and markets to make government pay comparable with private sector wages

performance management reform

improve the system for assessing employees’ performance by awarding salary increases only to those who exceed expectations

hiring reform

increase agencies’ hiring flexibility to make it easier to bring talented individuals into government

accountability reform

make it easier to hold workers accountable for their work and to discipline or fire workers for poor performance of misconduct

executives reform

simplify and strengthen the executive service, especially by focusing the top level on officials with interagency, intergovernmental, or intersector experience, and decreasing the number of political appointees in managerial positions

recruitment and retention

• every official wants local appointees but predicting who will be loyal and ensuring that new appointees do not have skeletons in the closet is a daunting job

• many appointees have suffered from lack of government experience

merit pay

• a term describing performance related pay, most frequently in the contest of educational reform

• provides bonuses for workers who perform their jobs efficiently

• ex teachers would get paid based on how well their students perform on education outcomes

turnover

• refers to political appointees serving only briefly in their posts (average service of presidential appointee is 2 years)

• rapid fire turnover creates many problems (undermines teamwork)