In an interview with SOO EWE JIN, the Chief Secretary to the Government Tan Sri Mohd Sidek Hassan outlines his priorities and the challenges that must be faced for the new year and beyond.
THE Chief Secretary to the Government is a man in a hurry. He is aware of the paradigm shift whereby not only the public is more demanding of the performance of the civil servants but the civil servants themselves have to face challenges like never before.
Tan Sri Mohd Sidek Hassan looks back at 2007 with a sense of pride because it is clear that the various measures taken to improve the government delivery system have been fruitful. “We are not talking about perception here, but real improvements at all levels,” he said.
There is no denying that many measures have been put into place that have improved the public delivery system in the past year especially. Could you elaborate on the journey so far?
Sidek: The journey has been challenging yet fulfilling. What has been heartwarming and encouraging is that public officials at the highest level want change and improvements. The officials at the middle and lower levels have been waiting for this to happen. So the resistance, as you would get in any change agenda, has not been as brutal as I had expected.
The challenge is to provide public officials, at all levels, the tools and the environment to enable them to change their mindsets and work culture.
We started the change agenda by ensuring “acceptance and understanding” through explanation and engagement within. For example, when we improved turnaround time for passports at Immigration, insisted that there must be response to editors, and that we have to engage stakeholders, we had to go into a buy-in of why if such is not done, the very existence of the public service will no longer be relevant.
The mindset change which I keep getting asked about all the time is basically this. The “benevolent public official of Iknow-what’s-good-for-you” attitude does not and will not work in these times anymore.This must and has to be shed and shed fast to a system of listening to the community.
It is in the nature of most people to be vocal in their criticism but quiet in their praise. How do you motivate the civil servants when the public at large are more generous with their brickbats than the bouquets?
When one chooses to have a career in the public service, it is simply to serve the public with integrity. That truly is the underlying career motivator. With this in mind, those joining the public service must know that this can be a thankless job. My colleagues and I have always been resolute that the ultimate acknowledgment is delivering on our promises to the public and the nation we serve.
When we get the brickbats, we need to objectively assess what caused this and what can be done to address this once and for all. Again, going back to the mindset change, like any public listed company, and I would argue that we are as good as one, we need to understand and respond to our investors. The officials must rise beyond the past nomenclature. They are now being counselled and trained to listen and respond objectively.
By the same token, the public must be equally objective in their demands. They too must educate themselves of their rights. We are often helpless when we have to deal with upset customers whose demands cannot be met because they have not fulfilled the requirements of their requests.
It has often been said that the people pay the civil servants and that they are therefore to serve the people civilly as it is their job. Your comments.
I would turn this rhetoric on its head by saying that with a public service of some 1.2 million public officials, a ratio of 26 Malaysians to each public official, it is the responsibility of all Malaysians to ensure that these national assets are effectively mobilised to sustain progress, peace and prosperity for the nation.
Therefore, whilst you may argue we are here to serve, I would add that every Malaysian has a moral responsibility of ensuring that our society develops as we would want it to. If continual bashing without the occasional credit where it is due brings out the best in a person, then I would disagree. As with any relationship, it has to be meaningful partnership of consultation, discussion and negotiation.
Often, we do not have all the answers as we are serving an ever changing demographic and nation. When needs change, this must be articulated through effective channels by all parties. Critics are great to listen to when you are not the affected party. Critics with a “way out” solution are truly beneficial for everyone.
There has been much improvement in the delivery system with regard to those with access to the online world, as many things can now be done via a broadband connection. But many people still do not have such access and many things still have to be done manually. What are the measures you need to take to ensure that there is no digital divide between the civil service and the people?
The public service must serve all and every segment of the populace, nonetheless.
Our officials must adapt to the evolving and changing needs of our customers and the nation, not the reverse.
The essence here is “One Service, One Delivery and No Wrong Door”. By this I mean, where internet and broadband is not available, we must continue to run face-to face counter services and other channels of services, for services now available online for instance. Where internet and broadband is available and skills are not, we need to train our customers to access and use online services especially in rural and kampung areas by providing customer kiosks, education in school, training adults and supporting the elderly.
This is one area the Public Service is working towards in the poverty eradication programmes and initiatives. The fundamental here is to facilitate and provide user-friendly services effectively, be it through the Internet or counter service, by always placing the customer at the core of all services rendered. Our quality of services must not be driven by digital divides. It cannot be short changed and lost by the advancement of technology. Therefore, the fundamental measure required here is to train officials to be adaptable to customers from all walks of life.
Last year, there was a lot of fanfare about the No Wrong Door Policy and also for the phone to be picked up by the third ring (or within 10 seconds) for those manning the hotlines. How successful has this been?
The essence of these directives was a means to an end. It was to drive mindset change to stop frustrating our customers by not giving them the wild goose chase. The symbolic meaning of these pledges are:
1. Pick up your calls and answer them; and
2. No matter who comes to which ministry, agency, department and local authority with an issue, we are to take this on board and address them with the necessary owners.
In the past, had you come to an agency that is not responsible for your problem, you may be given the proverbial, “you came to the wrong place”response. Now the approach is that it being practised, the public must advise us immediately. As I said earlier, this goes back to partnership of public service and public at large, failing which we will not achieve the heights we need to as a nation.
The email of top civil servants are made available to the public at large. When the CEO of the IRD, Puan Hasmah Abdullah, for example, told everyone to email her with their tax complaints, she was inundated with email but managed to respond to all of them. Do you think there is a danger that the top civil servants may end up micro-managing if they are too accessible to the public?
How do you initiate change? It is purely and strictly through leadership by example. As leaders and managers, we must start the ball rolling. Yes when you start this you will be inundated. A good manager will expound and spread the change down fast; first through fear of monitoring then through discipline of adherence which in time will convert to habitual second nature actions.
Therefore we need to first micro manage when driving discipline. Now you will note Hasmah or I, for that matter, have stopped receiving the hundreds of mails we received when we first gave out our emails.
This said, I would still give my email address to the public as with all my colleagues.
We must be accessible. We must be contactable. We must be approachable. That is one of the facets of creating a customer-centric public service.
We are aware of many civil servants who diligently attend to public enquiries efficiently even way beyond office hours. Can you share with us some examples and whether you see this as a trend that the civil service must be available at all times and that work is no longer confined to the office or during office hours?
Your office is not a room or a specific location. In these times of developing technology and virtual office, your office can be wherever you move; through phone, emails accessed through Blackberry, text messages and the like.
My colleagues who travel abroad respond to mails and phone calls. I have seen many of my other colleagues who have responded to emails through the night even after 10pm. I credit that to dedication and accessibility of technology. You need both.
My vision is to have public officials, at all levels, responding to our customers at any time of the day or night, with reason of course. Our obligation as an employer is to ensure we create such a workplace and these measures are being earnestly undertaken you will note through the commitments we made in our Public Service Commitments 2008.
What would you like to say to the civil servants for the new year?
To my colleagues in the service I would say this – To continue to remain relevant the public service of Malaysia must continually recreate itself by challenging definitions and norms. We need to shift our focus from that of only policy making to more importantly service delivery and outcomes.
We must collectively acknowledge that the public does not differentiate between the responsibilities of departments, of local government, nor of central government. Their main focus is whether or not issues are solved and how well services are rendered. Hence the efforts of a person, a team, a ministry in meeting these demands can make the whole service proud. The converse is also true.
What would you like to say to the public at large?
Every Malaysian has a moral responsibility of ensuring that our society develops as we would want it to. If we do not take up this responsibility and acknowledge our role in society, then we must recognise our complicity and guilt in allowing for the deterioration to standards of accountability. The civil society must take pains in understanding the rule of law clearly. It must understand its rights without ambiguity. The robustness of the services’ integrity is very dependent on public servants as well as the public who are served by the service.
