STRENGTHENING
WORKPLACE INTEGRITY
Notes prepared for a Forum arranged by the
Philippine Civil Service Commission
and The British Council, Manila
© Denis Osborne, 2007
WHY?
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Because there are rights and wrongs…
Because without integrity we are not trust-worthy
And trust is very important. Why?
 Because politicians want to win people’s votes
 Because trust promotes workplace harmony
and brings efficiency and economic advantages
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But integrity is not enough to win trust
We need
competence, transparency, accountability
 And once lost it is very difficult to win trust back
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THE CONCERNS OF GOVERNMENTS
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Everywhere, concern about loss of trust
 In governments, companies, by citizens, clients, investors
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Citizens increasingly educated and informed
Discontent with governments shown by
numbers voting, media comment, protests, tax-evasion, etc
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Wanting services as well as products
 Which private sector provides with standards
raised by competition (though not trusted?)
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Strengthening Workplace Integrity
UK CONCERN: Customer confidence
CABINET OFFICE FINDINGS 2003
‘Customer confidence in the ability of the public
service to deliver effectively declined from 54% in
2001 to 31% in 2003’
(‘Delivery and Reform: Progress and plans for the future’ 2003)
and that was despite efforts at continuing
reform and improvement including
‘an unprecedented and sustained
rise in investment in public services’
Concern about competence and integrity
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HENCE, THE CIVIL SERVICE …
must deliver
‘better services either directly to the public or
through others in the public, voluntary and private
sectors’.
This would require officials to demonstrate skills
and expertise that fitted the needs of the job
with first ‘leadership’ skill for top managers
as being ‘visible leaders who inspire trust’
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Strengthening Workplace Integrity
PUBLIC SERVICE TRENDS
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Traditional bureaucracy focused on RULES
Needed to protect citizens from exploitation by ‘governors’
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‘20th Century’ reforms focused more on RESULTS
Often with many targets that had to be met
Meeting target mattered more than meeting people’s needs
Employees stressed, public poorly served
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Now a new focus on RELATIONSHIPS:
To build trust diversify employment
Aim at peace-making, conflict-resolution, etc
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Changing concepts of INTEGRITY
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UK CONCERN: Targets
RISKS
WRONG DIRECTIONS?
 target measurable activities rather than the important?
INFLEXIBLE?
 ‘I must meet my target’ rather than
‘I must do my best to meet this customer’s needs’
CORRUPTION?
 Hospital waiting lists
 As elsewhere for state farms, factories
PERFORMANCE?
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Strengthening Workplace Integrity
TARGETS: AN EXAMPLE
FINDINGS IN BRITAIN
Report to Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee that
‘several managers made untrue claims of achieving
shorter waiting lists for health care’. In one hospital
‘A controlling mechanism delayed putting patients on
the waiting list’ so that it appeared shorter than it was
(Comptroller and Auditor General 2001)
Those who do this often justify their actions
 targets are unfair, set by politicians or bosses
who don’t know situation or why delays arise
 more important to treat serious cases than trivial
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THE NEED FOR DIVERSITY
PUBLIC COMPLAINT ABOUT OFFICIALS (in UK)
‘They’ don’t understand’, especially if ethnic minority
Therefore get a more diverse workforce to
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‘achieve a Civil Service better equipped to deliver, adapt
and innovate’ – and perhaps
win confidence of all sections of the population
Diversity for gender, ethnicity and ‘disability’
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targets set, initially for 2008 for percentage of
Senior Civil Service to be women, and from
ethnic minorities or disabled
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PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS
Treat Staff As People! Death of ‘long hours culture’
Aim to be ‘family friendly’, have ‘work-life balance’
Diversity of working practices & times, career breaks
1985 – staff protected by unions
1995 – performance criteria: to get promoted produce much,
get noticed, come early, work late
2005 – career breaks, job-share, 11 month year
‘Late again? Not on top of work?
Don’t you delegate enough’
Now ‘policy’, but implementation ‘patchy’
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STAFF CONFIDENCE & COMMITMENT
Office environment – social and physical
 Interactions, space, meetings, decor
Management style
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MBWA, MBGA, supportive, watch for weaknesses, etc
Flexitime
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How do staff travel? Core day and flexible start/finish?
‘Clock-in’? No! ‘Trust but verify’ = random checks
TOIL: Time Off In Lieu…
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Also transport issues…
Family-friendly, but how can we avoid abuse?
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A CHANGING WORK ETHIC
From
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rulers to servants of the people
patronage and favours to equity (no discrimination)
anonymity to ‘name label’ responsibility
secrecy to ‘freedom of information’
from ‘tell nothing unless authorised’ to ‘tell everything unless’
management to drive, control, to encourage, protect
deciding at the top to delegation, devolution
flattery, subservience; to ‘telling truth to power’
because ‘Leaders need to know
what they do not want to hear’
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Strengthening Workplace Integrity
SABOTAGED BY CORRUPTION
BY ‘VHF’ CORRUPTION MORE THAN ‘LF’
(corruption comes in many forms, all sizes, but two frequencies)
To reduce the risks to integrity from corruption
we need to
 Recognise the problem
 Understand VHF corruption
 Choose our objectives
 Balance our methods to ‘Trust but Verify’
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Strengthening Workplace Integrity
RESTRAINT AND OPPORTUNITY
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Change gives opportunity for corrupt practices
Rapid changes reduce effective restraints
 Compare one-off deals with having ‘regular customers’
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Countries with developing and transitional
economies as ‘Areas of Rapid Social Change’
Hence especially vulnerable…
 Initially much corruption came from ‘outside’
– from developed countries
 But with increasing collusion, ‘all to blame’
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Strengthening Workplace Integrity
A CRIME OF OPPORTUNITY
Consider the staff in an office
One short of cash…
makes fraudulent expense claim because he thinks he can
get away with it ‘just for once’
He does
Then he does it again, and again…
he tells his friend, who tells her friends…
until ‘everybody does it’
That is VHF corruption
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Strengthening Workplace Integrity
THE CORRUPTION TRAP!
Then somebody new joins the office staff…
If they don’t do the same, a problem…
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that may expose the crime of those who do
They are urged to join in
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and perhaps threatened if they don’t
as for the police recruits in Hong Kong…
Many trapped in patterns of corrupt activity
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If corrupt acts escape censure, many do it!
Without restraints VHF corruption is normal
Need to explain integrity rather than corruption
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BUT BEWARE …
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Nowhere is corruption zero, nowhere 100%
Perception may not reflect reality
 Perceptions and experience differ for surveys
in South Africa, Malaysia, Nigeria, elsewhere…
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But perception is important, for …
 trust, despair, encouraging the corrupt
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And many stakeholders gain when
corruption exaggerated (think who!)
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Strengthening Workplace Integrity
LF
BRIBERY
Strong Restraints: LF
 A few people bribe
to get unfair advantage
 Few employees abuse
position, take bribes
 Seldom discussed
 People, complacent
 Bribery shameful
 Guilty fear penalty, prison
 if not vhf
VHF
Few Restraints: VHF
 ‘Everybody’ pays
to get fair treatment
 Employees learn, justify,
demand
 Much discussed
 People complain, pay
 No shame
 Fear ‘group’
 Trapped (HK)
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Strengthening Workplace Integrity
OBJECTIVES, AIMS, PRIORITIES
LOW FREQUENCY, LF
 Maintain integrity, trust
 Prevent corruption
(outsiders try to subvert)
 Sustain good behaviour
 Beware complacency
 Warn of risks
 Analogies
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Immunize, inoculate
Repair, strengthen
Defend against invader
HIGH FREQUENCY, ‘VHF’
 Restore integrity, trust
 Reduce corruption
though risk never zero
 Help change behaviour
 Beware despair, disillusion
 Give people hope
 Analogies
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Cure, relieve pain!
Rebuild
Attack/war? Rescue!
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COMBAT OBJECTIVES?
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Where VHF, what measures of success?
 Not to fill prisons with all who act corruptly
 But nobody in prison for ‘corruption’
because nobody continues to act corruptly
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Objectives?
 Help people escape ‘corruption trap’
 Help them change behaviour
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Strategy? Hard/soft; tough/gentle
 To deter any tempted to act corruptly
 To encourage all to help reduce corruption
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Strengthening Workplace Integrity
ACTION TO DETER
Clarify laws, regulations, codes
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to speed the courts, strengthen Public Service discipline
Chase the money
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remember, usually those who pay get the big benefits
Set up stings when corruption expected
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and offer rewards for catching those who pay or demand
but warn ‘corrupt’ beforehand because
aim is not ‘prison’, but change of behaviour
Test integrity
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Strengthening Workplace Integrity
ACTION TO ENCOURAGE
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Sell the idea – ‘social marketing’
aiming to improve and strengthen…
Awareness
 The damage done by corrupt acts
 The success in some campaigns to reduce it
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Attitudes
 Wanting change
 Wanting to help bring it about
 And for that, make it easy to report
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Action
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Strengthening Workplace Integrity
STRENGTHENING STAFF INTEGRITY
‘TRUST BUT VERIFY’
Need to win support of staff to see need for integrity
 Improve transparency and accountability with care
 The best staff hate them – think them waste of time
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But trust may matter more than efficiency
 Avoid excess bureaucracy with random checks
 Convincing staff of need for these
to convince outsiders
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Strengthening Workplace Integrity
PAPERS AT www.good-gov.info
Published papers or recent notes ON
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Corruption issues – Cambridge lecture (notes)
Transparency and Accountability
Integrity tests
COMING SOON – by August 07…
Changing directions of Public Service Reform
 Combating corruption: some unfamiliar truths?
 Text-messaging to improve governance
 New reviews
Better readability, better access, new home page
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