Why are public-sector administrators so crap?

[longfingernails]

Recently, out of whimsy, I decided to interview a couple of ex-public sector types for a new company I have recently started.

I am not talking about nurses and policemen, I am talking about back-office jobs.

LOL.

No wonder the public sector is so rubbish at everything.

The private sector is going to grow a lot over the next few years - but unfortunately, the ex-public sector employees won't get these jobs. They will go to immigrants, or for new positions, graduates.

They are simply too lazy and in general, too unmotivated. They just don't understand why they should go the extra mile - probably because in the public sector, they never have to.

A pity for them - ah well. They can always march for their "entitlements".

Pretty much nothing gets done - . Have a

I know Mutt.

Similar argument would be "hey I interviewed 2 black people last week and they were SHIT. And I read some stuff on the internet that said all black people are really thick. Why are black people so stupid and rubbish, I'm NEVER going to employ one".

OP wouldn't get away with this, but it's the same logic, and similar MASSIVE prejudice and overgeneralisation based on a sample size of 2.

Bet if OP was in an accident she / he wouldn't think twice at rocking up at A&E and expecting a few public sector workers to make her / him better. Tit.

MrsKwazii You deliberately missed out the second part of my sentence.

It's easy to get something done if you throw a billion pounds at it. If it can be done with £100m, though, it is appalling.

I reckon it is possible to cut the public sector backroom headcount by at least 75% over the next 10 years and increase productivity by at least 300% over the same time period.

Businesses have to do this all the time.

Oh, come on people, the job applicants are clearly fictional, lfn starts a thread along these lines at least twice a week.

In fact, perhaps lfn is fictional, an experimental bot from conservative HQ maybe?

Is this a vacancy for the company Scrooge & Marley?
Were there any wages or was it all bonus?

Why is longfingernails so crap?

What a ridiculous argument Betamaxbandit.

No-one can choose to be black or not.

People can choose whether they want to work in the public sector or not.

Of course, to a left-winger, "choice" is probably an alien concept - so I forgive you.

OP, can you give specific examples of questions you asked and why the responses failed to live up to your expectations / requirements? Genuine question, it would be really interesting to know in what way they fell short. And how they compare to people you've interviewed from the private sector, coming from similar levels of management / expertise of course.

Ah! This is actually an "I hate the left!" thread...

Rumbled!

OP have you worked in the public sector?

I work in the public sector and have seen my private sector colleagues in action. Talk about corner cutting, shoddy work which meets the bare minimum of standards. Because, you understand, profit is King.

I've sacked people when Ive worked in both the private and the public sector, so it's not impossible to get sacked.

You're talking out of your arse.

longfingernails has MN history wrt public sector workers.

Last bright idea was to sack the bottom 10% of teachers iirc.

In short; she talks crap.

Of course AhhBisto

This is for a general IT administration position.

I asked about how closely they were following developments in the drawing up of a particular new technical standard which will have a major impact in this area; I gave them half an hour with a laptop and asked them to write some easy scripts to automate repetitive tasks (a concept seemingly unfamiliar to them).

This is the sort of thing which is the bread and butter of IT administrators. They couldn't do the basics. They were crap.

Even worse with one of them in particular, though, was the attitude. All the questions were about the benefits package (which I would expect, maybe, at a second interview) - but none whatsoever about the job. He seemed to have zero interest in independent learning and updating skills, and just a general attitude problem.

saggarmakersbottomknocker You think it's a good thing having crap teachers around? Why wouldn't you sack them? Keeping bad teachers destroys life chances for dozens of children.

Why the bottom 10%? Seems a bit arbitary to me. Why not the bottom 50%? How do you judge performance? What if the kids they teach aren't traditionally clever so do badly at exams?

Of course the 10% isn't fixed.

Did you know though, that only 10 teachers have been sacked for incompetence in the last 8 years.

www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/only-10-teachers-in-eight-years-are-stuck-off-for-incompetence-in-class-1297571.html

I think in any medium or large organisation, a pruning of deadwood at least 5% a year is healthy.

Performance cannot be absolutely quantified, of course, it is too nebulous for that - but the basic metrics (such as grade improvements) are fairly obvious for teachers.

It's not the sacking as you well know lfn. It's your idea that the bottom 10% based on performance of students should go. Performance of students is not necessarily an indication of good or bad teaching, there are far too many variables.

Sorry, that article was from 2009, but I don't think much has changed since then.

Of course, all the new academies and free schools will improve those statistics immeasurably. Thank heaven that finally there is an expansion of opportunity in the state education system, instead of being held to ransom by the teaching unions.

I didn't say that performance of students was the only measure - just one of them.

It is probably the most important measure though for all "normal" teachers. Obviously things are different if you are dealing with SN pupils, PRUs, and other cases.

And all performance measures should be relative. If it is harder to make an E student into a B student than an A student to an A* student, well, that is pretty easy to take into account.

So what happens when you "prune deadwood" year after year - surely it'll catch up with you and you over prune?

You seem to be forgetting that the "dead wood" are people. Not widgets or stock or foliage. I can see how such an attitude would be good for morale. Or does that not matter?

On the contrary. Getting rid of bad performers lets you hire more junior people, who might not otherwise have had the opportunity.

Actually its not lfn - there are many things that affect student performance, most of them outside the control of teachers.

Really? There'll be a never ending stream of junior people? Why would they join if the employer is constantly kicking out. It all sounds a bit too perfect and neat.

BTW I'm all for getting rid of crap but fail to see how this is a public sector problem. I come across many shite employees in the private sector and no sign of pruning there.

Graduates don't seem to be put off applying for most big graduate private sector employers, almost all of who regular get rid of their crap staff.