You are a new employee in this department of particular institution and you are glad you got the job. A few months down the line, your new workmates start asking; why do you work so hard this is the public sector. or they inform you that there are two kinds of salary one is the official salary on the pay slip and the other one is from the bribes.Life is tough and you must make survive, they say.Every thing in you lets you know that all is not well, yet you are just a junior officer and these are your seniors. How is one to deal with this situation? This one thing i know, it is not easy but it possible to influence the workplace for the better.If you beleive what i am saying lets share those experiences,
mary
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Hello Mary. I was a public servant for four years and found it to be a very enriching as well as somewhat frustrating experience. Yes, it was no secret to me that morally/ethically questionable practices were happening at varying scales in government but it also became apparent to me that there were honest and hardworking people who did their best in fulfilling their duties. It is extremely difficult being a public servant because you are accountable not only to your superiors but to your country as well. I think what kept me going inspite of all the negativity around me was the hope that change is possible and I was fortunate enough to be working with people who shared that same hope. We believed that we were all trying to make small changes one step at a time no matter how depressed or hopeless we felt.
ReplyDeleteHi Mary,as an employee at various universities and research institutes,I can also be considered as a public servant as these institutions are partly funded by government. Reading your latest blog, I really do not know what it is like to be working as a public servant in the kind of scenario that you have just described. I take interest in what you write, as I am learning that such workplaces can cause individuals to be in conflict with what is required of them by their superiors and what they truly believe is the way to conduct themselves based on the condition of their hearts.
ReplyDeleteHi Mary,
ReplyDeleteI worked in the public service for close to 10 years and yes this issue of two salarys is real.
In my expirence this came later as i got to a decision making level.
I learnt that by setting standards and not just following standards helped alot. In the process, you make enemies but in the end it pays off as people get to know you have integrity. It was a slow process but by the time you influence one person, others follow and before you know it your team is known as an honest team.
Bottom line people need to know that doing the right thing pays off.
Hi Mary,
ReplyDeleteThat is a really challenging scenario. I work in the public sector in Queensland, at the Queensland Parliament - a place I love to work at. In our city/state/country, this sort of thing can be dealt with fairly easily (assuming you have a moral code). You would need to gather some evidence, then present it to the media or a sympathetic politician. You would probably be praised as a 'whistleblower' and labelled a 'hero'.
However, the situation changes completely if I am in a very junior position (perhaps just starting out), and the job is very popular, meaning that if I caused trouble I could easily be replaced. Also, if I was paid a very low wage, this would also likely be a factor in how I would react.
I would like to think that there would be a structure in place to publicise any corruption that is occurring. I think the best you could do is continuing to work hard, not accept any monies you are not entitled to, and work your way up the ladder until you are in a more senior position. From then, you can, with a clean conscience, make radical changes to how the organisation operates and sack those who refuse to change.
Of course, this is my ideal and I just don't know if this would be so easy to do in practice. But I agree with Tony - it's important to believe that "doing the right thing pays off".
Cheers,
Sam Hussey-Smith