Officers from the Public Service Commission have been conducting awareness sessions with Ministries and Departments regarding the new Annual Performance Assessment (APA) criteria to be used service wide for all established and un-established officers.
The Public Service Commission permanent secretary Mr Parmesh Chand said the APA was a more transparent mode of assessment with both the Supervisors and the Officers being assessed having an open dialogue on the rating of the Officer by also citing his or her evidence of achievements.
“One of the prominent features of this assessment is that civil servants will also be assessed on their adherence to the PSC Code of Conduct which addresses indiscipline in the civil service.”
Mr Chand added that the previous assessment criterion was open to subjectivity. The objective of the APA is to accurately document and monitor the performance of officers on a quarterly basis. The exchange of information during the quarterly monitoring between the officer and his or her supervisor will also pave the way for professional advice to be provided during cases of underperformance.
“With this evidence based assessment, the performance gaps of an officer will be identified and addressed.”
In 2011, the APA model was piloted in the PSC, Ministry of Agriculture, Ministry of Education, Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Works and Transport for contracted officers only.
Since January this year, awareness sessions have been conducted to more than 2,200 civil servants in Rotuma, Kadavu, Levuka and the Lau Group. Presentations were also done to teachers during the Principal’s Conference in April as well as to Schools in the Suva-Nausori corridor.
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