PUTRAJAYA, Sept 10 — The Public Service Reform Agenda mooted by the Chief Secretary to the Government (KSN) Tan Sri Shamsul Azri Abu Bakar will focus on five key result areas and be strengthened with 20 strategies.
The five areas are appreciation of values and governance, human capital development, organisational development, service delivery, and empowering public and private synergies.
Speaking at the KSN Leadership Aspiration Programme here today, Shamsul Azri said most of the key result areas are “low-hanging fruit”, but some require medium- and long-term implementation.
As such, he said, the government will adopt associated and integrated strategies in a bid to realise the public service reform agenda.
“Associated strategy emphasises the whole-of-nation concept involving the private sector, while Integrated strategy emphasises the whole-of-government concept which involves an integration of government departments and agencies,” he said.
Shamsul Azri said the reform agenda will be implemented via five approaches — developing strategic cooperation and synergy between the agencies involved, sharing resources optimally, improving service delivery, highlighting initiatives that provide a return on investment, and ensuring every initiative implemented contributes directly to Madani Economy goals.
He said by optimally sharing resources, it can break silo walls between various entities.
“The sharing of information and communication between departments should also be facilitated to speed up the implementation of the reforms we dream of,” he said.
The chief secretary said the public service reform agenda would also be empowered by two key enablers that will help map the success of public service reform — monitoring, measurement and performance evaluation, and total communication.
Under the first key enabler, he hopes the monitoring committees such as the Malaysia Madani Action Council, the Special Task Force on Agency Reform, the Special Task Force on Business Facilitation, and the Service Delivery Monitoring Committee, can strengthen elements of the agenda.
Shamsul Azri also suggested that a form of award, recognition or appreciation be created as an incentive for ministries and civil servants to be more efficient and make improvements.
“Call it something like the Public Service Reform Excellence Award or any appropriate name. I am confident this will boost their spirit to stay committed to improving their performance and service delivery, meet the people’s expectations, and build a better future for Malaysians,” he said.
On the second key enabler, which is total communication, Shamsul Azri called on the government to make improvements to the publicity aspect by creating strategic notifications by taking advantage of various platforms, especially social media.
“In making plans, the aspect of publicity or simply having publicists promote our initiatives, our improved services, the complaints we have responded to and so on, was often neglected.
“In our country, the number of active social media users is estimated to reach 26.8 million, meaning we have the same amount of space and opportunity to publicise what the public service and the government are doing,” he said.
Shamsul Azri also praised the strategic response shown by the Immigration Department on social media recently, which was described as “showing without telling” to convey clearly that the department is serious about addressing customer complaints.
He said the government must continuously engage with the media and mainstream corporate communication teams in all ministries and departments.
“I am serious about this. For me, the media (corporate communications) team in ministries and government departments must master and be at the forefront of cyberspace.
“They must understand the spirit and philosophy of each initiative and aspiration by the government. Therefore, it is important this team be equipped with the latest media competencies, equipment and facilities, especially related to social media,” he added.
— Bernama
