Get the basics right to boost productivity in civil service

This past week I have spent a lot of time in Government offices in Nairobi. Things have improved a bit from the bad old days. The offices look better maintained and the staff are more efficient. That said, there is still room for improvement. Three things in particular, stand out. These are: the layout in Government offices; culture of unquestioning deference to the boss (call it the “mkubwa” culture); and the over-centralisation of office operations. Let me explain more.

If you walk into the offices of a private company, you are most likely to find an open plan layout with task-specific workstations, and mostly glass walls. In contrast, our Government offices still have walls separating staff of the same pay-grade and multiple walls separating the general staff from the senior management. This may seem benign at first but it has consequences.

First, it limits the extent to which staff can collaborate with one another or share ideas and feel like they share the same office environment. Second, it reduces ability of the boss to effectively monitor productivity of regular staff and vice versa. In an open plan system, it is a little harder for the boss to be perennially late or absent because everyone would notice so. In other words it provides staff of all pay-grades with ability to effectively check each other.

The “mkubwa” culture in Government was also a little off-putting. It seems like the same culture of sycophancy and unthinking servitude that we see among more prominent public officials and politicians seems right through the civil service.

A few times I was genuinely surprised when mid-level staff had no idea of what the boss’s calendar was like, or where he (they were all men) was during working hours. This scenario arises because of the rigid culture of hierarchy and absolutism that makes those at the top imagine they are above the rules. This is not good for office productivity. The boss is there not be a demigod but to give direction, set priorities and, perhaps most importantly, boost employee morale. The Government could do a lot better by ensuring the people it hires as senior managers in the civil service are less tyrannical and recluse, and a lot more accessible to their junior staff.

Lastly, the “mkubwa” culture leads to unnecessary centralisation of operations, even within the same office. In many other places, if you want to get something done fast you never have to go to the guy in charge. The trick is usually to find the junior staff who does the specific thing that you need done.

In Kenya, things are different. Here, everything, even the most mundane thing, has to be approved by the boss. The culture of hierarchy and absolutism has sapped all sense of initiative and autonomous creativity out of Government staff, leaving them to be nothing but robots of the boss. The sources of inefficiency in this kind of system are obvious. If everything has to be approved by the boss, with little delegation, then the boss will have piles of pending work on his desk. And since the office set up, and the culture of an unaccountable “mkubwa” is so pervasive, the boss never does anything on time. Lastly, the opaqueness of the system provides fertile grounds for corruption.

We can hold capacity building workshops and job trainings until the cows come home, but if we are not serious about these little but important aspects of the office arrangement, all of that will come to naught. If we dream of truly professionalising the civil service then we should start by getting the most basic things right.

If you have ever been to multiple Government offices, you know things work faster and better in places where staff can see each other work. It is in the places where office doors stay shut and no one see what the other person is doing that queues never move and hongo is the order of the day. Indeed, a common sight on the management floors of Government offices is usually a motley crew of shady characters waiting to see the boss – to facilitate tenders and all manner of illegalities. Bringing the bosses closer to their staff would not eliminate this, but it would make it more visible. The boss would have to do it elsewhere, thereby raising the cost of corruption for the boss. And that would be a good thing.