SPEECH BY MS.

ANNE WAIGURU, OGW, CABINET SECRETARY,

MINISTRY OF DEVOLUTION AND PANNING DURING THE LAUNCH
OF THE PUBLIC SECTOR REMUNERATION AND BENEFITS POLICY
AND JOB EVALUATION EXERCISE AT KICC ON FRIDAY 5TH JUNE
2015
Your Excellency, the President and Commander In Chief of the
Armed Forces of the Republic of Kenya, Hon. Uhuru Kenyatta,
Cabinet Secretaries Present,
Chairperson, Salaries and Remunerations Commission,
Chief of Staff and Head of Public Service,
Principal Secretaries Present,
Chairpersons of Constitutional Commissions Present,
Distinguished Guests,

Your Excellency,
We thank you for joining us here today, during the launch of the Policy of
Remuneration and Benefits in the Public Sector alongside the
launch of the job evaluation exercise for public service jobs. Both
these products are important milestones in the Countrys attempt towards
the achievement of a sustainable public sector wage bill, a process which
you launched in March 2014.

Your Excellency,
Two years on, this Government can confidently look back at the great
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strides it has made in delivering on its promises: Improving Service

Delivery, Improving the Countrys Global Competitiveness and
enhancing the standards of living for of its Citizen.

Your Excellency,
As has been indicated in prior fora, the conversation on public service
remuneration has been divorced from the conversation on public service
productivity. Justifications for wage adjustment, has been based on the
cost of living, rather than on labour productivity. This has resulted in the
seeming disconnect between wage increases and the value addition of the
public sector. For example between 2008/09 and 2012/13, the wage bill
increased by 92%, yet between 2001-2012, labour productivity increased
by only 30%. I am therefore pleased that the Salaries and Remuneration
Commission (SRC) has given some consideration to productivity and
performance in this policy.

Improving labour productivity will require a mix of policy interventions.

Productivity is influenced by the inputs, as well as the business processes.
Business process re-engineering will need to be a continuous excercise to
ensure that we refine our systems and processes to produce in the most
efficient and effective way. The implementation of the Huduma Centres
one-stop solution, is a useful demonstration, that innovations in business
process can go a long way in improving public service delivery, output and
eventual outcome.
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Closely linked to the business process re-engineering is the use of ICT in

the public sector. Technology is a key input in improving labour
productivity. Where technology eases the time and effort expended in
undertaking a job, more can be achieved. IFMIS is a classic example of
how the use of ICT has greatly improved the performance of public
financial management in the public sector. With an end to end integrated
package, processes that were previously manual and tedious are now
executed by the click of a button. This leaves officers with time, to be
innovative, and refine their work processes.

Your Excellency,
Another critical factor in enhancing labour productivity is training. The
government has spent a lot of resources in training public servants. There
is however need to provide targeted training, to ensure that, there is a
pay-off in terms of productivity. Becker, (1964), showed that training was
useful in a firm, in instances where it was specific and contributed directly
to the productivity of the employee. There is need for a strong policy
decision on what areas of training should be provided in the public sector,
based on the functional analysis and service delivery trajectory. The CAPRS
programme, will be critical in highlighting the specific skills gap, and the
training programmes required towards enhancing the same against the
policy and service delivery pay-off envisaged.

Your Excellency,
Beyond the inputs that enhance productivity and performance, it has been
recognised that incentives that motivate performance are useful towards
building a more productive labour-force. The policy we are launching today
underscores the need to ensure that there are incentives for workers to
actively pursue improvements in their productivity and performance. Such
incentives will provide rewards for public servants who perform beyond the
set productivity and/or performance targets in terms of quantity, quality,
efficiency, effectiveness and timeliness in completion of set tasks or
workload. Equally important are disincentives for poor performance.
Sanctions that penalise lack of performance are as powerful as positive
incentives. The two should be applied with equal measure, to motivate
performance.

We should be careful however not to think that wage increases will

automatically translate to improved productivity. As I have highlighted, the
increasing wage bill has not yielded increased labour productivity. In the
agricultural sector for example, 100 percent increase in cost of labour only
yielded 52 percent increase in productivity in 2012. The data actually
shows that there has been diminishing marginal return on investment with
regard to labour productivity for every unit increase in wages over the past
11 years.

Your Excellency
The very nature of public service delivery is that the outcome of producing
public goods is dependent on various actors, agencies, and processes.
Some may be directly connected, but others may be very disconnected, yet
have the potential for being mutually reinforcing. To enhance productivity
and performance, we need to build synergies and adopt a whole-ofgovernment approach to our work. We need for example to see the
delivery of health care, as more than just being a health sector problem,
but requiring the sectors of education; transport and infrastructure; ICT;
water; and even the agricultural sector amongst others. These sectors thus
need to speak to each other, plan as one and build synergies. Multisectoral teams need to be in place, where ideas and perspectives are
iterated using the different sectoral lenses, until sustainable solutions are
found.
Your Excellency,
As the saying goes, what gets measured gets done. A critical factor in
motivating public sector performance is performance contracting and
performance measurement. The current system of performance contracting
not only set out to improve service delivery but also to refocus the mindset of public servants towards a culture of business focused on customer
satisfaction and results. For the first time this year, the Ministry has issued
Performance Contracting Guidelines for County Governments for the
Financial Year 2015/2016. This is expanding performance measurement
beyond just the national government to the county government. The
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process has gone through various innovations and improvements. In doing

so, we hope to achieve a better measure of public service performance.

Your Excellency,
In conclusion I wish to appreciate the Salaries and Remuneration
Commission (SRC) for spearheading the preparation of this Public Sector
Remuneration and Benefit Policy and taking the first step in investigating
the value of all jobs in the public service for fair and equitable
remuneration and benefits.

As a Ministry, I assure you of our relentless support in the implementation

of this policy framework.

Finally I encourage all of us in public service, to see ourselves as

undertaking a vocation, a service that will transform this country for the
better, in our generation and beyond. Jack Lew, the one-time Chief of Staff
of the White House once said I think there's no higher calling in terms of a
career than public service, which is a chance to make a difference in
people's lives and improve the world.

Thank you Your Excellency