As Accountancy Age have reported:
An HM Revenue & Customs strike involving members of the Association of Revenue and Customs union is to take place on 14 February, over imposed quotas and new terms and conditions.
This has to be put in immediate context. ARC, which represents the most senior staff at HMRC (Dave Hartnett once told me he was a member) has never called a strike before, but have now over a new performance management system demanding fixed quotas - meaning 10% of staff fall in the bottom rating regardless of their performance - and new terms and conditions resulting in those who are promoted receiving a poorer deal.
As Accountancy Age again report:
The ballot received turnout of 48%, with nearly 60% voting for strike action and 78% voting for action short of strike - such as work to rule.
It so happened, and by coincidence, that I met ARC President Gareth Hills yesterday. His position was very clear, and is that these new rules hinder career progression in HMRC at a time when it is facing a demographic crisis as so many of its senior staff approach retirement whilst the new performance management system is demanding that staff divert vast amounts of effort that should be spent collecting tax into staff appraisal. Accountancy Age quote him saying the following, but he said much the same to me:
"Our members are not faceless bureaucrats, but real people striving every day to serve the government and the public. The work they do builds schools, hospitals, libraries and playgrounds. It's work that funds the social fabric of the UK and delivers for the nation. They deserve a fair performance system, one which allows them to do their job free from the tangle of bureaucracy."
I agree with him and his members. As such I think their strike appropriate and indication, yet again, of how far out of touch the senior management of HMRC are.
PS Apologies for lost of technical glitches in an earlier version of this post
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All part of he race to the bottom in living standards for the 99.9%. It’s hard to believe this not by design in order to intoduce neo-feudalism.
The unwashed masses must be reduced to Serf status while nothing is done about the parasites at the top.
This is a Civil Service wide performance management system imposed by the Cabinet Office originating from Francis Maude. Departments have to arrive at a quota of 10% of staff who have to be marked as “improvement needed”.
So in HMRC if you have a team of 20 staff say, 2 of them have to be marked as “must improve” (regardless of how good they have been at their job) -it is basically a ranking system. Yet what is nonsensical is that say by whatever means these 2 people do manage to improve to managements’ satisfaction , then next year the manager of the team has to find another 2 people who have to be marked as “improvement needed”! So after a few years ever single member of the team will have been tarred with this brush – totally inappropriately ! That the ARC members who have to implement the system are taking action demonstrates how intellectually bankrupt the system for assessing staff performance is !
I agree, absolutely
As a fellow worker in HMRC I fully concur. Interestingly, someone within PCS (who also represent civil servants) found out that Microsoft has recently ditched it’s own virtually identical Performance scheme, which was widely disliked by its employees, because they realised that staff spent more time competing with each other to try not to get into the 10% than they did with the company’s competitors.
You’d think that such an example from a ‘titan of capitalism’ would make the government think again, wouldn’t you? But of course not. To Maude his own civil servants are part of the despised public sector and therefore fully deserve to have their lives made more miserable at work. That’s on top of the changes to T&C’s which discriminate against people getting promotion, or new entrants, the pay freeze, diminished pensions, huge job losses, and so on.
Yes, just the thing to encourage people to try their best eh?
Reminds me of that hilarious story from “The Second Russian Revolution” recounting Gorbachev’s perestroika experiment. Apparently, one year, the Brezhnev-ers “Five-year Plan” happened to include a number of industrial washing machines that were sent from Moscow to be scrapped in Vladivostok, or somewhere in Siberia. And, lo and behold, for 4 years thereafter, they had to find another lot of washing machines, to be sent for scrap in Siberia!
Alice in Wonderland stuff then in the USSR; same now in UK plc under these oafishly stupid and cruel Tories. Maude! A character out of Lewis Carrol – the walrus? Or the Mad Hatter?
I agree that this appears to be a landmark event, its a shame ARC hasn’t used its members to defend HMRC’s foot soldiers more! The unfortunate thing is, no one will really notice.
Richard,
it doesnt change your argument, but the ARC did go on strike in early 2012, so this is the second time they have done so. I am sure that Gareth will confirm this.
this happens in all the big 4 accountancy firms, its called forced distribution of performance ratings. the theory is that you are judged against your peers, and therefore if the standard increases then 10pc will get left behind. i have some sympathy as its always a very blunt instrument, but if its good enough for the private sector why should the public sector be exempt? are we suggesting nobody is underperforming in the public sector? Wouldnt there be an outrage if it was revealed that nobody in the big 4 was being seen as underperforming and getting pay rises and bonuses?
What on earth is the use of blunt instruments in human relationships?
It is madness to think they help
And madness to say because some are mad others should be
Microsoft had this “stack ranking” system and some commentators believe it has been instrumental to its failure to capture mobile and cloud effectively – leaving the spoils to Apple and Google.
I heard they are now abandoning it due to the perverse incentives it introduces – i.e. better to be a strong player in a weak team rather than have a strong team with colleagues helping each other to improve.
If there is any organisation where a strong culture or teamwork and collaboration is needed – surely HMRC is one.
Agreed
I think this is just being introduced into the NHS. In the Trust where I work management are proposing to introducce a system attached to appraisal which is intended to hold down incremental pay progression for “underperformers”. The idea is that the system will be moderated team by team if HR see too many or TOO FEW underperformers identified.
I wonder if the people who think this stuff up know the first thing about nmotivation