Almost one third of Public Servants are feeling burnt out by their work but over 90 per cent still strongly believe in the purpose and objectives of the Australian Public Service (APS), according to the latest employee census.
Releasing the results of its 2022 APS Employee Census, the Australian Public Service Commission (APSC) said it received responses from 120,662 APS employees across 99 Agencies.
“This represents an 83 per cent response rate –the highest response ever received for the annual survey and up from 77 per cent in 2021,” APSC said.
“In 2022, one in three respondents (32 per cent) reported feeling burned out by their work,” it said.
“Positively, this represents a continued decrease in perceptions of burnout over the past two years (34 per cent in 2021 and 36 per cent in 2020).”
APSC said the Census used a model of employee engagement that measured the emotional connection and commitment employees had to working for their organisation.
It said the Employee Engagement Index score for the APS remained stable from 2021 to 2022 at 73 per cent.
“In 2022, 92 per cent of respondents said they understood how their role contributed to achieving an outcome for the Australian public (90 per cent in 2021),” the Commission said.
“Respondents also reported they believed strongly in the purpose and objectives of the APS (85 per cent in 2022; 82 per cent in 2021).”
It said the majority of respondents (83 per cent) rated their workgroup’s overall performance as excellent or very good, up from 82 per cent in 2021.
Similarly, APSC said almost three-quarters (71 per cent) rated their Agency as excellent or very good at meeting its goals and objectives.
It said employees were viewing their Senior Executive Service (SES) leaders with greater positivity across all measures of SES performance, with three-quarters of respondents (74 per cent) agreeing their SES manager ensured their work efforts contributed toward the strategic direction of the Agency and the APS (73 per cent in 2021; 71 per cent in 2020; 67 per cent in 2019).
“Perceptions of immediate supervisors largely remained very positive,” APSC said.
“The majority of employees (87 per cent) felt their supervisor ensures that their workgroup delivers on its responsibilities (87 per cent in 2021; 85 per cent in 2020; 79 per cent in 2019).”
The overall results of the 2022 APS Employee Census can be accessed at this PS News link.
