This article is written by Patricia Paskov, analyst, and Daniel Rogger, economist with the World Bank’s Bureaucracy Lab. A version of this article was first published by the World Bank. Click here to read the article.

Now more than ever, countries need strong, agile, and well-linked public administrations — not only to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic, but also to keep routine functions of government running in rapidly shifting conditions.

In moments like these, where many of us are working from home, governments need data on how well public servants are able to do their jobs and where they are struggling. Much has been made of building data systems to monitor the impacts of the pandemic. In parallel, we must build systems to monitor the strength, resilience and wellbeing of the public service. The faster we can identify and resolve the challenges facing the world’s public officials, the faster they can get on with their jobs at this critical time.

In other words, now is the time to initiate a high-frequency survey of public servants. A survey will help ensure effective communication about bottlenecks; foster best practices in government responses to COVID-19; and give public servants a voice at an uncertain time, when they are facing both the impact of the disease itself and the necessary measures of social distancing.

Asking the right questions

The Bureaucracy Lab and its global survey of public servants consortium partners from Nottingham University, Stanford University and University College London have put together suggestions for such a survey. It aims to regularly identify key constraints that can decrease the efficiency of the public administration, facilitate communication and engagement between authorities and public officials, and solicit input from public officials to address problems in this quickly changing environment.

In parallel, the Bureaucracy Lab and its partners are offering their support to any government in implementing a survey via email, phone, SMS or WhatsApp should such support be needed.

As an example, governments may choose to implement a brief phone survey of all officials on a bi-weekly basis. The survey may ask the following questions to provide managers across the service with a continuous diagnostic of the challenges faced by their staff:

  1. What are the greatest challenges you face in implementing your team’s response to the coronavirus?
  2. What are the greatest challenges you currently face in implementing your team’s typical core tasks?
  3. What activity has been most successful in dealing with the challenges your team faces during the coronavirus crisis?
  4. What has been most difficult about interacting with your colleagues during the coronavirus crisis?
  5. Do you feel you have sufficient support for your mental health and general wellbeing during the coronavirus crisis?

While rich information is to be gained through open-ended responses, governments may also wish to implement questions with categorical responses. This may also reduce the amount of time respondents spend on the survey, or some personnel can receive a shortened version of a survey whilst others (such as HR managers) might get a slightly longer version.

Examples of categorical questions that could be used in this setting are:

On a scale of 1-7, where 1 is ‘Strongly Disagree’ and 7 is ‘Strongly Agree’, please indicate the extent to which you agree or disagree with the following statements:

  1. The scope of demands facing my team has significantly shifted as a result of the coronavirus crisis.
  2. My team has been able to develop an effective strategy for coronavirus-related work during the coronavirus crisis.
  3. My team has been able to develop an effective strategy for core tasks during the coronavirus crisis.
  4. Resource constraints impede my team’s ability to undertake its core tasks during the coronavirus crisis.
  5. Resource constraints impede my team’s ability to respond effectively to the coronavirus crisis.

Making sure everyone is heard

What can you do with this data?

If a particular organisation is struggling due to a lack of information on the response strategy, they can be updated. Where they need equipment, this can be redistributed. Where they need training, peer-to-peer learning across the public service can swiftly be put into action. Learning best practice from the field can be communicated service-wide. Where particular individuals need personal support, their managers can be informed, or a member of the team can be asked to become an interim welfare officer. Survey communication will allow prompt response to any issue before it escalates.

A WhatsApp response survey now feels like chatting with a friend. A link in a text message can take your colleagues to a 5-minute online check-in

The particulars of the survey that is right for your public service will likely differ from what is above, but it is increasingly easy to gain feedback from your colleagues whatever questions are right for your organisation. A WhatsApp response survey now feels like chatting with a friend. A link in a text message can take your colleagues to a 5-minute online check-in. Having regular check-in surveys like these have made us personally feel more at ease with our organisations and that our voices are being heard.

While the world invests in building the infrastructure to combat Covid-19, we must take seriously a complementary effort to monitor and support the strength of the public service. Feel free to go ahead with your own survey but let us know where we can help.

For more information on our work and to discuss implementation support with the Bureaucracy Lab, please contact Patricia Paskov at ppaskov@worldbank.org. — Patricia Paskov and Daniel Rogger

(Picture Credit: Unsplash)