Public-sector workers 'lack skills for private sector'

StevieJ

amcluesent wrote: »

I'd be happy in the private sector so long as -

1) I can keep 'quota' sickies
2) Lunch on Friday last until going home time
3) No-one ever gets a bad review
4) Numpties are just 'parked' in the corner and not sacked

The only time I have encountered that is in the private sector in London

nomoreboomandbust

chewmylegoff wrote: »

i am a traffic warden

wow ! that's a lot of tickets you guys have flogged in over 6 months. 8 of you- £50 million- that works out at roughly £34,000 worth of fines a day per individual- not physically possible

robin_banks

amcluesent wrote: »

I'd be happy in the private sector so long as -

1) I can keep 'quota' sickies
2) Lunch on Friday last until going home time
3) No-one ever gets a bad review
4) Numpties are just 'parked' in the corner and not sacked

Must advise one of my ex staff of points 1,3 and 4.

Just happens to be ex-staff due to points 1,3 and 4.

ILW

Sir_Humphrey wrote: »

No, I said a major UK industry, not a major UK firm. The £10 million figure was an estimate from a trade association for their members alone, the true figure is probably much higher as it also goes wider than the industry in question (difficult to go into more details online).

The main benefit in our work is avoiding accidents, some of which would cost £ billions. This of course is not measurable, as you cannot logically prove that something would have happened and has been avoided. Nicholas Taleb makes this point in the his Black Swan book (of which generally I am not a huge fan).

I do not see why these firms should not be paying for this service, many services supplied by the public sector to industry are. Or is it a matter that the true value is being rather exagerated?

chewmylegoff

nomoreboomandbust wrote: »

wow ! that's a lot of tickets you guys have flogged in over 6 months. 8 of you- £50 million- that works out at roughly £34,000 worth of fines a day per individual- not physically possible

i thought the convention was that i stick one of these stupid things next to my post so you know that it is a joke. anyway if you were properly versed on the evil public sector, you would know that all traffic wardens are private sector employees of companies to whom the role has been outsourced.

tomterm8

I guess it depends exactly what Sir Humphrey does... if it is consultation, then the public sector should be compensated for his services. If he is formulating public policy, then not. From what he says, it seems to be some sort of third option... maybe research? I'm not really clear.

lostinrates

tomterm8 wrote: »

I guess it depends exactly what Sir Humphrey does... if it is consultation, then the public sector should be compensated for his services. If he is formulating public policy, then not. From what he says, it seems to be some sort of third option... maybe research? I'm not really clear.

I have a vague recollection that it was something to do with fireworks?

ILW

lostinrates wrote: »

I have a vague recollection that it was something to do with fireworks?

Same here, and I think for a hobby he does things like banning conkers from school playgrounds.

nomoreboomandbust

chewmylegoff wrote: »

i thought the convention was that i stick one of these stupid things next to my post so you know that it is a joke. anyway if you were properly versed on the evil public sector, you would know that all traffic wardens are private sector employees of companies to whom the role has been outsourced.

excuse my ignorance, I wasn't aware they were private sector

Hank_Rearden

Loads of generalisations going on here, but the traditional difference between private and public sector, in terms of addressing problems/opportunities (aka growth) was that private sector is output/outcome focused, while public sector has been input/process focused. Obviously the former is preferable, and the private sector has been able to do so easily by looking at profitability, and forced to by competition. Recently there has been a drive to turn the public sector to outcome - or even "Impact" - focus, which has struggled, often because it's not much more than introducing new levels of performance management that are simply cost centres, and expensive and complex ones given the considerably more complex set of targets that they have to work with.

My experience of recruiting from both - into the voluntary sector - is that those from the private sector are still more interested in achieving goals (and often get stuck when the objectives are more complicated than make money), while those from the public sector are more interested in the process (and will typically get to where they were intending - but often the ship has sailed). Prince2 project managment is a wonderful case in point. My boss has a lovely term - "Bentleying" - ie where a team insists on building Bentleys rather than just what is required. We spend forever having to argue for the best estimate of time, rather than the one safest for the team.

That difference in work ethos is a far greater issue, I would suggest, than the specific skills.