Public servants urged to switch to outcome-driven mode

FINANCE and Rural Development Minister Charles Abel has urged public servants to deliver outcomes through the use of service improvement programme (SIP) funding.
Abel, who addressed the Southern regional workshop on the revised SIP administrative guidelines yesterday, said that at the end of the day the K10 million a year or whatever funding that’s allocated, should translate into something on the ground.
“Regulations and instructions are not here to impede development, we must always be outcome-driven at the end of the day.
“It’s no use getting K10 million, have 100 meetings, travel to Port Moresby 20 times in a year and when money is gone and you go back fill in the acquittals but nothing happens on the ground.
“Let us be outcome-driven public servants. It’s hard sometimes, because you are from the public service and I’m from the public sector where if I don’t deliver something and make a profit, I’m sacked.”
Abel told the public servants from the Southern region that they had to deliver and not just sit around and expect to be paid every fortnight. “In the public service, we think that we collect our fortnightly pay and we don’t have to deliver much, we turn up to work fill in a few papers, chew some betel nuts and that’s the end of it.
“No, my people we’ve got to deliver, be outcome-focused people not just in the public service but also when you go home.
“Let us be people of action PNG because there is so many needs and wants in our community.”
Abel assured the public servants that he would support the Department of Finance and Rural Development and Department of Implementation and Rural Development to ensure that they delivered all the things they were committed to, particularly under the SIP funding.
“When I travel around the districts, I’m going to travel around to remote districts as I did to Ambunti in East Sepik. I expect to see outcomes from the last six-seven years of pumping in K10m.
“As minister for finance, I want to see those outcomes from the SIP and you people need to show me those outcomes because I
represent our people and this is not small money we are talking about.”