Head of Public Service and Chief of Staff appears to have hit the nail on head when he decried the apparent poor ethic and work culture in the public service.

“Adherence to working hours, dress code, official language, codes of conduct and norms and standards is extremely poor,” Felix Koskei said while officially opening the 27th Annual National Human Resource Management Conference at a Naivasha hotel.

Confession that the public service is facing a major crisis in productivity, coming from such a high ranking official calls for urgent measures and efforts to identify and mitigate risks that have led us to where we are.

The situation has degenerated to a stage where virtually every cherished principle, moral integrity and ideal of public service life has nearly been eroded. General norms and ethical values guiding decent and peaceful but harmonious human interpersonal co-existence are absent altogether. Evidence of this can be seen in the high rates of scandals, bribery and graft.

Gone are the days when working in the civil service was a calling that came with self-commitment, dedication and responsibility.

A worrying trend has taken over where those in offices are only there for personal gain and not act as government agents on service delivery.

Many are the times when civil servants only report to their respective offices, hang their coats on their seats before leaving to run their personal errands. There have been numerous complaints over public officers demanding bribes from the public before they can serve them.

Koskei’s concern comes at a time when there are serious considerations over the role of civil service in the development of a country. Employees should not only have to come to work faithfully every day and to do their jobs independently, but have to think like entrepreneurs while working in teams, and have to prove their worth.

The civil service therefore, needs to adopt modern management techniques such as performance evaluation, career planning, utilisation and effective delegation to enable it achieve efficiency gains in service delivery.

Koskei should not only be seen grumbling like any other ordinary Kenyan, but should kick in motion the process to make the amends.