By Jon Ortiz
Sacramento Bee
California’s state workers generally believe their work matters and that performance standards are well-defined, but that management doesn’t recognize good work or hold employees accountable for results, according to the results of a first-of-its-kind survey.
And when asked what words best describe their jobs, the term state workers used most often could be interpreted as good or bad, while adjectives high on the list split almost evenly between positive and negative.
The survey went to 5,000 state workers over the summer and drew responses from slightly more than half of them. Officials have said the results will factor into Gov. Jerry Brown’s effort to overhaul the state’s civil service system.
“We can’t fix what we don’t know,” California Government Operations Secretary Marybel Batjer said in a press statement that called the survey results “extremely gratifying.”
The agency, which oversees the state’s Human Resources Department, commissioned Sacramento-based JD Franz Research to help draft the anonymous survey, distribute it to state employees, collect and analyze the results. A little over half of those state workers, 52 percent, responded.