Spreading the CAF spirit in the Republika Srpska!

Dalibor Ćopić, Head of Department of Training, Improving Service Delivery and Analytical Affairs, Civil Service Agency of Republika Srpska, Bosnia and Herzegovina 

Given that improving the quality of service delivery and introducing tools and standards for QM in public administration is recommended in many documents dealing with public administration reform, the Civil Service Agency of the Republika Srpska – in cooperation with the Ministry of Administration and Local Self-Government – considered options for introducing quality standards in the administration of the Republika Srpska and concluded that the CAF is the most appropriate method for its introduction.

On 3rd August 2017, the Government of the Republika Srpska instructed the CSA of the Republika Srpska to apply to KDZ for support in the introduction of the CAF, to transfer the acquired knowledge to all interested administrative bodies and actively work to improve QM and the implementation of the CAF in administration as a free and an easy-to-use tool. In this way, the CSA positioned itself as a resource centre for the introduction of the CAF in the administration of the Republika Srpska. The CSA employees working in the Department of Training, Improving Service Delivery and Analytical Affairs have undergone train-the-trainer activities organised by GIZ and are continuously working to improve their knowledge and skills in this area. With the help of KDZ experts, the CAF has been implemented in the CSA. The agency then assisted in the implementation of the CAF in the Statistics Institute of the Republika Srpska and the Ministry of Energy and Mining. Further implementations – e.g. in the Republic Administration for Geodetic and Property Affairs – are in progress. After the promotion of the CAF and the positive experiences of institutions in which CAF has been implemented, increasingly more institutions have expressed their interest and need for its implementation. In addition to continuing the initiated activities, CSA plans to continue working on building necessary capacities, expanding a network of officials trained to apply and supporting further popularisation of the use of the CAF model in as many institutions as possible. The goal is primarily to use members of self-assessment groups of institutions that have implemented the CAF who express a readiness and interest to provide mentoring assistance to interested institutions in the introduction of the CAF as a basis for the selection of mentors for other institutions. The lighthouse project of the CAF in CSA as well as multiple efforts of CSA through information, training and coaching of leadership and PA experts have resulted in strong interest among public administrations in the Republika Srpska.

Vision work and team-building with the CAF!

Saša Savičić Counsellor for Legal Affairs and European Integration Sector for Legal Affairs and European Integration Ministry of Energy and Mining of the Republika Srpska, Bosnia and Herzegovina

How it all started The Ministry of Energy and Mining (MEM) of the Republic of Srpska decided to improve systematic QM. Our internal strategic documents set goals to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of the organisation and key work processes. In addition, the working atmosphere in the ministry was saturated with the old way of solving communication challenges among employees or – to be honest – not solving these challenges due to the prevailing mentality that excluded cooperation and coordination, namely the silo mentality. And then came the CAF ... The CAF methodology revealed to us a tool that we lacked and the first steps on that path could begin. We knew that the CAF was the first European overall QM instrument specifically designed for the public sector and developed by the public sector, and we wanted to be the first ministry in the Government of the Republika Srpska to introduce this methodology into its management. The CAF was revealed to us step by step by Sanja Tajisić and Dalibor Ćopić from the Civil Service Agency of Republika Srpska (CSAA) and CAF experts from KDZ. What we discovered The process of self-assessment required by the CAF can be very interesting, but also painful. The depth of insight into all of the questions from the CAF questionnaire revealed several skeletons in the closet, which we had deliberately pushed into remote corners of the ministry and built relationships on, which were essentially structural errors. The CAF asked us to face our fears, broken relationships, alienated organisational units, stereotypes and prejudices about our colleagues, our unmet needs and cries for change, for the better! From May 2019 to May 2020, we have come a long way in CAF steps: from starting with the CAF training to the CAF action plan, which we called "Ticket to the Moon and Back", inspired by the song of the Australian band Savage Garden. Indeed, this song – like the CAF after all – deals with relationships between people, which can be such an inspiration that even the moon is not far away! Working to develop an inspiring work environment at the ministry is a challenge for the strongest among us. Tough work, with many obstacles, marginalised and underestimated: "It is a tree whose roots are bitter and whose fruits are fragrant" (Iranian proverb). Chapter 4: Results from CAF implementation in the Western Balkans 229 However, the CAF is like water, as it deepens even the hardest rocks and bypasses all obstacles. By using the CAF methodology, we have re-learned that change must be small, lasting, and that we must begin to change ourselves.

What we want and what we don't want The CAF has helped us to discover that we want to focus entirely on the satisfaction of employees and service users of the ministry (citizens and partners): ▪ We want to play while we work. ▪ We want to laugh while we work. ▪ We want to be water, not stone. ▪ We don't want everything to stay as it was before and that's enough to start with. Of course, it will not be easy. The silo mentality is our great enemy, but today we are much more ready to take the path of fighting it than we were yesterday, when we did not even know about the CAF methodology and the support that it provides to us. There is also something else we do not want: we do not want to fix the whole world. We cannot do that, but we can and want to fix ourselves. Of course, we will not give up, but this is another song: "Never Give Up" (Sia Furler).

The CAF for pushing public sector reform!

Marija Hajduković, Chief of Directorate for Management and Monitoring of the Public Administration Reform Process Directorate for Good Public Admininstraoitn and Activities of Non-Governmental Organisations, Ministry of Public Administration of Montenegro

The Directorate for Good Public Administration and Activities of NonGovernmental Organisations is a recently-established directorate in the Montenegro Ministry of Public Administration (MPA). Its mission is to develop and improve the quality of work of public administration as well as improving cooperation between state administration bodies and NGOs. The directorate is structured in three directorates: the directorate for managing and monitoring the process of public administration reform, the directorate for cooperation with NGOs and the directorate for registration, a record of NGOs and political parties, with twelve employees overall.

Bearing in mind the devotion to the successful implementation of the public administration reform and the fact that the whole new team of employees is involved, the CAF project was also beneficial in improving service delivery. Within its strategic framework and scope of activities, the following objectives and results were focused on by implementing the CAF in the organisation: ▪ performing the CAF in accordance with the European requirements of the CAF quality label; ▪ deepening practical knowledge of the employees of the CAF self-assessment group in MPA with the principles of QM; ▪ developing strengths, weaknesses and improvement measures of MPA in a self-assessment process with the employees; ▪ based on a structured action plan, implementing sustainable improvement actions and strengthening the overall QM culture in MPA; ▪ enabling the CAF self-assessment Group of MPA to implement the CAF by themselves.

The need to think about the introduction of the CAF in MPA was primarily recognised in the 2016 public administration reform strategy, where it was noted that a QM system should be implemented in the state administration to improve management and governance in public administration. One important strategic objective of the CAF implementation was to make proposals for the further development of MPA's policies, which will help to achieve more efficient organisations and accountability in the public administration system and drafting a new strategic document in the field of public administration reform, which is planned for the 2021- 2025 period.

In cooperation with ReSPA and the Centre for Public Administration Research (KDZ), the project management and planned activities were set up, CAF training for employees was conducted, and a CAF action plan and defined short- and long-term goals relating to the improvement of work processes in the organisation itself were developed. The application and implementation of actions from the CAF action plan effected positive results concerning the optimisation of work processes. For example, one of the identified actions was to improve the work process through the continuous development and promotion of work through IT tools.

We are convinced that the CAF fosters the awareness that it is necessary to evaluate and implement new business procedures for better service delivery to citizens. The advancement of the work, the transformation of public administration, the more efficient achievement of rights through the reduction of time and costs are challenges in many administrations, including in Montenegro. In our view, it is important to start with the implementation of the CAF to further develop the strategic and operative Excellence of the organisation.

Implementing operational improvements with the CAF!

Naina Čuturić, Head of Section for International Cooperation Bureau of Metrology, Montenegro

During the course of 2019, the Montenegro Bureau of Metrology (BOM) became one of the first public institutions to evaluate its organisation and services in accordance with the requirements of the CAF methodology with the support of ReSPA and the Centre for Public Administration Research (KDZ).

The strategic commitment of BOM is to improve its work and thus the services it provides to citizens and customers through the implementation of quality standards. In our view, the CAF methodology provides the foundation for good public services and continuous improvement.

The CAF model is a modern, simple and interesting tool whose preparation and application means both improving business processes and strengthening team spirit. It is most important to highlight that the CAF methodology enables an in-depth identification of critical processes, as well as finding efficient ways to improve them through different tools.

The implementation of the CAF model at the BOM will bring enormous benefits in terms of a simpler definition of deadlines, responsibilities as well as the actual business processes themselves, given the specific activity of our institution. We strongly encourage all public administrations to implement the CAF because it is "fast drive" and its application can significantly improve the operations of each organisation.

Better resilience with the CAF!

Ljiljana Uzelac, Head of Strategic Planning Department Ministry of Public Administration and Local Self-Government, Republic of Serbia

The Ministry of Public Administration and Local Self-Government (MPALSG) introduced CAF in 2019/2020 as the very first in Serbia at the time. We started as a pilot sector in the Ministry with the professional support of the Austrian KDZ and ReSPA, and by the end of the process we identified several issues. First, that the action plan should be related to the whole ministry. Leadership, service delivery, and HR are related to the institutions as such, and not part of them. We had some communication challenges due to the size of the ministry. As a result we saw that they exist but if you have a lack of information flow, they cannot be visible immediately and with us CAF corresponded with the COVID-19 crisis, which means that COVID sped up some reforms that were met by the self-assessment group for CAF, something like: the need for flexible conditions, online collaboration, and a better work–home balance of obligations.

As the MPALSG is in charge of strategic planning in the area of PAR, or public administration reform, we saw the opportunity and connected CAF with the new 10-year PAR strategy and more specifically we connected it with service delivery reform.

We saw that service delivery reform cannot be implemented only by legalistic measures, which means we cannot just adopt the law and implement the law. We need a different kind of approach. In that way CAF can be a useful tool – not the fastest one – but a soft measure to change how institutions perceive their work, how much they can be customer-oriented, and how agile they can be in the new changing world. For us CAF was and is a learning process, it's a self-growing process that can improve a feedback, customer-oriented culture, communications, better performance, and in that way the MPALSG decided to dive into the new CAF cycle in 2021 and, not only that: in parallel we are planning to roll out CAF in 10 new institutions in the period of the next two years.