Do you think mandatory participation in “Distinguished Government Authority” (for large entities)/“Distinguished Government Department” (for small or newly established entities) and “Distinguished Government Employee” is an important element of DGEP?
I think that mandatory participation in the excellent awards by Distinguished Government Authority, Distinguished Government Departments, and Distinguished Government Employee is important as they form the major components entailed in quality assessment of public service delivery. The DGEP portfolio and mission resonates with the improvement of the service delivery through continued organizational learning by employees on both policies and implementation of guidelines. Improvement of quality of service depends on the enhancement of organizational learning, measurement of performance, assessment of quality, and timely response to complaints from the citizens. To realize its mission and objectives of improved service delivery in the public sector, DGEP requires mandatory participation of the main actors to provide the mechanism for tracking, assessing, and monitoring of policy implementations.
The Distinguished Government Authority, Departments, and Employee form the major actors of the DGEP scheme for the assessment of the quality of service in the public sector. The mandatory participation of these major actors enhances the incorporation of competition into service delivery in the governance sector that lack accountability relationship. Incorporating competitions in service delivery among these actors promote exposure and enhance delivery of quality services. Engaging these actors thus provides DGEP with an elaborate performance scoring system significant in setting organization goals and employee appraisal assessment. The Government entities and departments participation are essential in setting up strategies, plans, and policies that set the basis for implementation assessment and employee appraisal. The mandatory participation of government entities and departments provides an accountability relationship platform of governance on the quality of service delivery, technological investment, office appearance, response to customer complaints, and customer and employee satisfaction.
Additionally, the mandatory participation of the Distinguished Government Employee by DGEP motivates dedication of individual employees to deliver quality services and promote accountability to the governing bodies, customer complaints, and career growth. The assessment and appraisal of employee service delivery for excellence award involve knowledge of organizational policies, regulations, and guidelines on implementation for quality service delivery. The individual employee performance on assessment facilitates the processes of career growth and promotes exposure to various global service challenges. Overall, the mandatory participation of these major actors provides the platform for DGEP facilitation of improved service delivery in the public sector.
How closely in your view the other Emirates in the UAE have been successful in achieving excellence through their government excellence programs by emulating DGEP?
The other Emirates in UAE have relatively achieved high success through established government excellence programs and emulation of DGEP. The fundamental principles developed by DGEP in the UAE government involves improved quality of service, accountability, and excellence through continuous organizational training, assessment, and enhanced competition between government agencies. The process of focused customer-oriented service by the UAE government has enhanced the delivery of quality of service to all citizens across the nation. The customer-oriented approach improves effective delivery of quality services to all Emirates and establishes citizens’ identity. The established feedback culture and facilitated processes of customer complaints through online and government entities with DGEP monitoring promote achievement of excellence for all the Emirates. Additionally, further attainment of excellence has been achieved through the periodic messages of excellence and exposure schemes among the Emirates.
The establishment of DGEP programs in association with government agencies provides detailed and excellent blueprints to both individual employees and government entities, which enhance Emirates’ desires for success. The excellent blueprints provide all other Emirates with laid down procedures to adopt, pursue excellence, and achieve required success. Moreover, excellent blueprints adopted across all the government entities constitute a culture for the delivery of quality services and promotion of accountability amongst the citizens. The objective of the quality delivery of service thus enhances competition amongst Emirates, institutional employees, and various organizations. Competition significantly promotes achievement of Emirates success through training and partnership programs across institutions that boost knowledge sharing and advance entrepreneurship among the Emirates.
The political culture of the UAE government established by DGEP has promoted the achievement of excellence among the other Emirates. The political culture supports and encourages the adoption of the modern system of administration within the UAE that entail quality management and assessment programs. This system of administration significantly influences the level of excellence achieved by other Emirates of the UAE government through the adoption and implementation of the government policies and regulations. The culture of customer complaints system enhances the achievement of excellence among Emirates as the government set policies that require prompt response and action on any citizen’s concern. Overall, the government’s objective to improve service access among the Emirates has significantly increased the level of achievement of excellence among other Emirates.
What specific changes in the DGEP would you like to recommend to make it even more effective?
DGEP needs to make some few major changes to be effective. First, DGEP should privatize and outsource the customer complaint platform from the current government managed approach. In this case, DGEP should outsource the service to a private social consulting firm to enhance real-time engagement of customer feedback. The consulting firm acts to provide a model approach that engages customers on their complaints and dissatisfaction, analyze customer needs, and link them with the relevant organization, or employee. The consulting firm will also provide follow-up services to customers regarding their complaints, find out their satisfaction level, collect information on further areas for improvement, and communicate to the relevant bodies. Additionally, the consulting firm assesses and determines the existence of improved performance, declining performance, top performance, and low scorers in DGEP assessment of excellence award for correction, adoption, and sharing across all the bodies to improve service delivery.
The second change relates to training approaches. DGEP should develop occasional training programs in organization level directed to individual employees. This approach promotes direct employee-customer exposure and experience of service delivery significant in the adoption of new knowledge on policies and implementation of regulatory guidelines on quality service delivery. The objective of organizational level training programs to also target low scorers of both employee and government organizations and help improve their weak areas highlighted. The training approach should involve high scorers to enhance sharing of best practices to the low scorers. Moreover, expert trainers and top scorers to participate in organizational level training, and subsequently on different training lessons. The different involvements of the two groups facilitate independent knowledge sharing and assessment of the adoption of the quality service delivery that enhances DGEP success.
Finally, the third major change required by DGEP involves a quarterly review of performance assessment and recommendation of career growth for employees. The quarterly review of performance for all government organizations and individual employees enables continuous tracking of performance essential in planning training programs and workshops. Additionally, the results provide knowledge on the level of successful adoption of improvement strategies by the relevant bodies. In this view, the results guide DGEP in recommending special staff committed to the improvement of the quality of service delivery for career promotion. Recommendation approach entices staff in all areas of public service as the process of career advancement takes an impartial form. Overall, outsourcing customer service of complaints, change of training approaches, and quarterly review and recommendation of career growth for employees are the major changes that make DGEP effective.