AZ government employees: do they like their job?
Taking a gander at the employee engagement survey for government employees
A few years ago1 I obtained the employee engagement surveys through the Arizona Department of Administration and wrote about how Department of Corrections workers hated their jobs the most and Department of Revenue employees liked their jobs the most, among other fun nuggets I learned.
I planned to request these again now that I have this newsletter dedicated to public records and this is a rather light story to write about compared to a lot of bleakness in state government that usually earns a post.
But of course bureaucracy got in the way as it’s prone to do.
I requested these docs in August. Received one document in October which wasn’t what I requested. Asked for clarification on why this wasn’t what I was searching for and didn’t hear back until after I followed up this week.
“The engagement survey data belongs to the specific agency, and therefore you'd need to submit your request to each agency directly.
This concludes ADOA's response to your request.”
That’s what Anakaren Lemus, the ADOA’s public records manager, told me. She is also a staffer of the Governor's Regulatory Review Council.
ADOA always has these records, but now all of a sudden I would need to request each survey from every single state agency which would likely take months at best and also even more likely result in me not receiving them all anyway.
Personally, I think this is just a symptom of a lame duck administration counting the days until their jobs are complete and the next administration begins. And honestly, same here.
As you can tell, I have no patience for government officials doing a poor enough job for basic tasks. If you earn a taxpayer-funded salary you should not be phoning it in just because you might be out of a job in a little more than one month.
What I did receive was the overall state information (how would they get the state average without receiving each agency’s data as well…?) showing 75% of the state workforce responded to the survey and 75% of them provided favorable responses.
It’s apparently a steady increase since 2019, and in 2021 they added questions about remote work given the pandemic shut down a lot of in-person office time.
If I had to guess, I’d say working in-person only exasperated people’s working habits and moving to remote improved morale because as I can attest, it was nice to work in pajamas on the couch next to my dog. I can only imagine government employees felt the same.
57% of employees in 2022 worked remotely at least one day per week
88% of those surveyed said they agreed that “Remote work has had a positive impact on my work experience.” (63% said strongly agree.)
As seen above, Arizona government employees seem generally satisfied with their work and their position with the lowest marks coming from recommending their agency to others as a good place to work. That number is at 63% compared to 59% in 2019 pre-pandemic.
It’s a little worrisome that 14% of those surveyed claim they don’t understand what is expected of them at work, but I’m surprised it’s not actually higher than that.
92% of the state workforce thinks their job is important to the mission of the agency though which is positive.
Agency bosses should recognize and appreciate their employees more. 33% claim they don’t receive recognition when they should and 25% claim they don’t receive adequate feedback. It shouldn’t be difficult to say something nice to your workers and encourage them. There are enough shitty bosses out there, be one less.
Fun background on why I requested these in 2019: one Republican elected official wanted me to look at the impact a former colleague (also an elected official) had on their staff saying the body they worked at was at an all-time low morale while the colleague was there and as soon as they left, staff began to enjoy being employed there again.