Skills for a high-performing civil service draws upon current priorities to meet public governance challenges across OECD countries. It takes a look at the changing skills needed in the civil services and presents a framework through which OECD countries can begin to assess the skills they presently have or gaps that may exist.

Today’s civil servants are addressing problems of unprecedented complexity in societies that are more pluralistic and demanding than ever. At the same time, the systems and tools of governance are increasingly digital, open and networked. Civil servants need the right skills to keep pace.

Today’s civil servants address problems of unprecedented complexity in societies that are more pluralistic and demanding than ever. At the same time, the systems and tools of governance are increasingly digital, open and networked. Civil servants need the right skills to keep pace. This chapter looks at how the work of civil servants is changing, and presents a framework to identify which skills will be needed to produce a civil service which is fit-for-purpose today and into the future. These include skills to develop evidence based policy advice, to engage citizens for more effective service design, to commission services through third party delivery agents, and to manage in networks that extend beyond institutional borders. Each of these four skills areas contribute to a professional, strategic and innovative civil service.

Building and managing a civil service with the right skills requires a new look at public employment and management policies and frameworks, and at how people are managed in civil service. This chapter looks at the results of a recent survey on civil service management and reform to identify current practices and promising innovations in public sector people management. This includes specific focus on tools and methods to understand and identify skills gaps in the civil service, and ways to fill these gaps through targeted recruitment by promoting strategic learning and development. This chapter also looks at ways to ensure a highly skilled public sector workforce finds a home in organisations which are ready to put those skills to use.

This chapter presents a synthesis of the main findings of the earlier chapters, and considers lessons that can help guide civil service reform efforts aimed at advancing professional, strategic and innovative civil services. The chapter suggests the models, data and examples presented in this report show OECD countries are beginning to take steps towards updating their employment frameworks, but no guidance exists at an international level. The chapter discusses how developing the insights in this report towards an OECD recommendation on public employment will help guide countries on the investments needed to make their civil service fit-for-purpose in the twenty-first century.

To meet today’s public policy challenges – continued fiscal pressures, rising public expectations, more complex public policy issues – there is a crucial need to increase the level of innovation in the public sector. There is a fundamental need to increase the level of innovation within the public sector of OECD countries and EU states if they are to meet the challenges of the 21st century, a need which has only been increased by the fiscal pressures placed on many states by the 2008-9 crisis.