After reading an opinion piece in the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper), titled “Police officer risks his life, but gets a Grade B in his performance evaluation, showing the absurdity of the evaluation system for civil servants,” I share the same feelings.
I started my service as a military officer after I graduated from a military academy, and I never received a “demerit” or “warning.” My performance evaluation was consistently at least Grade A, year in and year out. This means I was always able to receive an extra one-month bonus annually.
A limit is placed on the percentage of evaluations graded “Excellent” (higher than Grade A) or above, but there is no limit on the percentage of Grade A evaluations or below, the Regulations on Performance Evaluations for Officers, Non-Commissioned Officers and Volunteer Soldiers of the Armed Forces (國軍志願役軍官士官及志願士兵考績作業規定) say. This means that as long as you have not made a big mistake in over a year, your evaluation result would be at least a Grade A, and you could obtain the bonus.
This is not the case for Taiwan’s civil servants. Civil servants are subject to the “25 percent Grade B” minimum by law. Although supervisors evaluate their staff every year, such assessments are neither objective nor fair. No supervisor wants to be the bad guy, so in some units there might be strange internal rules for performance reviews, such as issuing only a Grade B to newcomers in their first three years of service.
Given this, many newcomers see little point in working hard for the first few years, because they get a Grade B irrespective of how hard they work.
There was a Yunlin County police officer who sustained a head injury while trying to protect the chief of his police station. As he was still a rookie at the station, he got a Grade B in his performance evaluation.
Some organizations have also stipulated that if civil servants want to take leave in accordance with the Leave Rules for Civil Servants (公務人員請假規則) — such as sick leave, bereavement leave or paternity leave — or the Gender Equality in Employment Act (性別平等工作法), such as a menstrual leave, they must use their annual leave or risk receiving a Grade B, which would reduce their annual bonus by half.
Therefore, although many female civil servants might feel uncomfortable during their periods, they endure the pain and force themselves to work for fear of losing half of their bonus. Some civil servants do not even dare take funeral leave when their parents die.
The performance evaluation system for civil servants’ reviews should follow the system for military officers. After all, most civil servants are hardworking, law-abiding people.
Those who perform poorly and contravene the law deserve a Grade B or lower, but the rest of them deserve at least a Grade A or higher, and a one-month bonus seems reasonable.
By doing so, civil servants would be encouraged to devote themselves to their work, and strive to perform better.
Chen Hung-hui is a counselor.
Translated by Eddy Chang
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