"Firms wary about hiring public sector staff"

[Tom55]

Soovy said:

Our company has had a load of CVs from ex Labour MPs and their lackeys/staff/general hangers on.

We've had a few of them in for interviews in just for sts and giggles. Never before have I seen such a huge selection of st suits, st shoes, st ties and monumentally st candidates.


We wouldn't touch anyone who's got laid off by the public sector. You've got to be HOPELESS to get fired from it.

wow Soovy you really are the voice of the Daily Mail

[bga]

Some of my 4 best hires have been ex-public sector staff. The key is to find the staff who are under-appreciated and underpaid before they realise it themselves. The political wranglings in the PS give a good experience for the same petty behaviour in the private sector.

[Saddle bum]

Zod said:

pugwash4x4 said:

Saddle bum said:

pugwash4x4 said:

Saddle bum said:

As most public sector workers, especially in middle management positions, are better trained than those in the private sector, one can understand the animosity towards them. The public sector has more funds to ensure a wider training regime, whilst most commercial organisations hire in the expertise they require rather than train for it.

Non professional senior management in the private sector are nothing short of barrow boys in a smart suit. The senior Civil Service are all degree trained and are bloody good at their job, albeit considering they are answering to politicians, who are, in general, woeful when it comes to academic achievement.

Hmm this is up there for candidacy of most delusional post of the year.....

As with all my postings on all topics, this was not put up as a subject for discussion, but as a statement of fact.

Most peoples experience of public sector workers stems from dealing with your Council Tax or a local parking fine, hardly the best example.

Ooh get you, mr Megolamania.......

A perfect example of public sector misplaced arrogance.

It takes some arrogance to shake loose the ingrained belief: "Private Sector - good, Public Sector - bad. My experience as a project Engineer working with contractors in the private sector did not fill me confidence. All private companies are run by accountants, despite the product, which may be one of enormous technical complexity. The quality of the engineering staff was, to say the least, basic.

All will soon see the quality of the services provided by the private sector as public bodies are privatised - if they are provided at all.

[eharding]

Saddle bum said:

As with all my postings on all topics, this was not put up as a subject for discussion, but as a statement of fact.

Be sure to put that on your CV. Somewhere near the top.

Prospective employers really appreciate it when you come across as a didactic knob within the first couple of paragraphs, as it saves them the trouble of wading through the rest of the crap.

[Isaac Newton]

Saddle bum said:

My experience as a project Engineer working with contractors in the private sector did not fill me confidence. All private companies are run by accountants, despite the product, which may be one of enormous technical complexity. The quality of the engineering staff was, to say the least, basic.

All will soon see the quality of the services provided by the private sector as public bodies are privatised - if they are provided at all.

Have you ever considered the fact that you may just have seen a piss poor private company full of stty engineers? It does not set any sort of benchmark.

In my experience public bodies are run with a bottomless pit of money and there is literally no incentive to address any mistakes that happen because it's easier to just sign things off. This is from my own experience and from various things I've seen in the news (defense and IT contracts come to mind).

I work as a project engineer and do work for companies that used to be public bodies and are now private, and for similar sized companies that have always been private and there is a clear difference.

The private companies we work with that provide a service to the population would cease to exist very quickly if they failed to meet their regulatory targets.

[sleep envy]

eharding said:

Saddle bum said:

As with all my postings on all topics, this was not put up as a subject for discussion, but as a statement of fact.

Be sure to put that on your CV. Somewhere near the top.

[Saddle bum]

Isaac Newton said:

Saddle bum said:

My experience as a project Engineer working with contractors in the private sector did not fill me confidence. All private companies are run by accountants, despite the product, which may be one of enormous technical complexity. The quality of the engineering staff was, to say the least, basic.

All will soon see the quality of the services provided by the private sector as public bodies are privatised - if they are provided at all.

Have you ever thought that you may just have seen a piss poor private company full of stty engineers? It does not set any sort of benchmark.

In my experience public bodies are run with a bottomless pit of money and there is literally no incentive to address any mistakes that happen because it's easier to just sign things off. This is from my own experience and from various things I've seen in the news (defense and IT contracts come to mind).

I work as a project engineer and do work for companies that used to be public bodies and are now private, and for similar sized companies that have always been private and there is a clear difference.

The private companies we work with that provide a service to the population would cease to exist very quickly if they failed to meet their regulatory targets.

Historically, the Public Sector provided services to the public, the Private Sector still is a commercial operation driven by profit and the over-riding priority to satisfy the shareholders. Services are provided out of taxation and because of this the bodies providing them are subject to changes in the political wind direction and the never ending need to ensure value for money. Privatisation always chucks the baby out with the bathwater, the Transport infrastructure is a perfect example, buses and trains are a clusterf**k. Private companies cannot possibly provide adequate public services when the bottom line of the accounts is ever present. Public servants are trained to provide a service and that influences the way they think.

I have experienced the privatisation of a public body. The major consideration for those at a certain level was the sort of car they would be given, they immediately became like pigs at the trough. At the same time some became little Hitlers, bullying their staff like it was the thing to do in "Private industry". In the fullness of time, it was they that got the chop whilst middle and lower management survived because that was where all the expertise lay.

If the public expect to receive continuance of service from privatised bodies, they are going to be sadly mistaken, unless of course they are prepared to pay up.

[Zod]

Oh, well at least you've now shown your true colours as a "public sector always best" type.

It is, of course, utter nonsense. Remind me how long it took to get a phone installed (two models including the very modern trim phone). The trains were great of course. Having no choice of utilities provider was much better than the current situation naturally.

[MilnerR]

The guys and girls on the shop floor probably have a reasonable chance of being absorbed into the private sector. However the middle manager/teamleader no-marks are going to struggle. The majority of redundancies in my company (a percentage that would have a public sector union reaching for the ballots) have come from middle management. Cutting layers and trusting your performing staff to get on with the job seems to be the strategy. The bottom line is if you're useful and can do the job then you're alright.

[rs1952]

Whenever threads like these come up, I wonder where much of the detailed information on the public/ private sector debate comes from. As somebody has already said, if your experience of the public sector is simply paying your Council Tax or arguing a parking ticket then you ain't really very qualified to comment further. Unless of course you get your deep insight from the Mail or the Telegraph, in which case there's little hope for you but its not going to stop you spouting.

Just looking at the last 30 years, I worked in the public sector 1980-95 (whilst also working my arse off as a self-employed entertainer in the evenings so that tends to undermine the "work shy" brush being applied to all and sundry). I worked as self employed in those years because the salary I got from the Council I worked for was crap.

That same Council was also paying "market supplements" (aka "Golden handcuffs") to certain grades of staff such as Surveyors, Architects, lawyers and Development staff because they couldn't keep good staff away from the better salaries that were on offer in the private sector with the basic salaries they were paying. That tends to undermine the "public setor always pays better" argument.

I joined the private sector in 1995 and stayed there unti 2004 - I had been in the Housing department of that Council and we were "privatised." The first appointments after privatisation included one HR Manager and one Finance Manager, both women who had worked in the private sector all their lives. They both got the bullet within 6 months because they turned out to be incompetent wasters. Or perhaps they were expecting to find a "doddle" in an ex-local authority organisation and were surprised when they didn't find one? Who knows? The next Finance Manager came from the NHS and as far as I know she is still there (certainly was 2 years ago).

Since 2004 I have been a self-employed consultant and Surveyor in the private sector. My personal experience is that I have found many more people with the work ethic "never do today what you can put off until tomorrow" in the private sector than I ever found in the public sector. And I have found them in some of the largest building contracting firms in the country.

Just my personal experience

[LooneyTunes]

Zod said:

Oh, well at least you've now shown your true colours as a "public sector always best" type.

It is, of course, utter nonsense. Remind me how long it took to get a phone installed (two models including the very modern trim phone). The trains were great of course. Having no choice of utilities provider was much better than the current situation naturally.

...and don't forget that the private sector profits to those evil shareholders are always the result of screwing the customer: doing things on the cheap, yet charging sky high rates.

Value? Customer/client focus? Nah... the profit just appears doesn't it?

[Murph7355]

Only 4 out of 10 are nervous?

If I were in the public sector I'd be heartened it's that low!

[adycav]

I've spent some time working in public sector environments, including the Police, NHS, and Local Government. I've also worked with private sector health/secure environment providers.

In my experience, there's far more incompetence, inefficiency and (in some cases) dishonesty in the private sector.

However, the caveat is that this is within a fairly narrow field (learning disability, mental health, criminal justice etc.).

[eccles]

Isaac Newton said:

In my experience public bodies are run with a bottomless pit of money and there is literally no incentive to address any mistakes that happen because it's easier to just sign things off. This is from my own experience and from various things I've seen in the news (defense and IT contracts come to mind).

So you hold up defence and IT contracts as examples of public sector waste?......is it not these wonderful, faultless, glorious private sector companies that aren't providing products that actually work?
I know the public sector isn't exactly blameless, but the private sector often see large public sector contracts as a license to print money.

[eccles]

Soovy said:

Our company has had a load of CVs from ex Labour MPs and their lackeys/staff/general hangers on.

We've had a few of them in for interviews in just for sts and giggles. Never before have I seen such a huge selection of st suits, st shoes, st ties and monumentally st candidates.


We wouldn't touch anyone who's got laid off by the public sector. You've got to be HOPELESS to get fired from it.

I love the way you judge prospective staff on the way they dress!

Next time I watch an episode of The Apprentice I'll have to try to look past the private sector crap they spout and think, that's a nice suit!

[whoami]

Saddle bum said:

As with all my postings on all topics, this was not put up as a subject for discussion, but as a statement of fact.

Nice one.

[craig-A]

anonymous said:

[redacted]

My experience is completely the opposite.
When i worked for the public sector the penny pinching had to be seen to be beleived, i.e. 3 grown men in a Fiat stieshento hire car, with work gear and tools to travel to a job. Cause company policy dictated that was the largest car we could have.
Now happily working in the private sector, pay has more than doubled though the pension isn't so good. I recently returned from a week in Rio after finding out an hour after getting there that i was no longer required, took them 4 days to sort my visa and arrange a flight home.

[davepoth]

eccles said:

So you hold up defence and IT contracts as examples of public sector waste?......is it not these wonderful, faultless, glorious private sector companies that aren't providing products that actually work?
I know the public sector isn't exactly blameless, but the private sector often see large public sector contracts as a license to print money.

It's a private company, its raison d'etre is to screw as much money out of its customers as possible. If they're too stupid to manage their contractors properly it's hardly the contractor's fault.

[mph1977]

adycav said:

I've spent some time working in public sector environments, including the Police, NHS, and Local Government. I've also worked with private sector health/secure environment providers.

In my experience, there's far more incompetence, inefficiency and (in some cases) dishonesty in the private sector.

However, the caveat is that this is within a fairly narrow field (learning disability, mental health, criminal justice etc.).

in my experience working in the NHS, trying to work with other NHS agencies and the BiB was fine but trying to get local authority employees to actually do anything was a joke ... a classic example would be some of the shenanigans with 'section 2' and 'section 5' notices to social services regarding care etc where social services decided when you could file them rather than them being filed at the point the patient was medically fit ...

the real teeth gnasher was intermediate care - in 2 of the 3 Local authority areas Intermediate Care was 'health ' led and the teams would fall overthemselves to get patients signed up and placements / care packages in place in the other it was social services led and it was obstruction after obstruction ...

[Bullett]

eccles said:

I know the public sector isn't exactly blameless, but the private sector often see large public sector contracts as a license to print money.

I supply IT systems to public and private sector clients. Without fair public sector projects take twice as long to produce a product half as good.

The reasons are many, but design by committee, internal politics and no-one driving solid objective based outcomes are a few.
They go through a massive tender process which is generally very poor in the information we are expected to quote on. So we either give a massive quote to cover unknowns (and don't get the job) or quote a 'basic' price caveat what will be delivered up to the eyeballs then charge extra for every change or extra feature they add and then remove again later delaying the project in turn.

Not saying private Co's are flawless they rarely are, but at least they tend to make decisions and provide timely information and don't shut the office down at 5pm each night and 4.30 on a Friday.