Raising Living Standards

Looks like we're all headed for harder times ahead. Cost of living is going up, and the global economy looks like it's putting its brakes on.

In our country we've been relatively insulated from the ups and downs of the global market. I fear those days are coming to an end.

The common refrain we hear from the man-on-the-street is "harga minyak naik, barang makan naik, tapi gaji tak naik!" - which is true, since the inflation spiral will simply get worse if salaries are raised to keep up with cost of living.

I'd like to suggest though that salaries are raised via increase in productivity. It can be kick-started by the biggest employer in the country - the Government. Take a hard look at the existing productivity of its employees, sector by sector, agency by agency.

Focus on the high-value processes and functions and figure out what are the outcomes that can be measured (which can be terribly hard to do, but not impossible) and set targets for improvement (e.g. how long does it take to approve a building plan, end-to-end?) on an annual or even half-yearly basis. Monitor constantly to avoid "gaming" the numbers.

These high-value processes should be examined critically to reduce mistakes, "idle-time" when it's sitting, waiting for someone to continue the processing, and most importantly, be automated by technology wherever possible. By automating processes, mistakes are reduced and leaves the staff available to do higher-value activities, improving morale and enabling them to deliver more value and hence earn that higher salary.

Because the Government is also involved in a lot of activities in the private sector (through regulatory or facilitative activities) these efficiency gains would inevitably spill over to the private sector and overall economy, enabling us to do more with less, generating more value with the same or even less amount of effort. Then only gaji can naik, lah!