The World Bank has approved a support package aimed at modernizing the civil service in the Philippines. This initiative seeks to enhance the country's competency-based approach to recruitment, selection, learning and development, performance management, and rewards and recognition.
"Strong public institutions are fundamental to achieving inclusive growth and development," stated Zafer Mustafaoglu, World Bank Country Director for the Philippines, Malaysia, and Brunei Darussalam. "Global experience shows that countries with high-quality public administrations, including a merit-based civil service, raise more revenues, deliver better services, and create a more supportive environment for inclusive growth."
The project involves an investment of $67.34 million in establishing an integrated Human Resources Management Information System (HRMIS) along with a payroll system across government agencies. This will aid in workforce planning, career development, succession planning, training analytics as well as standardizing human resource management competencies.
Around 40 agencies will pilot this project including the Civil Service Commission (CSC), Department of Budget and Management (DBM), Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT), National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA), Department of Finance (DOF), Department of Education (DepEd), and Department of Health (DOH). The CSC will implement it alongside DBM and DICT.
Additionally, improvements in cybersecurity measures are part of the plan to ensure data privacy while enhancing resilience against cyber threats. The HRMIS system will be hosted on central cloud infrastructure designed for rapid recovery from disruptions or attacks. This is crucial given the Philippines' vulnerability to natural disasters which can impact administrative records.
"The digitization of HR records and implementation of HRMIS will enhance the government’s resilience to climate-related disasters by minimizing risk," said Davit Melikyan, World Bank Task Team Leader.
Personnel services have been significant in national budget expenditures between 2020-2023 accounting for about 28%. In 2023 alone there were over two million plantilla positions within civil service alongside additional employees hired through contracts.
This new system aims at budgeting based on actual staff numbers rather than plantilla positions leading towards efficient cash management saving government resources while improving salary expense forecasting increasing transparency providing better information managing payroll across governmental bodies.