T

here is no doubt that democracy was successfully implemented in Indonesia as a result of the reform movement a decade ago. However, it came at a cost:

The large amount of money that has been spent in addition to the disadvantages caused by the shift in mindset toward short-term goals and the neglect of professionalism in the pursuit of political objectives.

The short-term orientation is highlighted by the tendency of government agencies to pursue image rather than performance.

By nature, the “one-man-one-vote” system does not recognize professionalism in elections; there is no difference for instance, between the hard-workers and the beggars, the smart and the stupid, the artist and the professor.

Popularity has become a dominant factor in obtaining and maintaining a position. Not surprisingly, until society matures in political education, such circumstances provide the opportunity for instant politicians including celebrities to acquire top bureaucratic positions from the municipal to the provincial levels, from the legislature to the Cabinet.  

Following the five-year cycle of the general election, it may be advisable for all political bureaucrats including the President and Vice President to start selling their image one or two years before the election and if they are successful, they will be able to maintain their image by not making unpopular decisions.

As a result, they have only two years or less of effective time to do the real job of serving their constituents, not counting the time and energy that they have to spend for their political parties.


The shift of motivation in government agencies

The success of several celebrities in gaining top positions in regional governments and the fact that more and more politicians have become ministers may strengthen the impression that joining a political party is a fast-track career path to the top.

Regardless of the pros and cons, this is an interesting phenomenon which should become a point of consideration for human resource (HR) practitioners in realigning their career policies, particularly in government institutions including state owned enterprises (SOE).

If we ignore this reality, such a short-sighted orientation could become the norm and eventually professionalism will be marginalized.

The influence of politics has even spread to SOEs with a strong technological background such as state-run electricity firm PLN. On Dec. 23, 2009, the government replaced the president director Fahmi Mochtar, who has a solid engineering background, with Dahlan Iskan, a famous journalist who owns one of the country’s biggest media groups.

From the PLN professional point of view as expressed by most senior officials of the company, the replacement could be viewed as professional harassment, which is understandable because since its establishment, technical competence has been the cornerstone of PLN, something that its employees are proud of.

Now, however, they should realize technical competence is not enough.  

Whatever the reasons, the fact is that the PLN performance is still far from satisfactory in view of the fact that until recently the electricity supply in many regions including Jakarta is still in a critical condition and millions of people are waiting to get electricity from PLN.

There is no doubt that technically the PLN employees are competent. The problems are caused by non-technical factors including the lack of political bargaining power and the absence of competence in public perception.

For decades, PLN could neither expand its power generation capacity to meet the rising demand for power due to a lack of financial support from the government nor get government permission to raise its rates to an economically viable level.

That’s the situation which PLN found itself in when Jakarta suffered from a serious power interruption last December.

The government would not have allowed it to reap a margin of 8 percent, had there been no technical default threat from the global financial market due to its failure to maintain Consolidated Interest Coverage Ratio (CICR).

Back to the new PLN board of directors, from the pragmatic point of view, the replacement of PLN’s president director, three years before the end of his tenure, can be seen as a blessing. It happened either by accident or by design.

Why?

Political and public image may be the strength of the new PLN president since he is the owner of the powerful media group and presumably a strong ally of the nation’s top power.

Time will tell whether a PLN CEO with a non-technical background can successfully lead a company that is highly technical.

If so, the HR practitioners have to change their method and objectives in developing talented people and leaders.

What should be noted is that the increasing prevalence of the fast-track career to the top may tempt non-career opportunists to use political clout to gain top positions.

The SOE ministry and all HR management in government institutions should pay attention to this case; otherwise the top position of the regional unit may also become a “Political Cake” to be distributed to whoever is committed to the party in power.

The dark side of the HR management in government institutions including PLN and other SOEs is the temptation for the current employees to shift their motivation from improving their technical competence, requiring both time and energy, to the shortcut political and populist competence.

    
The writer is a former director of HR and General Affairs for PT PLN (Persero) 2008-2009 and the author of the book: The answer to the Challenge of Bureaucratic Reform: Transformational Leadership and Lateral Organization.