Its chapter on “Performance Management” proposed that a performance agreement be signed between the departmental Minister and the Secretary of the Ministry every financial year. The ARC has envisaged that the agreement lists all “physical and verifiable details” work done by the Secretary/ Head of Department which is also assessed by a third party, say, the Central Public Services Authority.

A draft performance agreement has now been prepared and workshops conducted by the Cabinet Secretariat with officials of the Ministries of Commerce, Labour, Tourism and Heavy Industry.

Prajapati Trivedi, Secretary (Performance Management) in the Cabinet Secretariat, is the nodal officer for the implementation of the performance rating and appraisal schemes.

“We want to introduce the Performance Agreement in two phases, with the first phase covering Ministries and Departments which deal with the service sector,” said Trivedi. “We are setting up a machine that will work with any Government and with any sort of agenda. We hope the performance ratings of Departments integrated with those of individual officers will become a model for the private sector as well.”

On the upcoming changes in writing of ACRs, he said the idea was for these to be less random and more narrative. “This is in keeping with best international practices. If an officer is rated as excellent, then there has to be an explanation and narration of why that is so and it should also match with the performance of the Department.”