Russian Civil Service Management: How Civil Servants are Recruited and Promoted

NISPACee Journal of Public Administration and Policy. 2014. Vol. VII. No. 1. P. 9–28.

Barabashev A. G., Prokofiev V. N.

To increase the quality of civil servants’ performance, governments may choose between three approaches, namely to recruit and to promote the personnel on the basis of team-building (personal-relations approach) or on the basis of merit (competency approach) or on professional-motivation evaluation (motivational approach). Starting from the beginning of the 1990s, Russian civil-service management has moved from the team-building approach toward merit (competency approach). The competency approach has dominated at legal acts for Russian civil servants’ recruitment and promotion in the last decade. The goal of this paper is to document that in Russia, during the last two years, namely since 2012, professional motivation has started to be recognized as the crucial element for civil-service recruitment and promotion. To prove this thesis, we performed the analysis of the content of more than 250 recently elaborated norms (years 2012 – 2014) at different Russian normative legislative acts (already adopted acts or legislative acts in the last stages of its preparation) concerning civil servants’ recruitment and promotion at Russian federal government bodies. Data analysis shows the clear trend: now the level of professional motivation is legally recognized as the central criterion for the selection and promotion of civil servants in Russia.

Keywords: управление человеческими ресурсами, государственная гражданская служба Российской Федерации, human-resources management, civil servants’ motivation, Russian civil service, recruitment and promotion of civil servants, motivation stimulus, мотивация государственных служащих, подбор и продвижение кадров