From the four and a half day week to bonuses, including pets: HRDs from communities compete ingenuity to try to fill vacancies despite the low attractiveness of the territorial public service.
“Public service attracts much less, job security is no longer decisive,” acknowledges Béatrice de Lavalette, deputy mayor of Suresnes (Hauts-de-Seine) in charge of human resources.
“We are no longer in generations where baby boomers spent their entire careers in the same community, today people are on the move,” supports Doriane Huart, who oversees the human resources department at Metropolis Lille European Union (MEL).
Therefore, “we have the challenge of retaining in an increasingly tight labor market”, with an unemployment rate falling to 7.2% at the end of 2022, he adds.
Additional difficulty for communities, with largely unknown professions: the average age of agents (46 years) is higher there than that of hospital or state officials, and many retirements are expected soon.
In the next six years, a quarter of municipal clerks and one in six municipal police officers are expected to finish their careers.
4 and a half day week
To attract new hires, the MEL is therefore based on the organization of work time: since 2019, its officials can concentrate their work week in four and a half days, or in nine days spread over two weeks.
Of 3,000 agents, “more than 800” have taken advantage of this possibility, says Doriane Huart, Mondays and Fridays being favored by the agents to extend the weekends, and Wednesdays to take care of their children.
In Suresnes, Béatrice de Lavalette is less enthusiastic: “The four-day week is ideally fine (…) but if it’s to work from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m., I’m still very reserved.”
The chosen Hauts-de-Seine prefers to offer free yoga or sophrology classes at lunchtime to its thousands of agents.
During their working time, city employees can also benefit from choral singing, theatrical improvisation or chess lessons: “chess is 50% more concentration and memorization, and therefore the agent will be more creative”, especially at work, greets Mrs. de Lavalette.
“We are starting to fall apart”
Subject to the agreement of their colleagues, agents are also allowed to bring their pets into the office.
But “we can activate all we want on the improvement of working conditions”, in job interviews, “the salary issue is the first issue that arises”, warns Johan Theuret, head of the city’s Resources division and Rennes metropolitan area.
Among the two million territorial civil service agents, 75% belong to category C, the lowest paid. But in terms of salaries, “we are really starting to drop out compared to the private sector and in almost all professions,” warns Johan Theuret.
Bricklayers, animators, municipal police, electricians: “there are many sectors in which it is difficult” to recruit for the communities, emphasizes Jérôme Pech, responsible for “human wealth” at the Blagnac town hall, near Toulouse. Therefore, the Occitan municipality offers specific bonuses in certain trades in tension.
“We add from 150 to 450 euros per month in bonuses for digital work”, explains Jérôme Pech. Previously, “we couldn’t even get interview candidates because we weren’t level with the market” in terms of salary.
It is still necessary to have the means to grant such bonuses, which is not necessarily the case for the smaller municipalities in France.
The latter, therefore, tend to insist on quality of life, which they consider better away from the metropolis. Even in Blagnac, a city of 25,000 inhabitants, “we also have things to play”, judge Jérôme Pech.
Source: BFM TV
