ROME – The Vatican has plenty of international business experts to turn to for advice, but you hardly need an MBA from Stanford or IESE to realise that if employees are expressing anxiety, dissatisfaction, disengagement and confusion, you have a pretty serious problem.
This is the situation facing the Vatican today under the rule of Pope Francis, with the latest confirmation coming in an Aug. 20 statement from the Association of Lay Workers, the closest thing to a labor union here.
The association, which was formed in 1985, has had mixed success in advocating for workers' rights, but it at least provides a unique sounding board for finding out what workers in the papal domain think and feel.
In its latest heartfelt cry, published as an unsigned statement on its website, the association argues that the Vatican is supposed to be a unique environment rooted in human dignity and shaped by Catholic social teaching, but in reality the reforms implemented by Pope Francis have turned it into just another multinational corporation, “dragging its feet” in the face of poor treatment of its employees.
Specifically, the association made five main complaints:
First, they cite a series of cost-cutting measures introduced under the Francis administration, including the suspension of seniority-based pay increases and restrictions on promotions, new hiring and overtime pay, and argue that while these measures have affected employees, due to information censorship no one knows whether they have been effective.
“What will be the result of this 'revolution'? It is not possible to know for sure as the annual financial statements, which until now were presented at press conferences, have not been published for years,” the association said.
“We have not lost hope that we will see the final balance sheet in 2023,” he said.
Second, the association argues that these restrictions contain unexplained exceptions, suggesting that favoritism may be involved: Certain promotions “to leadership positions,” it says, “have balance sheet implications and do not necessarily appear to be made according to meritocratic standards.”
Third, the association argues that Vatican officials are suffering collateral damage from other reforms. For example, it argues that efforts to reprice rents on Vatican-owned apartments to better reflect actual market rates have adversely affected Vatican officials who live in those properties, leaving their incomes essentially frozen at 2008 levels.
Fourth, the association noted a growing trend towards outsourcing Vatican labour, such as cleaning and reception services. It was recently announced that the Vatican's famous supermarket, where shoppers can purchase a wide range of goods tax-free, will be leased to a major Italian grocery chain, but it is unclear how this will affect the roughly 30 employees currently working there.
The association also noted that much of the management of the investment activities of Vatican entities has been handed over to outside consultants, “mostly American,” and questioned what role the Vatican's in-house investment experts will play going forward.
Finally, the Society complained that its various requests for dialogue with higher Vatican officials on these points had been ignored.The statement concluded with a reference to the late Cardinal Agostino Casaroli, the first Secretary of State under St. John Paul II, legendary for his diplomatic style and often cited by Pope Francis as a role model, and wondered aloud what had happened to the Casaroli-style dialogue.
“We recognize that our organization is disintegrating,” the statement concluded. “Will this policy bear fruit? Time will tell, but in the meantime we must ask… Why aren't we strengthening our internal resources, which are increasingly disengaged and disorganized? In what direction are we heading?”
“What is going on in the Vatican?” the Society asks. “Who do we work for? We all know the importance of keeping up with the times, but at what cost? What are the reasons behind this sudden change of direction? All is silent. We write, but those in charge have a hard time answering questions.”
The statement also mentioned a recent protest letter signed by 49 Vatican Museums employees threatening to file a class action lawsuit in a Vatican court if their concerns about employee safety and issues such as overtime pay and sick leave are not addressed.
To be clear, these are effectively union grievances, and as always, unions do not necessarily represent the views of everyone working in a particular industry. Often unions are the voice of the more militant and disgruntled sections of the workforce, while those who are fundamentally satisfied are not going to make statements or go on strike.
Yet anyone who has spent more than five minutes in the Vatican will realize that these are not isolated or idiosyncratic grievances, but the genuine concerns of people who have dedicated their lives to serving the Vatican and the Pope, and who are now anxious not only about their financial future, but also about their present.
In fact, the frustration runs even deeper, because the financial aspects of these issues could presumably be resolved through good-faith discussions. The underlying problem is that many Vatican officials believe their superiors are not particularly interested in their problems, and that the lack of dialogue is a sign of disinterest.
Let's do some basic math: there are 1.3 billion Catholics in the world, and between the Holy See and Vatican City, there are just over 5,000 people on the Vatican payroll. If you applied the same citizen-to-bureaucrat ratio to the United States, there would be just under 600 federal employees, not the 2.25 million currently on the federal payroll.
In other words, the Vatican operates incredibly leanly, and even the slightest disruption in morale or motivation can have a huge impact on productivity and quality.
Pope Francis is currently preparing to depart for Asia and Oceania for an 11-day visit to four countries: Indonesia, Timor-Leste, Papua New Guinea and Singapore. Along the way, he will meet and engage in in-depth dialogue with religious leaders, politicians, missionaries, indigenous peoples, cultural and business leaders and many other influential figures.
Perhaps when he returns to Rome, he might actually want to consider speaking to his own employees in the same way: Such internal outreach could, after all, have a far more direct impact on the success or failure of his efforts than any other use of his time he could imagine.
