What is the survey Transparent State-owned Companies (2012) about?
Does it measure corruption?
What areas were assessed?
Why these questions?
How was the data evaluated?
How much data had been collected?
How old is the data?
How were the “grades” calculated?
Is all data correct?
What can be done for the company to score better?
I am the representative of a company and the data had changed already.
I like your work. How can I help?
Who are the authors?
I see Slovak text on the site. Why?
What is the survey Transparent State-owned Companies (2012) about?
Transparent State-owned Companies (2012) is a transparency survey of the Slovak and foreign companies whose only shareholder is the state or municipality. It measures information availability and accessibility as well introduced anti-corruption measures in place in 6 policy areas. The survey ranges from 0 (least) to 100 (ideal case).
The survey highlights both strengths and weaknesses of Slovak and foreign state-owned companies, offering practical fixes for improvements.
Does it measure corruption?
Transparent State-owned Companies (2012) is just an indicator of companies’ openness. Although the ranking does not measure corruption, Transparency holds that higher score in the ranking and more transparent companies provide fewer opportunities for corrupt behaviour. However, it cannot be ruled out that companies high up in the ranking are not corrupt and vice versa.
What areas were assessed?
Companies had been assessed by 30 questions and ranked in 6 areas. These include especially the duties vested with companies by the Freedom of Information Act (e.g. transactions with public assets or public property) as well as policy areas deemed important by Transparency for good and ethical governance (e.g. ethics, conflict of interests, human resources policy). Areas and their value on the survey score reflect their importance and propensity to corruption.
The maximum score was 100 points. All questions and scoring details are provided here.
| POLICY AREA | SURVEY WEIGHT in % |
| I. Economic Indicators |
36 |
| II. Communication and Access to Information Policy |
21 |
| III. Public Procurement Policy |
25 |
| IV. Human Resources Policy |
5 |
| V. Ethics |
8 |
| VI. Grants and Charity Policy |
5 |
Why these questions?
30 questions were meticulously selected by team of Transparency. Questions reflect the most important areas that could be expected to have high occurrence of corrupt behavior. Moreover, they are based on the companies’ duties resulting from the Freedom of Information Act or the other areas important for transparent management of the company. On the basis of the survey results Transparency had formulated recommendations for the improvement of the state in every assessed area.
How was the data evaluated?
Data for the survey had been collected in several ways:
- Quality of information provided on the companies’ websites (48% of the total score)
- Replies to Freedom of Information Act (211/2000), requests filled by Transparency (15% of the total score)
- Replies to Freedom of Information Act (211/2000), requests filled by Transparency’s co-workers (“mystery shopping”) (10% of the total score)
- Data on public procurement from www.tender.sme.sk portal (15% of the total score)
- Questionnaire among the journalists (7% of the total score)
- Data from the Office for Public Procurement website (5% of the total score)
How much data had been collected?
The database contains 1530 answers to 30 questions in 6 policy areas.
How old is the data?
Data were collected in May and June 2012.
How were the “grades” calculated??
Transparency International Slovakia also chose to use a grade scale (see below) for better understanding and presentation of the point system. The maximum grade being A+ (100 points or 100%) and the lowest one being F (0 points or 0%).
|
GRADE |
% |
|
A+ |
80-100 |
|
A |
75-79 |
|
A- |
70-74 |
|
B+ |
65-69 |
|
B |
60-64 |
|
B- |
55-59 |
|
C+ |
50-54 |
|
C |
45-49 |
|
C- |
40-44 |
|
D+ |
35-39 |
|
D |
30-34 |
|
D- |
25-29 |
|
E+ |
20-24 |
|
E |
15-19 |
|
E- |
10-14 |
|
F |
0-9 |
Is all data correct?
In the case of Freedom of Information requests, the companies are legally bound to provide true and precise answers. These had been altered only in cases of evident mistakes.
TIS employees spent maximum effort to provide precise information from website assessment. However, complex website structures could cause that certain data was hard to find and hence appeared non-existent. Furthermore, TIS set a (few minutes) time limit rule used for online search of information in order to simulate an ordinary user.
What can be done for the company to score better?
The ranking of the company can be improved. One of the ways to do it is to get in touch with Transparency International Slovakia and ask for the information and suggestions that could lead to better and more open management of a company.
I am the representative of a company and the data had changed already.
Ranking portrays the state of transparency of the state-owned companies as of 10th of June 2012. Transparency plans to repeat the survey regularly.
I like your work. How can I help?
If you like this project, please consider financial donation, share this page with your friends, or become our fan on Facebook.
Who are the authors?
Transparent State-owned Companies (2012) is a project of Transparency International Slovakia and it is sponsored by Open Society Institute.
I see Slovak text on the site. Why?
This should be only text comments provided by the companies. We are very sorry for being unable to provide full English translation. Please, consider using online translation tools or get in touch.