European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde attends a meeting of the European Parliament’s Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee in Brussels, Belgium, on September 25, 2023.
Yves Herman | Reuters
European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde said on Thursday she was “proud and honored” to lead the European Central Bank after her leadership came under fire in a union survey of staff.
She was responding to questions about the results of a survey released earlier this week by European Central Bank consortium IPSO, in which more than half of respondents rated her performance so far as “very poor” or “poor”.
IPSO said qualitative responses to the survey suggested some staff felt she had created a negative atmosphere at the central bank and that she “spended too much time on topics unrelated to monetary policy”.
Lagarde, a former politician and lawyer, appeared unfazed, saying the ECB conducted its own investigation “in a way we can trust.” These revealed that the majority of respondents stated that they were happy to work at the agency, would recommend working there to friends, and felt a sense of mission connected to their work.
The surveys, conducted by about 60 percent of employees, also cover salary, workplace respect and workplace satisfaction, she said.
“We are very focused on these technically sound responses and we act accordingly and we will continue to do so,” Lagarde told reporters at a press conference after the ECB’s January monetary policy meeting. “These answers keep me going. .”
“I am very proud of the staff of the ECB and I am very proud and honored to lead this institution because we are driven by our mission. To achieve price stability but to serve Europeans and we will continue to do that,” she continued .
IPSO’s surveys are completed by approximately 1,100 people. The ECB has more than 5,000 employees and interns.
The union said the responses “generally” described Lagarde as “an authoritarian leader” who does not necessarily act in accordance with her stated values.
According to reports, her evaluation is significantly lower than that of her predecessors Jean-Claude Trichet and Mario Draghi.
An ECB spokesman called the survey “flawed” and said the topics it contained were not specific to the ECB and did not fall within IPSO’s remit. They also said the form could have been filled out multiple times by the same person.
—CNBC’s SiIvia Amaro contributed to this article.
