PAM Jaya CEO Asks Team Not to Take Criticism to Heart: It's Fine to Be Slammed

JAKARTA, KOMPAS.com - The CEO of PAM Jaya, Arief Nasrudin, has asked his staff not to get emotional (baper) when receiving criticism and complaints from the public regarding clean water services. This includes traffic jams caused by underground pipe excavation projects. He considers criticism from residents to be normal and something that can serve as material for company evaluation. According to him, PAM Jaya must remain focused on working to improve services even when under public scrutiny. He even described criticism as a mirror to drive improvements within the company. “I ask the team to keep working; let the criticism become a mirror for us to continue correcting ourselves,” he said. Arief revealed that in the last three to four years, PAM Jaya’s service coverage has experienced significant growth, even increasing by more than 20 per cent. This is different from the previous condition, which tended to be stagnant for decades. “Now our service growth is already significant. This must be continuously maintained,” he added. He assessed that NRW is often misinterpreted as merely water leakage. However, according to him, there are other factors such as the need for buffer stock or water reserves in the distribution network that are also included in the NRW category. “NRW is not just leakage. There is also water that must be on standby in pipes and reservoirs as buffer stock. This is part of the distribution system, especially with the pipe length in Jakarta already reaching 13,000 kilometres,” he said. He stated that such conditions are normal in the water distribution business, particularly in a major city like Jakarta.