Top bosses in the Australian Public Service think they are doing a great job, according to the latest research from the federal workplace authority.

Trouble is, many of their workers disagree: only half of federal public servants thinking the bureaucracy's senior leaders are "high quality" performers.

The latest research from the Public Service Commission confirms senior leaders in federal departments have a much higher opinion of their efforts than their rank-and-filers, and at the Commonwealth's largest departments confidence in the quality of the men and women at the top is running at a dismal 47 per cent.

But there was some good news for Canberra mandarins in the latest State of the Service Report: their staff's opinions of them used to be worse.

The commission published the results on Monday, saying they were grounds for optimism, with the small gains made in staff confidence in 2014 holding steady this year.

But there was "room for improvement", it conceded, and the gap between what the top bosses think of their performance and what everybody else makes of it "warrants attention".

Across the service, about 52 per cent of public servants who responded to the survey thought their senior leaders were of "high quality".

But at extra-large agencies, like the Department of Human Services, the Tax Office and the Defence Department, the number dipped to 47 per cent.

Opinions of the top brass improved the higher a public servant climbed the corporate ladder, the survey found, with 81 per cent of senior executives saying their department's senior leaders were of "high quality".

But only 51.5 per cent of workers in the APS1 to APS6 classifications agreed with their bosses.

When it came to nurturing the next generation, confidence was low: only 29 per cent of APS-level staff and 31 per cent of executive level 1 and executive level 2 middle managers gave their bosses a tick, compared to 67 per cent in the senior executive service.

How does your boss rate? Send your tips to ps@canberratimes.com.au

Publishing the findings on Monday, the commission noted that the results had not gone backwards since 2014, but there was more work to be done.

"The gains made in 2014 in relation to senior leaders have been maintained in this year," it said.

"Results from 2014 demonstrated improvements in employee perceptions of the quality, visibility and communication of senior leaders.

"However, there remains room for improvement in the areas of engaging with staff and leading and managing change."

The gap between the leaders' opinions of their own performance and the views of everybody else in the workplace is a problem, the commission found.

"A wide gap exists between senior leaders' perceptions of themselves and the perception held by APS and executive level employees," it said.

"The gap is significant and warrants attention."

"While just over three quarters of the senior executive service feel they take the time to develop talented employees, only around 30 per cent of their subordinates feel that this is true.

"Similarly, nearly 80 per cent of SES feel that their agency's senior leaders are sufficiently visible.

"Over three quarters believe that senior leaders engage with staff on how to deal with future challenges.

"Yet only half or less of APS and EL employees believe the same."