REMOVING THE CULTURAL AND MANAGERIAL BARRIERS IN PROJECT‐TO‐PROJECT LEARNING: A CASE FROM THE UK PUBLIC SECTOR

Project‐based initiatives form a major part of government investment and, so, learning from past projects should be a major concern for public sector organizations. Previous research has explored systems and processes for project‐based learning but little research has examined the social and cultural factors that enable this learning to be applied with useful effect. This paper reports on two successive major UK government projects. The introduction of independent learning accounts (ILAs) and the subsequent introduction of educational maintenance allowances (EMAs) following the scrapping of the former. Although similar in many respects, the first was a major failure while the second, having learned the lessons of the first, was acclaimed as a success. Using a cultural analysis, this case study shows how project‐to‐project learning enabled the EMA project team to learn from the failed project. This resulted in two significant changes in government and civil service organizational culture.     

From Competition and Collusion to Consent-Based Collaboration: A Case Study of Local Democracy

The high distrust in political institutions and a growing sense of powerlessness among many citizens suggest that prevailing democratic governance systems lack a capability for collective dialogue and learning. The key thesis here is that public governance systems can benefit from organizational arrangements informed by circular design. A case study conducted at a Dutch municipality illustrates how principles of circular design served to enhance the city council’s role of orchestrator of civil participation. This case also illustrates how a local democracy, which has long suffered from majority–minority ploys and voting schemes, can be transformed into a consent-based culture of collaboration.     

A THEORY OF CULTURE‐SWITCHING: LEADERSHIP AND RED‐TAPE DURING HURRICANE KATRINA

This article draws upon studies of organizational culture and sense‐making to develop a theory of culture‐switching. Culture‐switching occurs when organizational actors shift emphasis from one existing organizational cultural assumption to another to reshape organizational action. The concept is demonstrated in a case study of the Hurricane Katrina response by the US Department of Defense (DOD). A slow initial DOD response arose because of self‐imposed red‐tape designed to limit engagement in crisis response, reflecting a cultural assumption of the need to maintain autonomy. DOD leaders altered the nature of the response by committing to another widely‐shared cultural assumption: a ‘can‐do’ approach to achieving difficult goals regardless of obstacles. The case illustrates how different organizational cultural assumptions interact with red tape to foster either inertia or a proactive response.     

Conceptualizing Interagency Coordination as Metagovernance: Complexity,Dynamism, and Learning in Australian and British Statistical Administration

Top-down methods of interagency coordination are inadequate in contemporary public administration, where multiple departments and agencies interact across loosely coupled networks to solve complex problems. The concept of metagovernance suggests governments can employ combinations of coordination instruments to steer dispersed actors toward common goals. This article asks how officials in Australian and British statistical administration addressed problems with traditional coordination methods. Interviews with senior official statisticians show a transition from traditional interagency coordination to metagovernance, driven by failures and learning. Metagovernance captures how interagency coordination is increasingly practiced, though existing theories should give more attention to learning and adaptation.     

Organizational ethics and bureaucratic corruption in Chinese school

This paper takes issue with a central theme in the literature on corruption that a centralized bureaucratic structure necessarily promotes corruption. It argues that the growth of corruption after 1976 was not so much the result of a centralized bureaucratic structure as that of the changing organizational ethics in the schools. In an examination of the schools since 1949, it shows that their structures have not changed radically. But by separating the organizational ethics into their real and ideal dimensions, it demonstrates that despite the continuity in the official goals and codes of ethics, the ‘real’ or fundamental organizational ethic have changed, and new standards of behavior have prompted members to break organizational rules in the more or less decentralized organizational structures.     

Catering to Organizational Needs in Ethics Management: The Case of the European Commission

This article examines the ethical challenges encountered by European Commission officials in their day-to-day work. Based on an intra-organizational comparison between three Directorate Generals (DGs), the analysis reveals that ethical questions differ in these settings, depending on the type of external actors employees engage with. This internal heterogeneity makes the European Commission an interesting (unusual) case, which highlights the challenges of practising ethics management in a way that is truly responsive to organizational needs. The policy solution implemented by the Commission as a response—the appointment of “ethics correspondents” at DG level—has been only moderately successful.     

The Mediating Role of Ethical Climate in the Relationship Between Performance Appraisal and Organizational Performance

Although prior research has consistently established a positive relationship between performance appraisal and organizational performance across different research contexts, the mechanisms that underlie this link remain unclear. The present study attempts to fill this void by testing the mediating role of ethical climate in the relationship between performance appraisal and organizational performance across 181 Nigerian public sector agencies. Cross-sectional mediation analyses were performed using partial least squares path modeling approach. Results indicated that performance appraisal was positively and significantly related to organizational performance. Regarding the mediating effect, ethical climate significantly mediated the relationship between performance appraisal and organizational performance. The study made recommendations and drew suggestions for future research to enhance the performance of public sector agencies.     

ADAPTIVE AND MALADAPTIVE RESPONSES OF MANAGERS TO CHANGING ENVIRONMENTS: A STUDY OF AUSTRALIAN PUBLIC SECTOR SENIOR EXECUTIVES

This paper examines data collected from senior executives in two Australian government agencies to identify patterns of adaptive and maladaptive responses to change in public sector environments. The conceptual categories of passive maladaptive, active maladaptive and active adaptive responses are all supported by the interview data, with half of the executives expressing predominantly active adaptive responses to external change and uncertainty and half displaying various kinds of passive and active maladaptive responses. The implications of the findings for managers as agents of organizational learning and adaptation in public sector environments are discussed.     

The politics of partnerships: a study of police and housing collaboration to tackle anti-social behaviour on Australian public housing estates

This paper draws on the findings from a research project on partnership arrangements between the police and housing departments on three Australian public housing estates to tackle problems associated with illicit drug activity and anti-social behaviour (ASB). The analysis focused on the setting up of the partnerships and the interactions that followed from these institutional arrangements. The assumption that informs the paper is that when studying partnerships there is a need for a more critically framed analysis. The temptation to posit "a successful model" of what partnership entails and then to judge practices in relation to this model is considerable, but it inevitably falls into the trap of constructing a narrative of partnership success or failure in terms of individual agency (that is, the degree of commitment from individuals). The analysis undertaken in this paper has therefore sought to fathom a more complex set of organizational processes. Rather than confine the discussion to issues of success and failure, the study foregrounds the subjective accounts of individuals who work within partnership and the constraints they encounter. The paper therefore makes explicit the cultural tensions within and across agencies, contestation as to the extent of the policy "problem," and the divergent perspectives on the appropriate modes of intervention.     

Operationalizing Strategy Content: An Example from the Transit Industry

While models of organizational strategy saturate private sector research, public sector research lags behind. The model created by Boyne and Walker (2004) is an exception. The main objective of this study is to operationalize this model using a unique data set from the US transit industry. Through a survey of 103 local transit agencies, we developed separate strategy profiles for each agency that help us answer important questions about organizational strategy. We find that not only do the organizations adopt a mix of strategic stances through the action areas; they also have distinct profiles, which vary greatly between agencies.     

Development Effectiveness and the Politics of Commitment

International aid agencies have experienced a ‘political turn’ over the past decade, with political economy analyses becoming increasingly numerous as a means to drive development effectiveness. Yet aid agencies have so far failed to shift their aid modalities in response. The problem lies in an inadequate conceptualisation of ‘politics’. Most donors continue to see development as a public good, rather than as the focus of contestation in a context of societal struggle, and consequently fail to take oppositional forces sufficiently seriously. This facilitates the misapplication of terms such as ‘partnership’ and ‘ownership’, contributing to failures in efforts to promote reform. A more truly political analysis of aid intervention entails two innovations: the use of structural analysis to distinguish between interests in reform; and the use of this distinction, in turn, to inform the practice of taking sides in political struggles. Case studies of international aid programmes in Cambodia and the Philippines illustrate how the failure of donors to take sides with particular reformers has resulted in lost opportunities to achieve concrete outcomes from development projects.     

Agencification and Corporatization in Norway 1947–2011

We explore agencification and corporatization in the Norwegian central government. While these types of organizational change have often been linked to the NPM and post-NPM doctrines of recent decades, we will extend our analysis back to the post-World War II period. The empirical data are drawn from the Norwegian State Administration Database. The main focus will be on changes along the vertical dimension, i.e., conversions of ministerial units into state agencies and from state agencies to state-owned companies, or in the other direction. A main question is the organizational dynamics of agencification and corporatization. Why have the structure and organization of government changed, how and to what degree do the pattern of change reflect global trends in NPM and post-NPM reforms, and is the central government subject to the politics of structural choice. Moreover, what is the importance of national administrative doctrines, party constellations in government, and deliberate actions of administrative policy-makers?     

The Strategic Use of Public Information in Anti-Corruption Agencies: Evidence from the Asia-Pacific Region

In this era of anti-corruption policy-making, the Internet provides a potentially critical strategic resource for anti-corruption agencies (ACAs) aiming to promote organizational and policy learning. Realizing its potential is a creative challenge that will tap different types of capacities in the agency and its environment. We present a framework for understanding the information-related functions that underpin policy and organizational learning for ACAs, develop a rating criteria to assess strategic information usage, and then assess five ACAs in the Asia Pacific region on one aspect of strategic information usage: dissemination via the Internet. Agencies differ markedly in the degree to which their use of public information dissemination via the Internet is “strategic” in nature, pointing towards a new arena for capacity building and strategy development.     

Organizational Structure,Work Involvement,and Job Performance of Public Servants

The purpose of this study is to understand the predicting role of organizational structure on job performance. Work involvement is tested as a mediator in the hypothesized link. The study presents the results of a cross-sectional survey of 256 public servants in public service departments and agencies in Malaysia. The research results have provided marginal support for the key theoretical propositions. The significant and positive impact of job codification indicates the importance of this factor in predicting job performance of public servants. The empirical link is mediated by work involvement, which suggests that there is an indirect influence of job codification on job performance. This study aims to provide additional empirical evidence on the influence of organizational structure and job performance in the public sector.     

Are Changes Effective in Performance Management? An Analysis of Japanese Agencies

Agencies are key organizations for implementing and studying performance measurement and management (PMM). This article explores the implementation and effect of PMM in Japanese agencies. In Japan, design of the agency system included New Public Management elements, such as independence and delegation of powers, but also traditional ones, with a strong system of controls. The discourse about the soundness and ambitions of the PMM system permeated the agencies but not so much their effort toward PMM. The performance improvement attained by agencies depends on their agency characteristics, organizational culture, and organizational factors, with a remarkable influence of the organizational culture.     

Organizational position and program implementation

Examples of policy implementation success suggest that organizational characteristics are important but policy researchers generally neglect the explicit study of organizational characteristics. Data from a mailed survey are used here to examine two organizational characteristics in one policy area in a single state. The advice of capacitybuilders' (federal and state agencies, municipal associations) about organizing local energy management programs through the appointment of “comprehensive local energy coordinators” is one concern. The other is the importance of the regular organizational position of the parttime community energy coordinators on the “comprehensiveness” of community energy programs.

The research develops a rudimentary methodology for studying program implementation which assesses organizational change by measuring differences among policies based on the dimensions of change embodied in a policy. Also devised are measures of program implementors' attitudes and perceptions in influencing program implementation. The findings demonstrate the usefulness of greater linkages of research across the organizational change and program implementation literatures.     

TAKING THE ‘HIGH ROAD’: DOES PUBLIC SERVICE MOTIVATION ALTER ETHICAL DECISION MAKING PROCESSES?

Although public administration scholars have long been interested in promoting administrative ethics, recent lapses in judgment by government employees make the study of ethics even more pressing. Yet, we know relatively little about how public values and publicly oriented motives influence the ethical obligations employees reference when confronting organizational problems. We employ Perry's (2000) process model of public service motivation to connect public values, public service motivation, and employees' understanding of their ethical obligations. Using data collected from over 1,400 managers in United States municipal governments, we present findings that suggest that public service motivation appears to be positively correlated with ethical obligations rooted in virtue and integrity, or high road ethics, for less professionalized employees. Further, broader constellations of public values encourage increased application of high road ethics for the same employees, but only to the extent that they foster public service motivation.     

Funding,Management, and Individual-Level Factors: What Factors Matter in Predicting Perceived Organizational Effectiveness?

Scholars have examined organizational effectiveness in state and federal government agencies to determine which factors matter. Their findings revealed that public organizational effectiveness is affected by environmental, human resource management, organizational, and individual-level factors. However, what is conspicuously absent is the impact funding has on organizational effectiveness. To further previous literature, this article examined agency funding levels as well as management and individual-level factors to determine the relationship these factors had on organizational effectiveness. In doing so, a model was developed to predict perceived organizational effectiveness, and it was tested on 330 United States government workers in the state of New York. The findings from the analysis were clear: perceived organizational effectiveness was impacted by employee perceptions regarding the level of funding the agencies were allocated. Additionally, the level of role ambiguity and employee participation in decision-making as well as employee job performance and public service motivation levels were also found to matter. The implications and limitations of these findings are discussed in the article.     

Leading and learning? Knowledge transfer in the Beacon Council Scheme

This paper examines the Beacon Council Scheme as a distinct policy element within the UK government's wide–ranging local government modernization agenda. The aim of the Beacon scheme is two–fold. First, reward for high performing councils and second, the achievement of substantial change by sharing 'best practice' from identified centres of excellence. The scheme presupposes an implicit theory of organizational change through learning. The Beacon Council Scheme is based on the assumption that the organizational preconditions exist which will facilitate learning, and through its application to practice, improve service delivery. The paper analyses the presumed and possible conditions which facilitate or impede interorganizational learning and service improvement through the scheme. The paper then examines empirical data from 59 local authority elected members and officers about their attitudes towards and motivation to take part in the Beacon scheme during the first year of its existence. The data indicate that there are differing motivations for participation in the scheme and that these reflect different learning needs. The experiences of local authority participants suggest that the formulators of the dissemination strategy at the heart of the scheme have not yet given sufficient consideration to the processes of interorganizational learning, the conditions that support such learning between authorities and the embedding of new understandings, practices and organizational cultures in the receiving authority. This suggests that the underlying theories of organizational learning and cultural change may be insufficiently developed to create and sustain the kind of transformational change that is intended by central government.