Governance in the UK Public Sector: the Involvement of the Governing Board

Governing boards are a prominent feature of many public sector organizations today. These boards have been modelled on the private sector board of directors. Like company boards, one of their main functions is to provide strategic leadership and policy direction for the organization. The role of managers and chief executives is to implement this. This paper examines the extent of involvement of one public sector board, the school governing body, in strategic activity. Using empirical evidence from a number of semi-structured interviews conducted in schools, its findings indicate that governing bodies are not involved at a high level in strategy within schools. Rather, headteachers are more likely to be undertaking this activity. Reflections are made about the relevance of the 'board of directors' model for both governing bodies and the public sector more generally.     

Institutional and Economic Factors Affecting the Adoption of International Public Sector Accounting Standards

This article investigates the environmental factors associated with countries’ decision to adopt International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS). Based on a sample of 110 countries, the results reveal a positive influence of external public funding (coercive isomorphic pressure), the degree of external openness (mimetic isomorphic pressure), and public sector organizations’ importance on IPSAS adoption. They show a negative effect of the availability of local GAAP on this decision, whereas education level (normative isomorphic pressure) is a nonsignificant factor.

This research contributes to the international accounting literature in the public sector. The results are relevant to standard-setters, regulators, researchers, international financial organizations, and non-adopting countries.     

Walk the Talk: Private Sustainability Standards in the Ugandan Coffee Sector

We investigate the welfare and productivity implications of private sustainability standards in the coffee sector in Uganda. We use cross-sectional household survey data and an instrumental variable method with instruments that pass weak identification and over-identification restrictions. We find that triple Utz-Rainforest Alliance-4C certification increases income, and land and labour productivity, and reduces poverty. Double Fairtrade-Organic certification is found to be associated with higher producer prices but results in lower land and labour productivity, and thereby fails to increase producer income and contribute to poverty reduction. We conclude that private sustainability standards do not always live up the expectations they create towards consumers.     

Managing the Public Sector in Hong Kong: Trends and Adjustments

Public sector management in Hong Kong was initially designed to rule the territory as a British colony. A number of changes took place in the last quarter century before Hong Kong's reintegration with China and the nature of public sector management has transformed over this period. An overview of administrative principles and practices and an analysis of changes reveal trends that were influenced by both local and international factors. The framework of traditional public administration in the territory adapted effectively to embrace the principles of new public management without much difficulty. The global economic crisis compelled the government to revise its strategies to expand public spending and adopt a further reduced role in the provision of public services. New social, economic and political challenges are driving Hong Kong to adjust to the changing circumstances and trends, and four noticeable shifts can be identified. They include shifts from an administrative to a political executive, from job cuts to job creation, from financial restraint to increased spending, and from public to private sector provision of public services. The trends are driven by local and international forces as well as the progress of democratization and political awareness in Hong Kong.     

Performance and Equality in Public Sector Wages

Abstract

The present paper describes how democratic values—reflected by work equality values—paired with the organizational performance characteristics—defined by the height of organizational inputs and outputs—affect gender differences in wages. It is suggested here that despite the democratic conception of the public sector's equal employment opportunities, variations in the organizational performance of 83 local authorities account for gender differences in wages. The study assumes that organizational inputs (type and level of resources) and outputs (type and level of provided services) generate gender differences in individual earnings, when controlling for human capital factors. The results show that variations in organizational performance affect women's but not men's wages. However, the effect of individual level (demographic, human capital and employment) characteristics, reflecting the meritocracy‐based and democratic nature of public sector employment rather than the level of organizational performance explains most of the variance in gender differences in wages. These results point to the slow shift from the principle of administrative values of democracy and equality to the adoption of performance‐related mechanisms in the determination of public sector wages.     

Hybrids and Contradictions: Human Resource Management in the Contemporary Public Sector

Public employment is a dynamic field of study, buffeted by the ever-changing and reforming public sector environment and by external events such as changing demographics and the global financial crisis. This first article to the special edition on contemporary public sector human resources provides a broad overview of recent developments, starting with the nature of public sector reforms and proceeding with analysis of the far-reaching effects on public employment. For many western countries, this has led to a hybrid model of old and new practices, with many internal contradictions and a confusing array of accountabilities. The new arrangements led to a de-privileging of public servants through reductions in merit and tenure. They also reduced the institutional capacity of central personnel institutions to co-ordinate and monitor public employment and public management. The article proceeds with a review of the implications of these changes in the face of new challenges such as skills shortages and economic pressures. This overview provides a backdrop for the variety of articles presented in the special edition.

Peter Blunt, Mark Turner, and Henrik Lindroth's “Patronage, Service Delivery, and Social Justice in Indonesia” appears in the International Journal of Public Administration, Volume 35, Issue 3, 2013, pp. 214—220. doi:10.1080/01900692.2011.641050. It is related to this special issue's content.     

Self-Care in Public and Community Sector Workplaces

Key aspects of modern public service and community workplaces associated with significant levels of distress are identified. This includes the transformation of public sector and community agencies under the aegis of new public management (NPM). Using a child protection case study, it is argued that NPM ethos generates stressful workplaces and “uncomfortable knowledge” adding pressure to a system already in crisis. It is also argued that while there is value in self-care practices like debriefing, “boundary maintenance,” and “work-life balance,” one critical aspect of self-care associated with the virtue ethics tradition is missing. This gap in the literature and practice needs attention.     

Cyberterrorism and Cyber Attacks in the Public Sector: How Public Administration Copes with Digital Threats

Cybersecurity concerns among citizens and public administration officials are considered to be one of the major barriers to e-government implementation. While cyberterrorism is on the rise, the operational state of cybersecurity in the public sector appears as a black box and previous literature has scarcely examined how public authorities perceive and cope with cyber attacks. This study investigates public employees’ attitudes toward cybersecurity in the public sector, as well as the arrangements and measures in place to protect sensitive governmental data and securely manage it for privacy and regulatory compliance. Thus, it contributes to the e-government literature by presenting a comprehensive framework of cybersecurity in the public sector and by providing empirical evidence thereof. Furthermore, it gives an insight into the prevalent attitudes and cybersecurity infrastructure within the realm of public administration. Finally, the article derives research and managerial implications and provides suggestions for future research.     

Public Sector Reform in Central Asia and the Caucasus

Many developing countries are constantly seeking to reform their public services as part of a wider agenda which supports moves to a market economy and better governance arrangements. Some have embraced public management reforms as the template for their activities with limited success. This paper considers existing research on the impact of public sector reform in developing countries and offers an alternative approach, through case studies of Azerbaijan, Georgia and Kazakhstan, based on two keys elements: an agenda which attempts to shift developing countries to an outcomes based accountability approach operationalized through a “quality of life” framework; and, peer‐to‐peer learning.     

Collaborative Crisis Management and Leadership in the Public Sector

The goal of this article is to discover how leadership competencies affect the perceived effectiveness of crisis management. The study, based on a self-reported survey of executive public leaders in Turkey, found that the core leadership competencies have a positive relationship with the effectiveness of crisis management. Among task–oriented, people–oriented, and organization-oriented categories of leadership behaviors, task-oriented leadership behaviors were found with the highest level of impact on the effectiveness of crisis management. The study demonstrated the importance of the core leadership competencies in the effectiveness of crisis leadership. The hypothesis testing with the covariance structure model supported the positive impact of the core leadership competencies on the effectiveness of crisis management. This study contributes to the literature on leadership during crisis situations, and also provides proposals for public managers and practitioners to increase their effectiveness in leading their organizations during crises.     

Leadership Climate in the Public Sector: Feelings Matter Too!

Abstract

Although there is substantial empirical evidence supporting the important role of leadership in organizational contexts, there is limited empirical evidence that focuses on the distinction between how employees feel about senior leaders and what they think about senior leaders. This is particularly true in the public-sector environment. In this paper, a model is tested that identifies key consequences of affectively and cognitively based perceptions of public-sector senior leadership. Data collected from a large public-sector organization were examined to identify the correlates of affectively and cognitively weighted perceptions of leadership. A series of regression analyses was conducted to identify more clearly the extent to which affectively and cognitively based perceptions of leadership influenced affective commitment, attitudes to change, intention to turnover, and extra-role performance. The results suggest that both affectively and cognitively based perceptions of leadership influenced organizational commitment and cynicism toward change. Extra-role behavior was influenced by the affective dimension alone, and intention to turnover was influenced by the cognitive dimension alone. The results also showed a significant interaction between the affective and cognitive dimensions in predicting intention to turnover. In general terms, the findings will prove helpful to human resource practitioners interested in diagnosing and managing the transformational leadership climate in public-sector organizations.     

Organizational Learning Facilitators in the Canadian Public Sector

An implicit patriarchal bargain between Emirati fathers and daughters is examined from a social constructionist perspective. Using qualitative methodology we found that fathers explicitly encourage their daughters to pursue tertiary education and careers, but hedge this break from tradition with implicit understandings that daughters will observe norms that can only realistically be followed in public sector employment. The persistent public-private imbalance in female employment patterns can thus be construed, as a ‘wicked problem” that cannot be addressed through market incentive-based policies such as Emiratization but rather through behavioral changes on the part of both UAE businesses and Emirati families.     

The Relationship between Delegation and Formalization in the Public Sector

In drawing on adaptive theory, this article discusses the relationship between delegation and formalization in the public sector. While traditional and contemporary views suggest that these concepts are either negatively or positively correlated, or that they should be balanced, this study hypothesized that they are dynamically related to each other, and therefore the relationship would be best described as curvilinear (inverted U-shaped). This hypothesis was supported through hierarchical regression analyses of data collected from a police organization that has traditionally pursued formalization, but lately has been urged to pursue a strategy of delegation. Practical and theoretical implications are provided.     

Shared Services and Cost Reduction Motive in the Public Sector

The intention of this article is to understand whether and how shared service centers can help reduce costs in the public sector context. We identify the sources of cost reduction for shared service centers and discuss the obstacles to making use of them. In order to illustrate and complement the theoretical discussion and the literature review, empirical insights from two Estonian cases are provided. The case studies indicate that when the context is enabling, shared service centers can help reduce back-office headcount. However, the total costs and benefits of the public-sector shared service centers are not calculated and remain unknown.