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Volume 1 July 21, 2009 Issue 2 |
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From the Desk of the
Cabinet Secretary |
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As I read, reflect and talk to my counterparts from other countries about administrative reforms, I see
several broad trends in the area of performance management. First, there is a clear movement away from
the Administrator Model to the Management Model. The Management Model represents an internal
culture of making managers manage, as opposed to the Administrative Model which values compliance to
pre-determined rules and regulations. It requires the managers to assume greater responsibility while at the
same time, giving them greater operational freedom and holding them accountable for results. Various
techniques have been followed such as mandatory strategic planning by Government agencies, explicit
target setting, devolved resource management, performance monitoring and reporting, and regular
evaluations using benchmarked data. Many countries, including Canada, New Zealand, Australia,
Netherlands, Denmark, the United Kingdom, the United States and Finland, have made significant
progress using such techniques with New Zealand being clearly the leader of this pack.
The second trend is represented by more countries moving from the Bureaucratic Model to the Market
Model, which represents greater use of market type mechanisms as opposed to operating public services as
a monopoly provider.
The third trend is represented by the efforts of many Governments to reinvent themselves. Reinvention is
not the same as reform; it involves something much deeper, something tantamount to changing the very
DNA of public organizations so that they habitually innovate, continually improving performance without
external pressure.
The fourth broad trend is reflected in the efforts of the Government to promote knowledge management
and knowledge sharing within the public sector, which results in overall improvement of performance of
all wings of the Government.
The fifth broad trend is obviously e-Governance. It is safe to say that no government has successfully
transformed itself without extensive utilization of e-Governance tools. The converse, however, does not
hold true. Use of e-Governance tools by itself is no guarantee for success. If e-Governance is used for
cosmetic effect to create an impression of efficiency, it is unlikely to deliver potential benefits.
We hope to present details of these broad trends in the pages of this newsletter in the future. |
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