Public Service Values by Richard C Box

Author:Richard C Box [Box, Richard C]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Public Policy, Social Services & Welfare, Civics & Citizenship, Social Science, Political Science, Social Work, General
ISBN: 9781317507550
Google: pdQdCgAAQBAJ
Goodreads: 35195286
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2014-10-15T00:00:00+00:00

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Four public service values discussed in Chapter 2 are directly related to the market model of efficient public sector management: profitability, innovativeness, responsiveness, and serviceability. The meaning of profitability is straightforward. In Reinventing Government, Osborne and Gaebler (1993, chap. 7) urge public managers to find ways to earn profits instead of spending public money, such as charging user fees for services and selling products or services such as fertilizer from a sewage treatment plant and excess capacity in a prison that can be used by other jurisdictions. To give public managers an incentive to earn money instead of spending it, agency managers would be allowed to keep some or all of their profits to use on projects they think important, and financial incentives could be given to employees who earn money for their agency.

These activities are entrepreneurial, a value that does not appear in the research discussed in Chapter 2, but it is similar to innovativeness, exercising initiative to create something new. Whether an entrepreneurial public administration can be reconciled with the expectation that public organizations should be transparent, accountable, and accessible to citizen participation in policy making is open to question (Bellone and Goerl 1992; Terry 1993). In the American governmental system, the expectation is that public professionals will either follow the lead of elected officials or make policy recommendations to them for consideration. Acting alone without public discussion and legislative or executive approval could be regarded by leaders and citizens as inappropriate for the professional role. This leads to the conclusion that entrepreneurial initiative needs to be tempered with attention to the constitutional and legal context of the public sector. The nonprofit sector does not share this context, but in a particular organization the board of directors may expect to participate in decision making about major initiatives.

The public service values responsiveness (reflecting the preferences of elected leaders and citizens) and serviceability (providing quality service to the public and people in the organization) are part of “customer-driven government” in Reinventing Government (Osborne and Gaebler 1993, chap. 6). The idea is that by asking people what they want from the public sector (e.g., with a survey) and giving them efficient service, governments can show the sort of attention to pleasing customers that is found in the private sector. This idea assumes that staff members in traditional public agencies treat people in a mechanical, bureaucratic manner that is indifferent to the circumstances of the people they serve and that employees in a private firm are warm, welcoming, and efficient.

There are many examples today of public agencies that work to be customer-oriented, offering online services, schedules tailored to the needs of their clientele, and services shaped by feedback from their community of users. And, it must be said, not all customer interactions with the private sector are customer-friendly. Most people have had frustrating or upsetting experiences with employees of private companies who are not especially knowledgeable or helpful. Still, the point is well taken—it is a good thing for public

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