Knowledge Base

To improve public administration´s image, it is important to rebuild the trust in it. The citizens’ cooperation seems essential to achieve public purposes. The lack of trust can make the formulation and implementation of policies more difficult or even impossible. Relevant factors that influence citizens’ trust is the administrations´ integrity, as well as its performance.

Evaluation represents a separate stage in the policy cycle, but has to be pointed out as an own need in public administration. Evaluation decides whether a policy will be finished, modified and/or continued. At the same time, it can inform about results and consequences (intended and not intended). Only if policies are evaluated, potential improvement will be identified and at best implemented. In this context, it should be emphasised that a policy is never completed and is always evolving. This makes a qualitative and regular evaluation essential.

Public management has to react to changes in national and global contexts. A current key driver for changes can be seen in the Europeanisation, which affects the level of member states, caused by EU integration processes. Successful administrative action in the multilevel European system requires adjustments, ensuring efficient dealing with European objectives.

It is most important to take into account the state-specific circumstances, as well as local and regional specificities. For example, the German public administration differs fundamentally from public administration in other countries. Solutions that were identified as right and expedient for one country are not automatically useful in another. The possibilities of implementation will vary due to diverse traditions and organisational cultures.

Public administration has many opportunities to protect the environment and reduce its negative impact on it. There is a lot of potential in minimising energy, paper and water consumption, as well as waste production in public institutions. Because of the administration's role model function, it is necessary to take responsibility, and in consequence, to develop and establish environmental awareness. Environmental protection is a priority topic in recent years, which also needs to be addressed by the public administration.

Public sector organisations are mainly knowledge-intensive organisations, and to exploit their knowledge, effective knowledge sharing among the different departments is required. There can be great advantages if information is not only used in the own administration but is shared between hierarchies, different policy areas and levels of government. Including findings from other disciplines in respective monitoring systems (e.g. education, social, youth, and work) can create synergy and learning effects, which in turn leads to a share of benefits.

Public administration is a strictly standardised and structured environment, which makes it calculable and predictable to a certain extent. This includes, for example, a sufficient number of qualified employees. Also for the public administration employees in our focus group, this strict organisational framework seems to be important in order to complete their work and task. On the other hand, it would be desirable that this frame allows certain freedoms within it. This (limited) flexibility can be helpful in responding to unexpected developments.

A relevant but also critical factor in public management is the staff. It is important to recruit junior staff and specialists, which can manage the given challenges and have the necessary skills and technical knowledge to promote the digital transformation. Particularly in view of the demographic developments, it seems essential to recruit new staff and retain them in the long term.[1]

In addition to recruiting new employees, personnel development should not be neglected. Existing personnel should be trained to help them handle the challenge of new technologies and consequently changes in organisational environment. Personnel development measures have to be established to support employees’ acceptance and the acquisition of competences connected to ICT, preparing them for possible challenges.[1][2][3]

The public sector is facing demographic changes and has to compete with the private sector for talents. Incentives like, for example, an adequate payment or the possibility of mobile working, seem important to retain young and qualified employees in the long term and to increase the job satisfaction of all employees. The interviewed public administration employees criticised a lack of appreciation of their work.