Family-friendly policies and culture are important components of creating a healthy work environment and are positively related to work outcomes for public employees and organizations. Furthermore, family-friendly policies and culture are critical mechanisms for supporting the careers and advancement of women in public service and enhancing gender equity in public sector employment. While both policies and culture can facilitate women’s participation in the public sector workforce, they may affect men and women differently. Using data from a 2011 study with a nationwide sample of state government employees, we investigate the effects of employee take-up of leave policies, employer supported access to child care, alternative work scheduling, and a culture of family support on work–life balance (WLB). We examine where these variables differ in their effects on WLB among men and women and make specific recommendations to further WLB among women. The results inform the literature on family-friendly policies and culture in public organizations.
Open government is an important innovation to foster trustworthy and inclusive governments. The authors develop and test an integrative theoretical framework drawing from theories on policy diffusion and innovation adoption. Based on this, they investigate how structural, cultural, and environmental variables explain three dimensions of open government: accessibility, transparency, and participation. The framework is tested by combining 2014 survey data and observational data from 500 local U.S. government websites. Organizational structure, including technological and organizational capacity, is a determinant shared by all dimensions of open government. Furthermore, accessibility is affected by a mixture of an innovative and participative culture and external pressures. A flexible and innovative culture positively relates to higher levels of transparency, whereas capacity is a strong predictor of adopting participatory features. The main conclusion is that there is no one-size-fits-all solution to fostering the three dimensions of open government, as each dimension is subject to a unique combination of determinants. Practitioner Points • Open government adoption includes features such as accessibility, transparency, and participation. • There is no one-size-fits-all solution to improving open government; each feature of open government is subject to a unique set of determinants. • Adoption of open government features is more likely to succeed in less politicized environments, when there is ample technological capacity, and when there is a rather flexible and innovative working climate.
In this review and critique of mentoring theory and research, the authors identify persistent problems in the development of mentoring theory. Their conceptual analysis highlights these problems with a “thought experiment” illustrating the inability of mentoring theory and research to resolve certain fundamental issues, the resolution of which is a prerequisite for the advancement of explanatory theory. They conclude with ideas about demarcating “mentoring” from the sometimes confounding concepts “training” or “socialization.” Absent an ability to distinguish mentoring from related activities, progress in explanatory theory will remain impeded.
Academics and journalists have depicted government bureaucracies as particularly subject to administrative constraints, including the infamous red tape and personnel rules that sharply constrain pay, promotion and dismissal and weaken their relations to performance.Research on these topics has often focused on public organizations alone or on comparisons of public and private organizations. The analysis reported here extends this research to include nonprofit organizations. Certain theoretical perspectives would predict sharp differences between public and nonprofit organizations, while others would predict no differences. Using survey data from managerial-level respondents in state government and nonprofit organizations in Georgia and Illinois, this analysis compares perceptions of red tape and personnel rule constraints in public and nonprofit organizations. We investigate whether or not public and nonprofit respondents differ in their perceptions about levels of organizational red tape, and about whether formal rules enable or constrain managers in promoting and rewarding good employees and removing poor performers. The results indicate sharp public and nonprofit differences, with public managers reporting higher perceived organizational red tape and lower levels of personnel flexibility. In addition to public and nonprofit comparisons, the analysis takes into account other factors that might influence public and nonprofit managers' perceptions of red tape and personnel flexibility in their organizations, including individual motivations to choose the job, the respondent's state (Georgia or Illinois), and others. 1 The authors would like to thank the anonymous reviewers who provided valuable suggestions and insights to further the development of the manuscript. The reviewers' thoughtful recommendations greatly improved this manuscript and the authors are greatful for their feedback.
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