HKSAR government civil servants: a non‐Drucker organisation?

Abstract

PurposePeter F. Drucker (1909‐2005) was an influential modern management theorist. This paper, however, aims to challenge his diagnosis and prescriptions on the public sector for over‐simplifying several complex issues and not being sufficiently comprehensive. With the support of the empirical findings of a survey in the government of Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSARG), the authors seek to supplement Drucker's discussion on government and to propose managerial actions for implementing change.Design/methodology/approachAn e‐mail questionnaire survey of 700 randomly selected government employees in Hong Kong was conducted. Additional information was gathered from senior management to validate the survey results.FindingsIn line with Drucker, HKSARG employees, as a whole, are reluctant to change. But statistical tests show that there are heterogeneous behavioural groups. Specifically, younger and more educated staff are more willing to change. The existence of these groups has both practical and managerial implications for implementing change.Research limitations/implicationsThe usable sample is relatively small (n=66).Practical implicationsThe government should not be viewed and understood unidirectionally. Management should target the younger and more educated users first to build up sufficient user mass and adopt peer pressure for a more successful level of implementation of IT usage across all staff. Job rotation and flexible entry and exit options are worth considering, too.Originality/valueThis research validates empirically the nature of HKSARG. It demonstrates that researchers' challenges to Drucker's views on government are well founded. More research on the characteristics of the public sector is required for better understanding of the real nature of these large, bureaucratic organisations.

Factors Affecting e-Government Technology Adoption Behaviour in a Voluntary Environment

“…In this case a positive attitude to eService's and a clear understanding of the contribution of eService's to the work role are likely to perpetuate further eService adoption. Government organisations are often viewed as resistant to change, but heterogeneous attitudinal groups can offer managers leverage in bringing about change (Lamond et al, 2010); specifically change with regards to technology utilisation. From an organisational perspective it is most interesting to find a non-significant relation between Organisational Conditions and Eservice Utilisation, and a significant relation between Organisational Conditions and Individual Attitudes & Beliefs.…”

“…Unlike other type of organisations, government offices do not face a competitive environment (Clark, 2003), and have an image of being slow-moving bureaucracies, unwilling or unable to change and lagging behind the private sector in their use of new technology (Davison et al, 2005). Hierarchical and formalized structures of the government are not as responsive as those typically found in the private sector (Clark, 2003, Sørensen andTorfing, 2011), resulting in government offices being criticised as conservative entities that are slow to adopt technology, or to adopt new initiatives (Davison et al, 2005, Marche and McNiven, 2003, Lamond et al, 2010. In addition, previous poor experiences with information technology projects have led to a poor information technology culture for many government organisations (Margetts and Dunleavy, 2002), while austerity measures, following the recent global economic downturn, have limited government technology investment (Margetts and Dunleavy, 2010) Moreover, resistance from traditional style information technology departments and difficulties in overcoming established government bureaucracies' can hinder the potential of web-based technologies Dunleavy, 2002, Chadwick, 2011).…”