Public Administration of Administrative Ethics

Introduction

Study of public administration revolves around several related factors, namely – people in government organizations, administrative ethics and employee-friendly policies, among others – that collectively function towards promoting effective government. Commitment and motivation of the people in government organizations determine the efficiency of government’s service delivery as well as public’s perception towards government organizations, implying the longer-term sustainability of the relationship between government and public. Likewise, employee-friendly policies and administrative ethics both are directly related to the motivation of people in government organizations and their integrity towards the work they perform.

This paper explores how three of the above-mentioned factors contribute towards promoting effective government.

People in government organizations

Research suggests that public service motivation (PSM) can play an important role in government agencies in promoting effectiveness. Effective service delivery ultimately depends on the performance of government workers. According to Wright, Hassan & Christensen (2017), on the one hand, employees with higher PSM are more likely to select public jobs in comparison to private sectors if they perceive that the former provides greater opportunity to serve and on the other hand, PSM can also over the course of time improve employee performance when they can actually observe how their job and performance directly serve the public and society.

In this regard, the organizations should be considering two things: organizations need to recruit individuals with high PSM in order to promote effective service delivery and it is also equally important to create a conducive work environment where motivated government workers can not only retain their PSM but also scale it up over the course of their public service.

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General public and media opinion about the people in government organizations in Nepal provides an example for how crucial PSM is to determine the effectiveness of government’s public service. In Nepal, government workers are often lashed by public and media for their low motivation towards public service which results in delays in service delivery, limited accountability and integrity of government workers towards the public they serve. While for the government workers in Nepal, satisfaction with their jobs reportedly have strong implication for improving the quality of government services and eventually have a direct impact on the quality of public services deliveries (Subedi & Chaudhary, 2014). As people in the government organizations are the representatives who act as the bridge between government and public, their public service motivation directly affects general public perception, opinion and trust towards government as whole. Therefore, the integrity, accountability and motivation of people in government organizations is a crucial factor that shapes the ground for public trust towards government through effective public service delivery.

Administrative ethics

Governments exist to serve the public. If there is no trust, satisfaction and understanding among the government employees and public, then the entire government will fail to cater the needs of the public creating havoc in the democracy and governance. The trust and the understanding can exist only when the government workers are honest to their work, organization and the public. Prabhu and Baliga (2016) highlight how ethical behavior and decisions maintaining citizens’ trust help in ensuring effective and efficient use of resources. In order to create an ethical environment and foster ethical conduct in the public agency, the role of leadership is widely seen as having an important role (Downe, Cowell & Morgan, 2016).

In line with the social learning system, Hassan, Wright & Yukl (2014) opine that if the leaders incorporate ethical values into their actions and treat the staffs fairly, the staffs learn from the observation of the managers to report ethical issues and problems to management as well as to avoid unethical actions themselves. This way, the leaders can create such environment where the staffs feel motivated to employ ethical behaviors in themselves and where the staffs can feel comfortable sharing the issues with the managers with the hope of it being addressed. On the other hand, if the managers themselves show unethical behavior, the staffs do not bother reporting to the managers with the assumption that the complaint would go unnoticed. Apart from influencing the staffs to report ethical problems, the ethical leadership can also increase the emotional bond of the staffs towards the organization and make them loyal and committed to the organization (Hassan, et. al 2014).

Likewise, the whistle-blowing policy also helps the organization maintain a good governance and foster ethical decision-making. I think with such policies; the staffs would feel safe in the organization and it would create fear among the staffs to conduct any unethical behaviors. Lavena (2014) relates how people with high motivation and affective work motives are more likely to whistle blow as they are committed to the organization and fulfilling its mission. In order to create an organizational culture that fosters whistle blowing, the leaders need to reward the whistle blowers and punish the wrongdoers. They can also establish confidential ways for the employees to report unethical behaviors. Examples of how it could be done is by developing a mobile application or hotline services where the staffs can report anonymously.

The discourse about administrative ethics also boils down to several factors such as absenteeism, late arrivals, longer breaks and bureaucratic procrastination of service delivery, all of which collectively point towards ineffectiveness of government. For instance, government workers in Nepal are characterized as unethical in several ways, such as – delay in public service and corruption which has raised frustrations among the public (Shakya, 2009). These ‘unethical’ characteristics are explained again by the general evidences of government workers remaining absent from their workplaces and taking longer breaks during working hours, among others. Nevertheless, apart from limited PSM, mistreatment at work and stress, implying that the workplace does not have an enabling environment for government workers to have high work ethics, is another factor leading to the culture of skipping work hours and absenteeism (Hassan, et. Al, 2014). Therefore, it is important to mend and nurture administrative ethics from both sides of the coin – one, creating, retaining and scaling the PSM of government workers, and another, a top-bottom approach in passing on the work ethics from leaders to workers through replication and emulation.

Employee-friendly policies

Employee friendly policies are, I believe a win-win situation for both the employees and the organizations. On one hand, they are in the best interest of the employees and reduce their stress. On the other hand, stress free employees are efficient in the performance helping in the overall performance of the organization. Lately, public agencies have started giving importance to the employee friendly policies which I personally think is a great way to increase the emotional connectivity of the employees with the organization and vice versa. Such policies make the employee feel valued who in turn would want to contribute to the organization in achieving its mission. Furthermore, the employees would be loyal to the supervisors who support such policies. The social exchange theory that deals with the exchanges between employees and their organization have been described as perceived organizational support while the exchange between employees and their leader, or supervisor as leader exchange theory (Lee & Hong, 2011).

I also believe that an employee cannot deliver a good performance at work if he/she is worried about the things at home. For instance, if my child is at home and I have to come to the office to do my job, I will not be able to concentrate on my work as my mind will be occupied with the thought of my child. I will have two options, either to stay absent or come to the work but have no concentration. In such cases, family friendly policy like child subsidy program can be really effective. I will neither have to remain absent nor lose my concentration, infact that would motivate me to do better for the organization which is looking after my child. According to Lee & Hong (2011), such policy has the power to reduce the turnover rate of the agency and at the same time increase its performance.

Telework, I believe is another policy that enhances the productivity of the employees and enhance their perceived organizational support. The amount of time one spends on getting ready and travelling all the way to the workplace could be utilized to do the actual office work but at home. This also keeps the employees away from the unwanted gossips and discussion that take place in the office and actually devote that time in doing productive home at work. The policy also boosts the well-being of the employees as it is not compulsory for him/her to go to the office even in poor health and makes them less stressful. Apart from that, the telework policy is also environment friendly in the sense that it helps reduce the carbon footprint of an individual. In that case, telework has dual benefits. According to Kwon & Jeon (2017), because of the employees driving less and less energy of the office being used, telework can help achieve climate protection goals. On the other hand, it also helps increase their satisfaction through flexible working schedules and locations. Therefore, employee-friendly policies are evidently instrumental to shape overall organizational culture by motivating people working in the organizations.

Conclusion

To sum up, the ideas discussed in this paper explore how several factors including workers’ motivation, ethics and friendly policies interact with each other in shaping the ground for effective government. While individual motivation of people working in government organizations matters a lot to determine how efficiently they perform their responsibilities, it is also equally backed by the other two supportive factors – ethics and employee-friendly policies. In this light, maintaining ethics in an organization through exemplary practices of trickling down ethical practices from leadership positions to the workers and having favorable policies such as to induce high work motivation and commitment among staff work together to establish a healthy work environment where both public organizations and employees thrive in a milieu of mutual trust and confidence on each other and ultimately delivering better public services.

References

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