Public sector organizations, worldwide, are currently in the process of dramatic transformation. Organizations in the (semi-) public sector are recently confronted by severe challenges to their existence and performance. The current financial-economic crisis forces governments, worldwide, to cut-down public sector expenditures dramatically. In conjunction with the planned budget-cuts, governments formulate large-scale reforms in many domains of the (semi-) public sector, such as health care, education, defense, police and security, social policy, or culture. Hence, organizations in the (semi-) public sector will be soon forced to adapt their strategies, goals, and primary processes.
Major changes in the public sector often take place simultaneously at various levels of the multi-level system of public sector management: at the top-level of political-administrative management, within networks of inter-organizational collaboration, and within public sector organizations themselves. The underlying motivation of most reorganization activities in the public sector is to increase performance and efficiency. However, the planned change approaches most often neglect unintended, negative consequences of these changes in the rule-making system of the organizations (producing red tape) and in the service-delivery system of employees (producing resistance to the organizational change).
The course “Organizational change: Resistance and red tape” zooms in on processes of organizational change within public sector organizations, such as (networks of) administrations, departments, and providers of (semi-)public services—such as the police, housing corporations, schools and universities, or youth care institutions. The focus of the course is on two key processes within organizations that are often associated with organizational change and reorganizations:
(a) resistance to organizational change among employees, and
(b) the creation of red tape induced by the new rules, regulations, and procedures that are produced by the organizational change. Both processes are dysfunctional to public sector organizations, because they could severely impede the proper functioning of professionals and the quality of services delivered. Hence, employee resistance and the creation of red tape could backfire on the original goals intentions of the change itself.
The course “Organizational change: Resistance and red tape” has a specific place in the master “Comparative Public Management” because in this course the focus is on transformation processes within organizations.
Students are able to:
- reflect on the origins, mechanisms, and consequences of two dysfunctional processes within organizations: employee resistance and red tape,
- develop a research design to study these processes within a specific organization,
- formulate management instruments that deal with these dysfunctional processes,
- report on the research design and / or the implementation of the management instruments both in presentation and a written proposal.
In a series of seminars the theoretical-empirical literature on organizational change, employee resistance, and red tape is discussed on the basis of specific cases. Students analyze and discuss cases, and present the results of their analyses in two assignments. Subsequently, students write a brief research proposal in groups of two students.
Coordinator
Prof. dr. R. Torenvlied
Teaching format
Weekly lectures, assignments, and presentations.
Literature
Demers, Christiane. 2008. Organizational change theories: A synthesis. Newbury Park, CA: Sage. 296 pp. (ISBN 978-0-7619-2932-1). Price: € 36,99 (Bol.com).
Bozeman, Barry, and Mary K. Feeney. 2011. Rules and red tape: A prism for public administration theory and research. Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe. 207 pp. (ISBN 978-0-7656-2335-5).
Additional articles in ISI journals in the fields of management and public administration, primarily Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory. About 100 pp. to be announced. (Accessible through the online access journals of Leiden University library).
Examination
Two individual book assignments (weight 20 percent each). One joint paper (written by maximally two students; weight 60 percent). Final grade is defined as the weighted average of the two assignments and the paper. Each assignment must be passed with a grade ≥ 5.5.
Schedule
Fridays: 10/2 through 23/3
Time: 9-11 hours
Location: Campus Den Haag, Stichthage, zaal Buitenhof