Government agencies in the public sector suffer from many of the same organisational problems as corporations – the only real difference is that they are not driven by the profit motive. They are driven by the needs of the community or the nation they serve. They are accountable to the taxpayers. The taxpayers are effectively the shareholders who fund the investments and operating costs of public sector agencies. What the taxpayers and the private sector care about is mission assurance and cost-effective performance. Institutional resilience is just as important for the uninterrupted supply of public services as it is for the generation of profits from the manufacturing of products or the supply of commercial services. Indeed without reliable sources of electricity, transport, sewers and water the private sector cannot grow and flourish.
Government institutions, therefore, play a major role in nation building. When they are efficiently run, they are able to provide cost effective services. When they are not efficiently run, they are a drain on the economy and the national budget. They also undermine the capacity of the private sector to deliver products to the market at affordable prices.
Therefore, whole system change, cultural transformation and leadership development are just as important in the public sector as in the private sector.
We carry out values assessments for Government Agencies in exactly the same way as we carry them out for corporations. The only difference is in the template of values we use for the survey. Words such as profit and shareholder value are replaced by words such as financial stability and public investment.