EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Public Governance includes all underlying principles, laws and rules that help a public sector organisation function. Bad governance could lead to exponential negative impact to the public because its scope influences the entire population. Good governance, on the other hand, has a positive impact and is extremely important to citizens and the civic society, the latter two having major roles to play in the quality of public governance.
There are many other factors, besides citizens and the civic society, that influence public governance, and it is thus important to look at all of these to ensure the proper functioning of an organisation in the public sector. Among these, national institutions that can make fair and appropriate governance-related decisions are prominent.
Government decisions and allocation of resources and spending directly affect public services. Many challenges could impact the quality-of-service delivery, including corruption, lack of public awareness, political pressure and/or control, lack of decentralisation, resistance to change, etc.
With the increasing demand of the public for high quality and efficiency services, Open Government Partnership as a concept is gaining increasing focus and attention, which is ultimately resulting in increased transparency, accountability and responsiveness to the public, among many other benefits. This new form of governance empowers citizens to take action to achieve the desired social outcome.
Course Objectives
The main objective of this Advanced Governance and Leadership Strategy in Public Sector Management Course is to empower public sector professionals with—
- An overall understanding of governance in the public sector and its related challenges
- An ability to pre-empt all possible challenges and hindrances to good governance in the public sector and keep handy the solutions thereof
- Multiple options to ensure that quality and efficiency of public service delivery is not hampered
- The skill to identify gaps in public governance and undertake initiatives to improve or resolve these
- The capability to engage citizens and the civic society in governance reform initiatives
- Potential to play an active part in the reform of public sector governance in order to address all challenges and gaps for better quality, efficiency and effectiveness
- Experience and exposure to bring about more transparency and accountability in the public sector
Institutional Benefits
With public sector professionals attending the course, the organisation will benefit in the following ways:
- Greater transparency, ownership and accountability by all stakeholders
- Higher quality and efficiency in public services, thus impacting the society positively
- Greater customer satisfaction from public services
- More insights into capitalizing on all avenues to create more opportunities and innovation in public sector governance for a positive change
- More consideration towards citizens and the civic society and greater involvement of the two for first-hand feedback on quality and other aspects of service delivery
- More efficient and quality-conscious work environment and culture
Personal Benefits
Through this Governance and Leadership in Public Sector Management Course, public sector professionals will derive the following benefits:
- Greater understanding of end-to-end governance in the public sector
- Increased ability and better preparedness to face all challenges and hindrances to good governance
- More knowledge of dealing with low standards of governance and improving it through the most applicable means
- More information on how to engage citizens and the civic society in public sector governance
- Increased ability and knowledge to anticipate, identify, initiate and manage government reform measures and activities
- Increased agility to take on higher roles and responsibilities within one’s domain
- Higher capabilities of handling all aspects of governance in the public sector, thus fostering faster growth and progression.
Who Should Attend?
- Top Government /Senior public sector officials and management – to thoroughly understand all critical aspects impacting the quality of public governance and find ways to improve governance in the public services
- Any other public servant who can contribute to an overall improvement to the quality of public sector governance
Course Outline:
The Governance and Leadership in Public Sector Management Course will cover the following areas that are critical for the effectiveness of measures to improve governance in public services:
Module 1 – Governance in the Public Services
- Overview of governance in the public services
- Importance of governance in the public services
- Difference between public governance and governance in other sectors
- Hindrances to good governance in the public services
Module 2 – Important Stakeholders for Improving Governance in the Public Services
- Directors/Board Members
- Employees
- Citizens
- Local Governments and Civic Societies
Module 3 – Principles of Good Governance
- Rule of law
- Transparency
- Accountability
- Public sector ethics and values
- Stewardship
- Leadership
Module 4 – Steps to Improve Governance in the Public Services
- Decentralisation
- Establishing political accountability
- Establishing complete transparency and accountability of the government to its people
- Better fiscal management
- Use of technology to increase efficiency in public service delivery
- Training and mentoring of public sector professionals
Module 5 – Hindrances to Improving Public Governance and Solutions to Overcome Them
- Corruption
- Manpower shortage
- Political imperatives
- Poor judicial performance
- Weak legislatures
- Resistance to change by public sector professionals
Module 6 – Public Sector Reforms
- Steps to initiate public sector reforms
- Features of a successful public sector reform
- Supporting conditions/requirements for public sector reforms
- Tools to measure the effectiveness of a public sector reform
Module 7 – Performance Management of Public Sector Professionals
- Definition of performance management of public sector professionals
- Methods to set performance targets and measure the performance of public sector professionals
- Changing performance measurement to performance management
- Benefits of performance management
Module 8 – Corporate Governance and Open Government Partnerships
- Corporate Governance in the Public Sector
- Definition of Open Government Partnerships
- Aims of this initiative
- Benefits of this initiative
Module 9 – Influencers/Success Factors of Good Governance in the Public Services
- Defined framework of policies and processes
- Robust performance management systems and processes
- Optimistic work culture
- Good internal and external stakeholder relationships
- Well-managed budgets
- Good human resource management practices
