tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24338064.post6519976006249690432..comments2024-02-11T19:28:27.997+11:00Comments on Personal Reflections: Innovation, efficiency & the processes of industrial changeJim Belshawhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10075614280789984767noreply@blogger.comBlogger17125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24338064.post-20446259054365200822012-03-17T10:13:20.356+11:002012-03-17T10:13:20.356+11:00Machiavelli noted! I agree with you on the core fu...Machiavelli noted! I agree with you on the core functions of Government; the issue is how they might be delivered.<br /><br />The minister question lies at the heart of it. <br /><br />One problem with the model is that you actually have sufficient in-house skills to manage the process. A second problem is that it requires ministers and governments to articulate needs and objectives with a high degree of precision. It's not just that this is hard, but it actually runs against the democratic and political process where part of the role is to reconcile different views at the margin to make the system work.Jim Belshawhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10075614280789984767noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24338064.post-39457577019921124542012-03-17T08:39:06.934+11:002012-03-17T08:39:06.934+11:00Jim, I had in mind tha the kinds of considerations...Jim, I had in mind tha the kinds of considerations raised by Machiavelli would preclude the mercenary option. He suggested that mercenaries were an existential threat to government.<br />My general point is that there ae some core functions of government.<br /><br />Coming back to your original question, my recollection is that ministers rarely had the skills needed to perform the purchaser role. They needed a departmental secretary to advise them.Winton Bateshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07383561940886657594noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24338064.post-51585414708907284282012-03-17T03:12:55.997+11:002012-03-17T03:12:55.997+11:00Winton again, I do not know enough about Popper...Winton again, I do not know enough about Popper's conditions for progress. As you might suspect, I remain attracted to the concept of progress and to the idea that progress is facilitated by an open society and by free markets.Jim Belshawhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10075614280789984767noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24338064.post-56158145028030253322012-03-17T03:06:10.700+11:002012-03-17T03:06:10.700+11:00My apologies all for leaving this post and the com...My apologies all for leaving this post and the comments too hanging in the air. It was just one of those things!<br /><br />Winton, dealing just with the New Zealand model. <br /><br />I don't think that it's as clear cut as that. Take defence. Political considerations, among other things, would preclude the mercenary option. But it would have been open to the NZ Government to outsource some activities by, for example, a defence mou with Australia; by use of civilian contractors; through use of other government agencies (customs etc).<br /><br />The point about the model is that it provided a structured way for examining functions and services and for exploring other supply options. <br /><br />Treasury is even more clear cut than defence. Perhaps as much as 90% of the Treasury function could be outsourced! The model also allowed, in theory at least, agencies to look for other income sources.Jim Belshawhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10075614280789984767noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24338064.post-69868004114321143822012-03-14T19:43:32.616+11:002012-03-14T19:43:32.616+11:00Jim, there was never any prospect that the defence...Jim, there was never any prospect that the defence minister would purchase the services of mercenaries even if they offered better value for money than the army. The minister for finance could never literally refuse to buy the advice offered by treasury. In my view the model was fundamentally flawed.Winton Bateshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07383561940886657594noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24338064.post-90486624625558091462012-03-14T19:05:53.640+11:002012-03-14T19:05:53.640+11:00Winton, the pure NZ model is very different.
Und...Winton, the pure NZ model is very different. <br /><br />Under that model ministries such as Defence become suppliers to the Government. Those ministries were expected to keep commercial accounts and make a profit on the capital invested by their shareholder, the NZ Government. <br /><br />The Government was concerned with outcomes. These might take a variety of forms and combine inputs from a number of sources. Those inputs included services purchased from, say, the Treasury or Ministry of Defence. <br /><br />The Government was not bound to purchase all or any services from agencies. It might chose, for example, to outsource economic advice in whole or part to another provider. In theory, this made all Government services of the traditional type fully contestable.<br /><br />It didn't quite work that way. Can you guess why?Jim Belshawhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10075614280789984767noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24338064.post-69522966366752136402012-03-14T15:06:24.909+11:002012-03-14T15:06:24.909+11:00This discussion is of particular interest to me be...This discussion is of particular interest to me because I am currently writing a chapter about the concept of progress for my book.<br />I am attracted to Popper's concept of conditions for progress and the role of the open society and free markets in that context.Winton Bateshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07383561940886657594noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24338064.post-47487913916581492522012-03-14T07:51:40.228+11:002012-03-14T07:51:40.228+11:00Hi Jim
That's a very good point you make abou...Hi Jim<br /><br />That's a very good point you make about the balance between investment in further efficiency as opposed to investment in innovation. There's a sort of inertia which builds, almost ensuring concentration upon further efficiency. Lose, lose.<br /><br />kvdAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24338064.post-10767642384170224382012-03-14T07:24:51.539+11:002012-03-14T07:24:51.539+11:00Hi Jim,
you said: "The problem is partly one...Hi Jim,<br /><br />you said: "The problem is partly one of measurement. We can often measure the efficiency of a particular activity or process, but we tend to do so in isolation of consequential effects."<br /><br />This is a simple statement that captures the picture very well. I always had trouble figuring out why the contemporary notion of efficiency often caused problems rather than resolve them. I think this is making it clear why there are often those problems.<br /><br />Rod.Rodhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10962789743908134314noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24338064.post-48675741019326463312012-03-14T07:10:08.942+11:002012-03-14T07:10:08.942+11:00Jim, I don't understand your point.
Regarding...Jim, I don't understand your point.<br /><br />Regarding the NZ public sector, the purchaser-provider model is about outputs rather than outcomes. Outputs equal costs, so there is no difference in practice to a system where a department is given a budget.Winton Bateshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07383561940886657594noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24338064.post-33236708138220462312012-03-13T19:54:17.904+11:002012-03-13T19:54:17.904+11:00Thanks, all. Will try to continue later tonight af...Thanks, all. Will try to continue later tonight after tennis. For now, a few brief comments. <br /><br />Winton, it is perfectly normal for efficient activities to fail a market test. Efficiency is normally defined in terms of the known; a market shift may invalidate that approach. Indeed, that is one thing that I am arguing!<br /><br />Oh for a relatively low paying job with long lunches, working at own pace with high degrees of personal autonomy. Do they exist?!<br /><br />Evan, all the evidence is that people want to feel that their work is of value, so as in the call centre case you have to create that value. But you also have to do it within the performance criteria set for the task. That's a challenge!<br /><br />Oops. Time for tennisJim Belshawhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10075614280789984767noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24338064.post-22617184729721692802012-03-13T16:44:20.740+11:002012-03-13T16:44:20.740+11:00Jim - Having worked with and for the public servic...Jim - Having worked with and for the public service over a number of years (I am now self employed) I have come across this obsession with Efficiency Dividends defined as thus : <br /><br />An annual reduction in the amount of resources consumed for the same level of output, achieved usually through financial and budgetary controls, improved management and administration, application of new technologies and staff cuts.<br /><br />However I have my own theory on this I call it Efficiency Dividend Spill. And this is defined by me as:<br /><br />The propensity for management to engage consultants and other external entities to offset the divergence of the minimum required productivity for functionality from the current output divided by the remaining resources. <br /><br />Or in other words as the resources (workforce) decline to the point where departments are unable to function the slack is taken up by consultants. Although in some service areas this is not so. For some Departments there is an elasticity in service delivery. <br /><br />For example I was at the RTA renewing my rego. There were two people serving behind 12 counters (10 were unmanned) with approximately twenty people waiting. <br /><br />People complain about things like this but support governments who cut the public service. Well let’em complain and pocket their $2.50 tax cut and wait in line for essential services. <br /><br />Cheers<br />AWAugustus Winstonnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24338064.post-83879628282183490142012-03-13T15:53:55.390+11:002012-03-13T15:53:55.390+11:00More 'efficiency':
http://news.bbc.co.uk/...More 'efficiency':<br /><br />http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/south_of_scotland/6146974.stm<br /><br />- leaving the UK taxpayer to pick up the bill for unemployment benefits.<br /><br />kvdAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24338064.post-74068371330604876192012-03-13T11:10:44.411+11:002012-03-13T11:10:44.411+11:00Hi Evan
I am a fan of Tim Gallwey's books incl...Hi Evan<br />I am a fan of Tim Gallwey's books including 'The Inner Game of Work'. <br /><br />We are having some problems with different definitions of efficiency. My concept of efficiency - which I think is fairly standard in economics although perhaps not in business studies - does not assume that activities are entirely instrumental.<br /><br />In terms of individual objectives it may be perfectly efficient for a person to choose a relatively low paying job where he or she is allowed to enjoy long lunches with other staff, work at their own pace and have a great deal of say about how the work is done, rather than a higher paying job with less job satisfaction. <br />In terms of business objectives, a low pay- high job satisfaction culture is likely to be more appropriate in some firms/ industries than others.<br /><br />Work practice become inefficient as a result of restrictions on competition. For example, it was relatively common in this country in the 1970s for restrictions on competition to allow some people to enjoy cushy jobs at the expense of other workers, consumers or taxpayers. I hope we never go back to that!Winton Bateshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07383561940886657594noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24338064.post-54037138132639445482012-03-13T09:33:33.473+11:002012-03-13T09:33:33.473+11:00Hi Jim, one philosophical problem with efficiency....Hi Jim, one philosophical problem with efficiency. It assumes that the activity is entirely instrumental - not worthwhile or enjoyable in itself. I take it that this is the point of Winton's remark about orchestras.<br /><br />Making work entirely instrumental might not be a good idea. There was a book called something like The Inner Game of Work - the approach to making call centre work interesting was to get people to focus on the task - things like giving people a scale to assess how much they calmed down an angry customer and so on.<br /><br />Looking forward to the next post.Evanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13355215688351759230noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24338064.post-9399351578563839832012-03-13T07:34:52.936+11:002012-03-13T07:34:52.936+11:00Jim
I agree with you that a cost-cutting view of e...Jim<br />I agree with you that a cost-cutting view of efficiency is often too narrow. I don't think efficiency should be identified exclusively with cost cutting. At the same time, cost cutting is still an important consideration, particularly given recent increases in union power and their efforts to restore inefficient work practices.<br /><br />On reflection, the model I offered of a market test of efficiency of management versus a political test is a bit too simple. Some activities (including some schools and hospitals)are supported by civil society.<br /> <br />It may also be important to recognize ex ante and ex post considerations and the role of luck. A project might fail to meet the market test for reasons that have nothing to do with inherent efficiency of management.Winton Bateshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07383561940886657594noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24338064.post-33178807567276062092012-03-13T06:52:19.413+11:002012-03-13T06:52:19.413+11:00Excellent post, excellent points. Will await furt...Excellent post, excellent points. Will await further thoughts with great interest.<br /><br />kvdAnonymousnoreply@blogger.com