Each year, as we move towards Matariki, I gather the seeds of knowledge I found most valuable in the previous year and offer them to others. In 2021, I offered knowledge on good public sector governance, focusing on collaboration and anticipatory governance. I did this because I observed that the authorising environment was struggling with…

Public management reform worldwide follows four main themes: fiscal stability, managerial efficiency, improved capacity and better public accountability. Fiscal reforms are generally the most consistently pursued. They are far-reaching and directly affect the well-being of public sector employees, state capacity, and social cohesion. They mostly involve downsizing, reducing input and output expenditures, privatising, and reforming…

One way to see proposals to change the design of the public sector is through a lens that presents the state as fragmented whenua on which political struggles play out. In the same way, whenua reflects the battle between settler and hapū interests, agendas, claims and rights, so it is for the state. Through that…

This post is a letter to my friends and whānau working in the public service. As the whakataukī suggests you are always working in the past, present and future. That is because the past is central to and shapes your present and future reality. It also because you are always carrying previous attempts at public…

The whakataukī above reminds us that different emotions can be more useful than others, especially in a time of conflict. I think about this whakataukī, especially when it comes to public service reform and the endless round of working group reports on state sector productivity and effectiveness. I mean, can we jump to devolution now?…

I love this whakataukī. It reminds me that understanding comes from knowing and welcoming the difference between similar things and people. I have heard a lot of korero this week about our golden age of public management. Many commentators assumed the 1980s public management reforms are our high point. Sadly, those people are wrong. Let…

A small warning. I am writing a journal article on public-sector reform and why many reform programmes fail. It follows a panel discussion I was part of early this year. IPANZ and Deloitte hosted it. Deloitte was calling attention to their 2022 State of the State report. The report found that the public sector in…