scholarly journals Organizational Professionalism: Social Workers Negotiating Tools of NPM

2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. e2381 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nanna Mik-Meyer
Keyword(s):  
Social Work ◽  
Social Workers ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Meaningful Work ◽  
Welfare Recipient ◽  
Social Work Values ◽  
New Public ◽  
Treatment Facilities ◽  
The Individual

This article examines how social workers and managers perceive meaningful work and expertise in six care and treatment facilities in Denmark. Based on 29 interviews with social workers (n=22) and managers (n=7), the article shows how New Public Management-inspired tools such as scoring schemas align with social work values such as “client-centeredness” and working with the individual welfare recipient face-to-face. The article finds that fitting social work into organizational schemas changes the work practices of social workers and also the way members of this profession define meaningful work and expertise. In addition, the article also finds that scoring schemas cause conflicts among social workers regarding the character of expertise when values of social work (to meet a welfare recipient’s need) must be aligned with NPM-inspired values of organizations (to meet managers’ demand for documentation).

Organisation des Luzerner Forstdienstes – konsequente Entflechtung von hoheitlichen und betrieblichen Aufgaben | Organisation of the forestry services in Lucerne – differentiating between sovereign and management tasks

2001 ◽  
Vol 152 (11) ◽  
pp. 453-459 ◽  
Author(s):  
Georg Iselin ◽  
Albin Schmidhauser
Keyword(s):  
Forest Management ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Work Force ◽  
Forest Reserve ◽  
New Public ◽  
Forest Regions ◽  
Management Project ◽  
Forestry Services ◽  
The Individual

During the past ten years most cantonal forest services have undergone re-organisations. Lucerne's cantonal forest administration initiated a fundamentally new way of providing forestry services by differentiating between sovereign tasks and management tasks. By examining the individual steps of the process we demonstrate how starting with the mandate,goals were developed and implemented over several years. Product managers assumed responsibility for products, as defined in the New Public Management Project, on a cantonal-wide basis. Work within a matrix organisation has led to significant changes. Territorial responsibilities are increasingly assumed by district foresters, who have modern infrastructures at their disposal in the new forestry centres. The re-organisation has led to forest districts being re-drawn and to a reduction in the number of forest regions. To provide greater efficiency,state forest management has been consolidated into a single management unit. The new forest reserve plan removes almost half of the state forest from regular forest management,resulting in a reduction in the volume of work and in the work force. We show how effective the differentiation of sovereignty tasks and management tasks has been in coping with the effects of hurricane Lothar.

"Effetti corrosivi"? Problematizzare l'impatto del New Public Management e della governance sui social workers del settore pubblico

2012 ◽  
pp. 37-52
Author(s):  
Riccardo Guidi
Keyword(s):  
Social Workers ◽  
Network Theory ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
New Public

L'articolo sviluppa considerazioni di carattere metodologico e sostanziale sull'impatto che le riforme ispirate al New Public Management e alla governance hanno avuto sul lavoro sociale. Nella prima parte dell'articolo sono sinteticamente esposti i caratteri fondamentali dei due paradigmi di riforma. La seconda parte si focalizza sull'approccio di studio all'innovazione nel campo della Pubblica Amministrazione. La terza parte espone alcune evidenze empiriche della letteratura internazionale sui cambiamenti del lavoro sociale. Sull'Italia viene proposta una rilettura dei dati di due ricerche nazionali svolte a cavallo del ciclo di riforme del welfare degli anni 2000. L'articolo giunge alla conclusione che lo studio dell'impatto delle riforme sul lavoro sociale richiede di considerare una pluralitŕ di "variabili di traduzione" delle riforme (pathdependent e actor-dependent). Siul piano teorico ciň sollecita a verificare la possibilitŕ di un incontro tra il neo-istituzionalismo sociologico e l'Actor-Network Theory.

scholarly journals Supervision: A force for change? Three stories told

2010 ◽  
Vol 53 (6) ◽  
pp. 773-790 ◽  
Author(s):  
Greta Bradley ◽  
Lambert Engelbrecht ◽  
Staffan Höjer
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Social Work ◽  
Child Welfare ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
New Public

Drawing on research, we contextualize social work and describe the role of supervisors in child welfare settings in South Africa, England and Sweden. Exploratory frameworks and models of supervision illustrate how it has been influenced by principles of New Public Management and the concluding discussion proposes an agenda for change.

scholarly journals Leadership Support of Supervision in Social Work Practice

2015 ◽  
Vol 32 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 151-165 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rosemary Vito
Keyword(s):  
Social Work ◽  
Social Workers ◽  
Human Service ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Work Practice ◽  
Human Service Organizations ◽  
Social Work Practice ◽  
Service Organizations ◽  
Leadership Support

This article discusses research findings that highlight the importance of leadership support of supervision for social workers in human service organizations. While supervision is considered a cornerstone of social work practice, whether and how such supervision is supported by human service leaders is not adequately analyzed. Using qualitative research data from interviews with supervisors and managers in southern Ontario, this article presents the vital role social work leaders play in supporting supervision by modelling values, and creating a safe organizational culture. The challenges of providing this support are also discussed in the current context of new public management. The article concludes with a series of recommendations, including: prioritizing supervision to promote organizational learning, organizational restructuring to reduce power differentials, modelling social work values to create a safe learning culture, and supporting supervisory and leadership training for social workers. Findings may be of interest to social workers who are leading, supervising, teaching or practicing in human service organizations.

scholarly journals New public management and information communication technology: Organisational influences on frontline child protection practice

2016 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 51-63 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mike Webster ◽  
David McNabb
Keyword(s):  
Social Work ◽  
Child Protection ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Work Practice ◽  
Social Work Practice ◽  
Information And Communications Technology ◽  
Work Processes ◽  
New Public ◽  
Key Aspects

In this paper the authors examine the new public management (NPM) philosophy influencing the organisational environment in which child protection social workers are located. NPM prioritises outputs through policies, such as results based accountability (RBA) predicated on the expectation that responsibility to achieve designated programme outcomes is sheeted to the agency and its workers. Ongoing funding depends on programme results.NPM ideology assumes that workers and managers in agencies tasked with delivering care and protection services are able to control the variables influencing outputs which contribute to outcomes. The authors will analyse four key aspects of NPM thinking (RBA, outputs, outcomes and key performance indicators) and explore their organisational consequences. The influence on social work practice of information and communications technology (ICT), on which NPM depends, is also considered.The paper is not an ideologically based rejection of NPM, but rather an assessment of its consequences for care and protection practice. The authors call for a return to the centrality of relationally based social work processes embodied in common factors (CF) practice, such as the therapeutic alliance. We argue that CF approaches offer a contrasting and more appropriate practice philosophy than NPM thinking while still enabling achievable, multifaceted organisational benefits.

Performance auditing and neoliberal governmentality: future research directions

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tarek Rana ◽  
Dessalegn Getie Mihret ◽  
Tesfaye T. Lemma
Keyword(s):  
Public Sector ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Neoliberal Governmentality ◽  
New Public ◽  
Concurrent Development ◽  
Performance Auditing ◽  
The Individual

Purpose This paper aims to interpret the role and professional issues of public sector performance auditing (PA) as a mechanism of neoliberal governmentality in the New Public Management (NPM) era by drawing on a Foucauldian conceptual lens to chart directions for future research. Design/methodology/approach The study uses the Foucauldian concepts of visibility and identity to interpret PA against the background of neoliberal imperatives of public sector management. Findings As the growing emphasis on PA in recent decades can be understood as driven by the concurrent development of neoliberal and NPM rationalities, the relatively underexploited concepts of visibility and identity allow further inquiry into important PA issues. This paper identifies avenues for future research under the following three themes: the issue of visibility in neoliberal governmentality and potential for auditors-general to expand the domain of influence of National Audit Offices through the PA role; the potential for PA as a unified distinct specialisation; and the neoliberal idea of professional identity as the individual expert and its interplay with the potential emergence of PA as a distinct function within the accounting profession. Research limitations/implications This conceptual paper is anticipated to stimulate future PA research. Key areas in this respect include the position and authority afforded to PA and the possibility of transformation in auditors’ conception of their professional worldview. Originality/value This paper charts direction for future research by interpreting PA using Foucauldian concepts of visibility and identity that remain to be exploited in PA research.

New Public Management, migrant professionals and labour mobility: possibilities for social justice social work?

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donna Baines
Keyword(s):  
Social Justice ◽  
Social Work ◽  
Social Services ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Work Practice ◽  
Social Work Practice ◽  
Study Data ◽  
New Public ◽  
Unpaid Labour

Social work labour is increasingly mobile and global, as are neoliberal policy and management models such as New Public Management. These global processes overlap with local contexts to create and limit possibilities for social-justice-directed social work practice. Drawing on qualitative case study data collected in Canada, Australia, the UK and New Zealand, this chapter: 1) briefly sketches the history of colonialism and immigration that shaped, and shape, these four countries; 2) discusses the standardising influence of New Public Management and managerialism on social work practice possibilities in the four countries; analyses, in particular, the increasing use of immigrant ‘volunteer’ labour and other forms of unpaid labour, including student placements and internships, as a response to ongoing under-funding of social services and policies of ‘permanent’ austerity; and 3) explores implications for practice and possibilities for liberatory social work practice.

Can managerialism promote organisational transformation in private universities?

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 221258682110672
Author(s):  
Maeda Kazuyuki
Keyword(s):  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Private Universities ◽  
University Reform ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
The Public ◽  
New Public ◽  
Autonomous Management ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Organisational Level

Used as a method of university reform, new public management (NPM) involves an ideology of managerialism that conflicts with collegiality and causes ‘hybridisation’. In management organisations, when organisational goals are not shared at the individual level, this adjustment mechanism shifts to the organisational level. This study aimed to examine whether there are coordination mechanisms at the organisational level in universities by focussing on those in Japan, particularly private universities that require autonomous management. Multi-level analysis results revealed that although there is hybridisation associated with increased managerial pressure, there are no organisational-level mechanisms to reduce conflict. In conclusion, the authors point out the difficulty of organising private universities based on managerialism and suggests that university reform in Japan may be ‘hollowing out’ in the public sector as well. Further, the study emphasises the importance of undertaking a comparative study of governance arrangements in China’s private universities in the future.

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