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    Narratives of Creole islandness : exploring the relational practices of public servants and community leaders in Jamaica : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Development Studies at Massey University, Manawatū, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2023) Waite, SueAnn Georgia
    Understanding islands as spaces that amplify relational phenomena, Creole as produced by the experience of plantation colonialism; and narratives as sense-making tools which sustain cultural repertoires, this thesis uses a case study of public servants and community leaders involved in local development planning in Jamaica to explore the extent to which relational practices of islanders are explainable through narratives of Creole islandness. Assuming relations as the building blocks of institutions, the thesis proposes that examining relations and their cultural context is instrumental to understanding institutional change (and maintenance). The research uses Jamaica as an example of a Creole island, with the local sustainable development planning process and the participatory governance framework as the institutional context. Three subnational jurisdictions in Jamaica provided the basis for identifying a network of public servants and community leaders to produce the conversation data used for analysis. Members of the diaspora involved in related development initiatives were also included. Conversations produced two sets of research data: 1) identity narratives of Creole islanders, and 2) relational practices in the design and implementation of the local development planning and participatory governance processes. Analysis of the data set revealed patterns among public servants and community leaders in their emphasis on different elements of shared narratives of Creole island identity and conceptions of development, as well as patterns of relational practices between public servants and community leaders in their roles in the local development planning and participatory governance processes. The findings provide insight into how cultural narratives and repertoires support actors in their navigation of governance processes on a Creole island and suggest the importance of planning for relational practices when designing and managing development and institutional change processes.
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    A day in the life of a chief executive : the real-time use of six chief executives in the NZ public service : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Business Studies in Human Resource Management at Massey University
    (Massey University, 1997) McCann, V. Jane
    The research involved a structured observation real-time use study of six New Zealand government chief executives, and examined Mintzberg's 1973 theory of managerial roles in practice. Mintzberg's theory of ten management roles was found to be relevant in 1997, but with the addition of the risk manager role, which is essential in a changing environment. Similar patterns of work to those described by Mintzberg were found; that is, chief executives jobs were "activity characterised by brevity, variety, and fragmentation." The NZ chief executives appeared to have a reactive orientation, being driven by external events and stakeholder and spent over 65% of their day in meetings. They never gave direct orders; and never finished a task that they started without interruption. They worked long hours, took short lunch breaks and spent some of their time fire-fighting with other agencies or the media. They also spent most of their time in the leadership, role exhorting staff to do more with fewer resources, for the good of society. This time use study gives a snapshot of the chief executives' role in the NZ public service in 1997. It has implications for the recruitment, retention and development of chief executives in the public sector and will be of interest to their employers, staff, information technology specialists, professional developers and researchers of management. It illustrates Mintzberg's managerial roles in practice.
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    Unbridled optimism : public choice, the public service and electoral law reform : a thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Social Policy
    (Massey University, 1996) Shaw, Richard Hugh
    This thesis addresses issues that are likely to be confronted by the public service in New Zealand as a result of the advent of electoral law reform. During the decade since 1984 the institutional arrangements that circumscribe the activities of the core public sector have undergone a process of considerable change. The proposition extended in this research is that the structural configuration that has emerged out of the process of public sector reform will face a number of significant challenges in the emerging political environment. In the context of a milieu shaped by the imperatives of proportional representation, two particular characteristics of the contemporary public service may prove problematic. Specifically, the nature of the statutory interface between responsible ministers and the chief executives of government organisations may, in conjunction with an 'atomised' core public sector, function so as to compromise both the impartiality of public servants and the ability of an administration to develop and implement policy in a strategically consistent fashion. The extent to which such difficulties are likely to occur will be the result of the convergence of a series of variables, including the calibre of political leadership provided by future Prime Ministers, and the nature of the advice and guidance provided to public servants in the new climate. Perhaps most significant of all, however, will be the precise configuration of future parliaments returned under the new electoral system. The fusion of the legislative and executive arms of government under New Zealand's constitutional arrangements means that patterns of legislative representation influence the formation of governments; in the future, those patterns may exercise a more direct influence upon the environment within which the public service operates than has historically been the case in New Zealand.
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    The quest for efficiency : role of human resource management in public sector reforms in Uganda : a thesis presented in fulfilment of the requirements for the Doctor of Philosophy in Development Studies at Massey University, Palmerston North, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2002) Bacwayo, Kukunda Elizabeth
    The context of this thesis is the development strategy of public sector reforms and privatisation. It uses Uganda as a case study, and argues for the need to integrate the issue of human resource management in the privatisation discourse in developing countries. Public sector reforms arose out of neo-liberal thinking that argues against state intervention and recommends market led economic growth. Privatisation is part of the attempt to scale back on the role of the state in economic development and has been integrated in the development policies of developing countries through the structural adjustment programs of the IMF and World Bank. It is required because of the belief that the private sector is more efficient in allocation and use of resources and is therefore the best medium for attaining development goals. Private sector companies in the developed countries which utilise modern techniques of management are comparatively more efficient than their public counterparts. Globalisation and market competition forced organisations to search for ways to be competitive and this partly led to organisations elevating human resource management issues to a strategic level because of the belief that a company's workers add value that make firms competitive. When privatisation is made a requirement by the multilateral aid agencies for developing countries it is based on the assumption that the conditions that make public enterprises inefficient do not exist in the private sector. No empirical evidence is available to confirm or refute these assumptions, particularly in the case of Africa's developing nations. This thesis has contributed to this area by examining the human resource management practices of seven Ugandan organisations, three public, two private and two privatised. The aim was to find out whether there are differences in the way in which private and public organisations manage their employees and if their practices are those associated with effective management of human resources. The practices that were examined were recruitment and selection of staff, training, compensation and employee attitudes. The results from this study did not provide evidence that the differences that were exhibited in the seven organisations were related to ownership. Rather they seem to be determined by the values and culture of managers and the labour market conditions in Uganda. Both private and public enterprises exhibited practices that human resource management literature and practice consider as obstacles to efficiency