Do all roads lead to a managerial public service bargain? Performance management systems for senior civil servants 1.

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1 Do all roads lead to a managerial public service bargain? Performance management systems for senior civil servants 1. Annie Hondeghem Public Management Institute Katholieke Universiteit Leuven annie.hondeghem@soc.kuleuven.be Karolien Van Dorpe Public Management Institute Katholieke Universiteit Leuven karolien.vandorpe@soc.kuleuven.be Introduction Relations between senior civil servants and their ministers, and by extension the government and the wider society, has been a classic theme in the field of public administration. A number of authors have sought to describe and analyze these relationships (a.o.: Aberbach, Putnam & Rockman, 1981; Svara, 1985;1999; Peters, 1987). Amongst these, Christopher Hood provided the most recent work with his typology of Public Service Bargains (PSB). The past couple of decades, we have witnessed numerous reforms in the public sector in OECD countries, many of these inspired by the new public management movement (Politt & Bouckaert, 2004). Various forms of performance management systems and devices have been introduced, agencies have been created and put at arm s length, and contracting has been introduced for senior civil servants in some countries. As a result, the traditional public service bargain came 1 This paper is part of a broader project entitled Assessing the Belgian mandate system from an international perspective directed by the following research team: Christian de Visscher (UCLouvain), Annie Hondeghem (KULeuven), Karolien Van Dorpe (KULeuven) and François Randour (UCLouvain). It is financed by the Belgian Science policy ( ). The authors wish to thank the foreign research partners in this research project: Trui Steen and Frits van der Meer (Leiden University), Jacques Bourgault (ENAP Canada), Morten Balle Hanssen (University of Southern Denmark), Heidi Salomonsen (Aalborg University) and Sylvia Horton (University of Portsmouth). 1

2 to be under pressure, and has been replaced by at least partially a managerial public service bargain, according to Hood. Our interest is in how changes in performance management systems for senior civil servants have impacted on the public service bargain between those senior civil servants and their political masters. In our opinion, the PSB framework has thus far been used largely in a descriptive way. This paper aims to add to the literature on politico-administrative relations by exploring the performance management systems in place for senior civil servants in 5 countries. This way, we aim to add to the PSB typology, and possibly refine the hybrid and managerial category of PSB s. The paper includes case studies of Canada, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Denmark and Belgium. The empirical analysis focuses on the performance management systems for senior civil servants in central administration on the federal/national level. These are the Deputy Ministers in Canada; the members of the Senior Civil Service in the UK (these are, amongst others, the permanent secretaries and the director-generals); the members of the Top Management Group in the Netherlands (these are, amongst others, the secretary-generals and director-generals); the permanent secretaries in Denmark; and the presidents of the board of directors and director-generals in Belgium. In the next section, public service bargains are conceptualized, as well as the performance management system, which we will analyze by means of the performance management cycle (plan-do-check-act) (Deming, 1986). Section 3 describes the methodology used for this research. The empirical analysis of our cases is presented in section 4. In section 5, we discuss our findings and the implication of these findings for the PSB typology. Conceptualization of the Public Service Bargains typology and the performance management cycle The typology of public service bargains (PSB), constructed by Hood and Lodge 2, refers to any explicit or implicit understanding between (senior) civil servants and other actors in the political system over their duties and entitlements relating to responsibility, autonomy, and 2 There are two grand categories of public service bargains: systemic bargains, which are firmly entrenched in law, or in the constitution, and pragmatic bargains, which are a more or less convenient agency arrangement between politicians and civil servants. The systemic bargain is subdivided into a consociational and a Hegelian bargain, with Belgium being a typical example of the former, and Germany of the latter. There are three types of pragmatic bargains: the Schafferian, the hybrid and the managerial bargain (Hood, 2001). 2

3 political identity and expressed in convention or formal law or a mixture of both (Hood, 2000a: 8; Hood, 2000b; Hood & Lodge, 2006). A bargain implies an exchange between two or more parties, which in this case is between senior civil service and ministers, who exchange some x for some y. The exchange will vary depending on the type of public service system. Also, different bargains may exist within one particular system and bargains can change over time. The traditional public service bargain in the UK is said to be an example of a Schafferian bargain. However, the major reform programmes during recent years have greatly changed the organisation of the civil service, which has led some authors to point to changes in the traditional bargain (Hood & Lodge, 2006; Pollitt, 2009). As mentioned earlier, Hood (2000a) suggests that these reforms have led to the installation of a managerial bargain. In this type of bargain, senior civil servants typically receive more autonomy in organizing their services, accepting in exchange the blame in case of unsatisfactory results or mistakes. Following the private sector situation, conditions and working relationships for senior civil servants are person-specific and individually negotiable. Senior civil servants in such a managerial bargain are said to be managers, often coming from the wider public or private sector. The public service bargain identifies three key aspects: competency, reward, loyalty and responsibility, and these vary along with different types of PSB s. Rewards are what public servants receive in return for their work, in what form and at what stage in their career. Competencies are the skills, knowledge or abilities public servants are expected to demonstrate in exchange for the right to exercise administrative power. Loyalty or responsibility is the understanding about who is responsible for what in executive government and who is to be loyal to whom and in what ways. A managerial public service bargain is characterized by a strong steering on results in the various phases of the performance management cycle. These four phases are: the planning phase (plan), the monitoring phase (do), the evaluation phase (check), and the phase of the consequences of the evaluation (act). In the first phase, the objectives to be attained, and the resources to this end are agreed upon. Performance indicators are usually included to make these objectives measurable. In the second phase, the progress is monitored against these objectives. When necessary, these objectives can be modified due to changes in the policy priorities or unexpected circumstances. The third phase is the evaluation phase: the senior civil servant is assessed on the targets met. In the final phase, the senior civil servants bears 3

4 the consequences of the evaluation: this can be a reward in case of a positive evaluation, or some kind of punishment in case of a negative evaluation. In each case, we will investigate to what extent we find a steering on results in every phase of the cycle. This paper proposes the following research question on performance management systems and the occurrence of a managerial public service bargain: to what extent do we find evidence of a steering on results in the different phases of the performance management cycle? In case of a vigorous steering on results in each phase, this is a strong managerial public service bargain. In case of a steering on results in parts of the performance management cycle, or in case of a faint steering on results, we speak of a weak managerial public service bargain. It is possible that, despite the introduction of a performance management system, the traditional public service bargain remains in place, or that some minor aspects of the managerial bargain are integrated into the traditional bargain, leading to a hybrid public service bargain. If all cases end up in this hybrid category, this might have to be refined. Research design and methods Our five cases the UK, Canada, Denmark, the Netherlands, and Belgium are chosen because they represent a variety of performance management systems for senior civil servants, which allows for us to investigate into our research question. In the Canadian and Danish civil service, senior civil servants still work in a career system, with permanent tenure (in principle). In the Danish case, fixed-term appointments for senior civil servants are also possible, but this is rarely the case. Senior civil servants in the UK have individual employment contracts which are permanent, in principle. Fixed-term contracts are also possible, in particular for tasks which are limited in time, such as the organisation of the Olympic Games. In the Netherlands, senior civil servants are still statutory employees, but they no longer enjoy permanence. They work for the State, with an appointment for five years (in principle). For the top civil servants these are the members of the Top Management Group 3 this is somewhat different: they work for the ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations, and are detached for the time of their appointment (in principle this is seven years) to another department. In Belgium, a mandate system for senior civil servants was introduced: senior civil servants work on a temporary statutory basis. For career civil servants, this 3 This is the Top 60 of the Dutch SCS. 4

5 means a temporary detachment to a mandate function, for externally recruited senior civil servants, these are renewable short-term contracts (in principle for six years 4 ). In order to answer our research questions, we used both quantitative and qualitative techniques, and gathered different sorts of data. By means of a survey, first-hand data was collected in each country except for the UK, amongst a population of top civil servants (these are the highest senior civil servants) in central administration on the federal/national level. In-depth interviews with a part of this population have been conducted by an international team of researchers. Furthermore, elite interviews with Civil Service department officials and other experts were conducted by the research team in each country. Furthermore, a thorough desk research and document analysis was carried out for each case (for further information, we refer to: Van Dorpe & Hondeghem, 2011a; 2011b; Montuelle, Randour, de Visscher, 2011a; 2011b). The performance management systems for senior civil servants: an empirical analysis In the following section, we will discuss the four phases of the performance management cycle in each country. We will discuss to what extent we find a steering on results in the management of senior civil servants performances. Plan In the Canadian case, the performance planning is based on the mandate letters for the deputy ministers. They are written for two years in principle, but can be adjusted in case of crises or other circumstances. The minister is generally not involved in the drawing up of these letters, this is the task of the clerk of the privy council 5. Three outcome domains are included: policy and programmes, management, and leadership. Within these fields, both permanent and key objectives are defined. Within the field of policy and programmes, the realisation of government objectives is captured. The field of management concerns the management of the organisation for which the deputy minister is responsible, in line with the 4 There are some exceptions to this term, such as the chairman of the Chancellery of the prime minister and top civil servants who are working for the federal public service of Foreign Affairs. 5 This is the most senior non-political official in the Government of Canada, and provides professional, nonpartisan support to the Prime Minister on all policy and operational issues that may affect the government. See website of the Privy Council Office: 5

6 Management Accountability Framework (MAF) 6. Not only the what, but also the how is defined in each domain. Also, in all three fields key performance indicators are included. The yearly performance cycle in the British case works with individual performance agreements for senior civil servants, in which performance objectives are defined in consultation with the minister 7 and with the agreement of the Cabinet Secretary. A standard format is provided by the Cabinet Office. By means of performance indicators, objectives are fixed in four domains: the business delivery objectives, the corporate objectives, the capability objectives, and the personal objectives. The permanent secretary identifies 5 to 6 key targets on which he chooses to be evaluated by the end of the year. As a general guideline, the proportion between the domain objectives is 60:20:20, meaning 60% business, 20% corporate and 20% capability objectives (Cabinet Office, 2009). These documents are not open to the public. The performance agreements in the Dutch case are called werkafspraken. These are relatively informal and flexible documents, concluded between the minister and the senior civil servant, and are not made public. In general, the minister fixes the political content, the senior civil servant the managerial content. Although the work agreements result from the minister s policy agenda, the department s budget and the department s work programme, they are less concrete than the aforementioned documents. Furthermore, they can contain targets, but there are hardly any quantifiable performance indicators included in these documents. Emphasis is more on how the results should be achieved, than on the actual objectives themselves. Both a focus on delivery and the secretary-generals role in the current public service modernization program are explicitly stated as part of the performance appraisal (Steen & Van der Meer, 2011). In the Danish case, the performance management cycle for senior civil servants is not very extensively developed. All permanent secretaries have a performance contract, but this is no performance contract in the usual sense of the word. The content of this contract is kept secret. Every year, they receive a letter from the ministry of Finances indicating the priorities to be realised in the following year. The content of the contracts varies heavily between different ministers and organizations. According to the permanent secretaries themselves, pre-set 6 The Management Accountability Framework is a key performance management tool of the federal government. For more information on the MAF, see the website of the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat: 7 This is true for permanent secretaries. For lower SCS-members, this is the line manager. 6

7 efficiency criteria and similar tools are not suitable for their specific job, and more appropriate for heads of executive agencies (Hansen & Salomonsen, 2011). Senior civil servants in the Belgian case work with management plans (with a six year horizon) and operational plans (1 year), concluded with their minister or line manager, depending on their place in the hierarchy. In practice, most senior civil servants integrate both plans, and in approximately half of the organizations, there is one common performance plan for all senior civil servants in that organization. Quantifiable performance indicators are included in the majority of the plans (de Visscher et al., 2011). It is important to mention that the degree to which ministers are involved or interested in these performance plans varies to a considerable amount. Do The monitoring phase in Canada is rather informally organized. The Clerk of the Privy Council acts as a coach to ensure a good functioning in the ministries. Follow-up is ensured, amongst others, by means of breakfast and lunch meetings of deputy ministers and the clerk. In the UK, after six months a first official follow-up moment is organized to monitor the progress over the past half year. At this point, objectives can be changed in case of changed context. The monitoring of the realization of departmental objectives is the responsibility of Her Majesty s Treasury (James, 2004). Instruments for the follow-up are amongst others the balanced scorecard and the EFQM 8 Excellence Model. The emphasis is on output and, even more, on outcome indicators, instead of on input and process indicators (Bouckaert & Halligan, 2008; National Audit Office, 2009). Until recently, the monitoring phase in the Dutch case was rather informal, on a day-to-day basis. The introduction of delivery scorecards, in line with the British example, changed this somewhat. The frequency to which senior civil servants report on their performances varies strongly among departments: some of them report several times a year on their progress and results, others not more than once a year. In this case, there is no formal follow-up, apart from the evaluation. The degree of formalisation of such performance reports is also variable. The individual performance plans of Danish permanent secretaries are not lengthy, detailed documents, and the performance management system for permanent secretaries in Denmark is 8 European Foundation for Quality Management. 7

8 not extensively developed, which is why little data can be found on the monitoring phase. It seems that a thorough performance management cycle is in place for Danish agency heads, but much less so for permanent secretaries. In the Belgian case, the most important form of monitoring is the intermediate evaluation, which takes place every two/three years 9. Almost 30% of the senior civil servants studied state that the official evaluation moments are the only follow-up of their performance plans (Van Dorpe et al., forthcoming). This may indicate that the performance plan is not an instrument for the daily practice of a senior civil servant. Those senior civil servants whose management plan is monitored, use a broad range of instruments: board tables, balanced scorecards, management dashboards, business reviews, etc. This monitoring happens predominantly within organisations, not by some central organ and hardly by the political master. Furthermore, there is great variation in the frequency of this follow-up: in some organisations the management plan is monitored twice a month, in others once a year. Check The evaluation of deputy ministers in the Canadian case is centrally organized, and based on three documents: the MAF, the letter of mandate and the corporate objectives convened with the clerk. To begin with, the deputy minister annually prepares an auto-evaluation and a proposal for next year s performance agreement. A broad range of actors subsequently deliver input and advice on the deputy minister s performances: the Committee of Senior Officials (COSO) 10, but also former deputy ministers, the minister, the clerk of the privy council and a number of other actors. In a two-day COSO meeting, each deputy minister s performance is discussed for 45 minutes, resulting in a mark 11 for each deputy minister. At this point, the clerk requests the advice of the minister, but he is not obliged to take this advice into account. Finally, the clerk renders his recommendations to the prime minister. Every deputy minister receives feedback on his performances and on his final mark in a discussion with the clerk. As such, not only the results, but also the way in which these results are obtained and the leadership capacities of deputy ministers are assessed, in comparison with other deputy ministers performances. 9 For senior civil servants appointed before the introduction of a new evaluation system in 2005 this is every three years, for all others every two years (Van Dorpe et al., forthcoming). 10 The members are: the clerk of the privy council, two deputy ministers, the secretary of the Counceil du Trésor, two former deputy ministers, and the HR principal director. 11 There are 5 possible marks: Not obtained or not up for evaluation, obtained -, obtained, obtained +, and surpassed. For more information, see: de Visscher, Montuelle & Randour (2011a). 8

9 A separate evaluation procedure is in place for permanent secretaries in the United Kingdom, compared to the rest of the SCS. The performances of the latter are assessed in a discussion with their line manager, who places the SCS-member in one of 4 performance groups. Subsequently, all line managers of one department join in a meeting for a relative assessment against peers. They investigate for example whether not too many SCS-members were ranked in the highest performance group, and if so, who does or does not deserve this? Finally, the decisions are forwarded to the HR-division of the department, who process the pay decisions. The permanent secretaries evaluation starts with a written self-evaluation. Both the performances against the original objectives and the way in which these where achieved are assessed, the latter by means of the Leadership Framework. This is the responsibility of the Permanent Secretary Remuneration Committee. Many actors are involved in the process: first of all the minister and the Head of the Civil Service. Furthermore a third party this can be a permanent secretary from another department, a non-executive director of the same or another department, etc. Her Majesty s Treasury, the Prime Minister s Delivery Unit, the Office of Government Commerce, No. 10 and the Cabinet Office s Capabilities Reviews Team (Cabinet Office, 2009). The evaluation procedure of secretary generals (and senior civil servants in general) in the Dutch case is much less formalised as compared to the previous cases. The secretary general discusses his performances with the minister, in a formal or informal meeting, or as part of the management meeting, where the organization s general performances are discussed. As little actors are involved in the procedure 12, the judgement of the minister is quite decisive. Not only the performances against the preset objectives are assessed, but also the general competencies of the secretary general, and his day-to-day performances. In between different departments, there is little consistency in the use of the performance agreements. Members of the Top Management Group themselves acknowledge this, and complain about the lack of a shared and unambiguous normative frame of reference. In the Danish case, the permanent secretaries prepare for their evaluation by means of an auto-evaluation on their performances. This information is complemented with survey results on remuneration policy and ethnic minority policy, and with reports from the National Audit Bureau. The role of the minister in this evaluation procedure is not as big as in the other cases. 12 There is support to the formal or informal performance discussion between both parties, by either the Bureau of the Senior Civil Service (BABD) or the departmental controller s unit. 9

10 The yearly evaluation of permanent secretaries is performed by the secretary generals of both the ministry of Finances and of the Prime Minister. The minister is allowed to express his opinion on his permanent secretary s performance, but this is not a systematic practice. There is a formal part of the evaluation, which focuses on the realisation of the priorities defined by the ministry of Finances, in accordance with preset criteria. The most important fields are the human resources management including remuneration policy and ethnic minorities policy and contract management and the management of agency relations. The policy advice provided by the permanent secretaries is assessed in a rather informal way. This is part of the evaluation, though not part of the performance contract. According to Hansen and Salomonsen, the decision concerning performance pay is not based on specific, objective or transparent performance criteria, but rather it is based upon a general assessment of the relative workload of the permanent secretaries in the past year, including reflections on their involvement in preparing and implementing major reforms (Hansen & Salomonsen, 2011). As mentioned earlier, Belgian senior civil servants performances are evaluated every two years during their mandate 13, with a final evaluation 6 months before the end of their mandate. The presidents of the board of directors are assessed by their minister, the directors-general by their president and their minister. The role of the minister in the director-generals assessments is generally rather limited. Each senior civil servants prepares for his evaluation by means of an auto-evaluation. Based on his management plan, he is assessed on the realization of his objectives, the way in which he achieved these, his personal contribution to the realization of these objectives, and the efforts he took to develop his competencies. There are 3 possible marks: insufficient, sufficient, and very good. However, there is some criticism about the evaluation procedure: according to the Court of Audit, there are large differences in the quality of the evaluations (Rekenhof, 2011). Also, in 2009, 82,5% of senior civil servants was marked very good, leading some senior civil servants to doubt the objectivity and value of the evaluation. It is generally acknowledged that the goodwill of the minister is a factor of major importance, and that evaluations on the director-general level are on average more thoroughly executed. The guarantee of objectivity in the evaluation procedure remains one of the major concerns for senior civil servants (Van Dorpe et al., forthcoming). 13 With the exception of senior civil servants appointed before

11 Act In the Canadian system, it is the responsibility of the clerk of the privy council to decide upon the consequences of the evaluation, by applying the performance-related pay (PRP) system 14. There are 4 elements of rewards: an economic increase as a percentage of the base salary, a progression within the salary scale, a risk reward, and a bonus. The higher the mark the deputy minister receives, the more elements of the PRP system are applied to him. A distributive curve is in place, which a.o. defines that only a limited number of persons can receive a bonus. If the performance is deemed insufficient, the sanctions vary from a reprimand or a reduction of rewards, towards a demotion or dismissal. We must add that although they still are permanent civil servants the prime minister is entitled to move or dismiss deputy ministers, by means of a simple non-motivated decision, in case of insufficient performance. By way of transparency, anonymous data on the evaluation and its consequences are published on a website. Overall, the deputy ministers consider both the evaluation procedure and the remuneration system to be fair and satisfying (Bourgault, 2011). The consequences of the evaluation for senior civil servants in the UK is similar to those applied in Canada: in case of good performances bonuses are awarded, in case of bad performances one can receive no bonus at all, or can be demoted or dismissed. The height of the PRP is dependent on the performance group in which one is put: the lowest receive no bonus at all, the highest a rather large bonus. On average, the PRP for the entire SCS in 2008 was 8,6%, and this percentage continues to increase year after year. Furthermore, in 2007 Cabinet Office removed the maximum amount of PRP (which was 20%), which allows for some functions to have a rather low base salary, and the possibility of up to 40 to 50% PRP (Van Dorpe & Horton, 2011). Although dismissal is possible in theory, the practice shows that this almost never happens. Our interviews revealed that in many cases, after one or more negative evaluations one chooses to hand in resignation. Despite this seemingly efficient system, the SCS survey in 2006 showed that dealing with bad performances was one of the major concerns amongst SCS members (ORC International, 2006). For permanent secretaries, the reward decision is the responsibility of the prime minister, with advice by the Permanent Secretary Remuneration Committee. As the Dutch secretary generals still are statutory civil servants, the werkafspraken are not very closely linked to an extension of the appointment or a dismissal. However, dismissal of 14 A schematic presentation of these types of rewards can be found in attachment 1. 11

12 senior civil servants is possible, in case of an incompatibility or a conflict with the minister. In such a case, the senior civil servant is moved to another position. A positive evaluation can and usually does lead to a bonus, up to a maximum of one monthly salary. This decision is the responsibility of the minister, and within departments specific arrangements can be made. One example of such an arrangement is that such a bonus is awarded no more than two times in a row to one senior civil servant. Externally recruited senior civil servants receive labour market bonus, which is not linked to their performances, but it can be terminated in case of a negative evaluation (Steen & Van der Meer, 2011). Furthermore, secretary generals receive a 5% fixed management bonus on top of their base salary, as a compensation for leading the ministry. Following the report of the Dijkstal Commission 15, the relation between performance and rewards is underdeveloped. The commission thus proposed a new reward system, in which 10% of the base salary would be linked to the realisation of the performance agreements. For the Danish permanent secretaries, no individual performance system was implemented in the sense of clear ex post criteria for evaluating performances (Hansen & Salomonsen, 2011). They receive no feedback on their evaluation, and as such it is not a transparent system. There is an impact of the evaluation on their salary and bonuses, though this impact is relatively small. It is the decision of the minister of Finances to grant these bonuses, based on the advice of the permanent secretaries of the bureau of the Prime Minister and the ministry of Finances. We can thus state that the impact of performance agreements is of a rather small importance, except for the extension of short-term contracts. Removal of a permanent secretary is possible, but this is in case of a falling out between the latter and his minister, rather than due to his performances (Christensen, 2006). As in the Dutch case, Danish permanent secretaries receive a permanent top manager bonus, which is not related to their performance. In the Belgian case, no performance-related pay in the narrow sense of the word was introduced. In an informal way, extra holidays are distributed off the record, or a car is put at one s disposal. While the evaluation has no direct impact on the wage of senior civil servants, it does have repercussions for contract renewal. When a senior civil servant is marked very good, his mandate is renewed automatically. If he is evaluated sufficient, the senior civil servant must reapply for his function. In case of an insufficient, renewal of the mandate is 15 This commission was installed in 2004 to formulate advice on the reform of the remuneration system for the political and administrative top leaders. For more information we refer to the report of this commission (Ministerie van Binnenlandse Zaken en Koninkrijksrelaties, 2004). 12

13 not possible. If the senior civil servant was a statutory civil servant, he can return to his old position in the administration. Externally recruited senior civil servants leave the administration. In practice, there are little negative evaluations. There is no official conflict resolution in place, as is the case in some of the other cases. Some senior civil servants are rather critical about the objectivity of the whole procedure, and point at the arbitrariness in the renewal of mandates (de Visscher et al., 2011). Conclusion: What implications for the PSB typology? After studying the four phases of the performance management cycle in each case, we are able to answer our research question: Do we find evidence of a steering on results in the different phases of the performance management cycle?. In table 1, each phase of the performance management cycle was labelled as strong, moderate, or low with regard to the extent to which there is a steering on results. For example, we speak of a low steering on results in the planning phase when there are performance contracts, but without precise goals to be achieved or without any quantifiable indicators to measure progress. We label the actphase as a strong steering on results if the consequences of the evaluation are completely result-dependent, and both appointment and pay system are based on performance evaluations. We use the label moderate where a performance oriented system is in place, but the elaboration in practice is variable, rather informal, or highly dependent upon the different actors involved. Plan Do Check Act Canada Strong Moderate: rather informal Strong Strong UK Strong Strong Strong Strong The Netherlands Moderate Moderate: variable Moderate Moderate: there is a link, but this is not strongly developed Denmark Low Low (Low to) moderate Low to moderate On paper: strong In practice: Belgium Moderate Moderate to strong: moderate to strong variable (questions about Moderate objectivity and added value) Table 1: Steering on results in each phase of the performance management cycle 13

14 Overall, the Canadian case shows a strong steering on results throughout the performance management cycle. There are clear objectives with quantifiable indicators in the planning phase, with a central steering of the process by the Clerk. The monitoring phase is a rather informal event, which is why we classified this phase as moderate. In both the evaluation and act phase, performances are the most important criterion for action. The entire process is formal and centrally organized, which leaves little room for arbitrariness. The strongest steering in results was found in the British case: all phases of the cycle were characterized by a strong steering on results. According to a government official, the UK performance management system is quite severe, with regard to the importance of achieving results for remuneration and the further career. In the UK, as in the Canadian case, several central actors are involved in the process, leaving little room for variation or arbitrariness. The research on the Dutch case revealed a more moderate steering on results. The entire performance management cycle is organised in a rather informal way, and as such, there is considerable variation in between different organisations, ministers and senior civil servants. There is very little involvement of other actors in the entire cycle and the system is rather not transparent. Furthermore, the link between performances and rewards is not very strongly developed. In the Danish case, the steering on results was the least observable as compared to the other cases: we found a low to moderate steering on results. The performance contract for permanent secretaries is not a performance contract in the usual sense of the word, the content is kept secret and varies heavily among different ministers and permanent secretaries. The performance management cycle is not extensively developed, and the evaluation and its consequences are rather not transparent. The link between performance and reward is not very strong. The Belgian case showed a moderate to strong steering on results, with in some cases considerable difference between theory and practice, and in between different organizations, ministers and senior civil servants. The planning and monitoring phase are relatively formalized, but the subsequent phases are much less formal, leaving room for variation and possible arbitrariness. Although there is no performance-related pay, steering on results is 14

15 moderate in the act phase, because the renewal of the mandate depends on the outcome of the performance evaluation. As such, we have found in all of our cases a steering on results, be it to a very variable degree. More or less the same can be said about the emergence of a managerial public service bargain: in some of our cases this is much more manifest, than in others where only a very small amount of managerial elements has been adopted. For both the Canadian and British case, we conclude that a strong managerial public service bargain has been introduced for senior civil servants. For the Dutch and Belgian cases, we have found a rather weak managerial bargain. The Belgian performance management system on paper would have introduced a managerial PSB, but the implementation in practice remains stuck in between the traditional public service bargain, and a strong managerial bargain (see also: de Visscher et al., 2011). We conclude that the current public service bargain in the Danish case is of a hybrid nature, with little managerial aspects added to the original public service bargain (see also: Hansen & Salomonsen, 2011). Our findings indicate that the introduction of a performance management system does indeed have implications for the type of public service bargain in place. However, it seems that the Anglo-Saxon cases have moved further towards a managerial bargain, than the small European continental countries. Different types of performances contracts may account for this variation: in the Anglo-Saxon countries strong performance contracts have been introduced, as opposed to the weak performance contracts in the other cases (Putseys & Hondeghem, 2002). More research to explain for these differences is necessary, but we can point to differences in political and institutional systems to at least partially account for these differences. The administrative history of a country, including the traditional relation between politicians and administration, is one of such factors. With regard to the public service bargains typology, it seems that the managerial category should be further refined, making a distinction between strong and weak managerial bargains. By doing so, less cases would end up in the hybrid category as a residual category, and this category can thus keep its value. 15

16 Attachments Attachment 1: Schematic presentation of the performance related pay system in Canada (Privy Council Office, 2008). Pay following the Performance Management Program for Results of Progress in Economic the the salary Risk reward Bonus increase evaluation scale Not X X X X obtained Not up for evaluation Obtained V V Obtained V V Obtained + V V Surpassed V V V X X X V DM 1/GX: 10% extra V DM 2/3: 15% extra V DM 4: 20% extra V DM 1/GX: 15% extra V DM 2/3: 20% extra V DM 4: 25% extra V DM 1/GX: 20% extra V DM 2/3: 25% extra V DM 4: 30% extra V DM 1/GX: 20% extra V DM 2/3: 25% extra V DM 4: 30% extra X X X V DM 1/GX: an additional amount of 6% extra V DM 2/3: an additional amount of 8% extra V DM 4: an additional amount of 9% extra 16

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