Public service values and e-administration: an explosive mix? Illustration drawing on the case of the Family Allowance Funds ( Caisses d’Allocations Familiales ) in France 1

Conceptual framework adopted: a structurationist perspective on the relationship between technology and organization

Whether in the public or private sphere, it is today widely recognized that analysing the role of ICT in organizational change requires an interactionist perspective. The relationship between technology and the organization emerges in effect from an interaction process that is not totally predictable. One research current in particular is today widely mobilized in research in the field of information systems to describe the process of using and taking up technologies; the structurationist current (Orlikowski, 1992; Rose and Lewis, 2001).

In this current, the interaction between technology and organization can be summarized as in Figure 1. OPEN IN VIEWER

Technologies are therefore both structured and structuring, a property summarized under the term ‘duality of technology’. Technologies are structuring because they constitute a set of objective rules and predefined resources and thus contribute to the transformation of contexts. At first, this property is not considered to be very active; in other words, the uses as well as the structures in charge of their management merely reproduce existing social and technological structures, but over time and in most cases, new conventions emerge, activating the potentially structuring character of the technologies.

Technologies are also structured as they are:

physically constructed by actors working in a given context, according to the property of interpretative flexibility;

In this dynamic, the changes are ‘unpredictable, depending on interpretations, feelings, complex interactions between the actors and the technology or between actors’ (De Vaujany, 2009: 169). To better understand this process of not totally predictable interactions, it is worth taking a look back at the fundamental principle of structuration theory (Giddens, 1984), namely the reflexive control of the action. On the one hand, the actor controls and directs its action, and on the other, the oriented action provides the actor with new sources of information to be taken into account. The interpretations of the actors and the sense they give to their actions are hence fundamental to understanding the structuring process around technologies (Rose and Lewis, 2001).

In the words of Orlikowski (2000), technology is then not only a technical artefact but also a ‘technology in practice’. It is ‘enacted’ by the actors, that is to say, staged or activated. The process of ‘sensemaking’ (Weick, 1990) of the actors around the technology depends on the experiences and situations previously witnessed by the actors and consists of a selection of data that carry sense for the individual. This research focuses on this process of enactment of the technology. This process cannot be described without presenting the organizational framework that serves as the support for this research, namely the CAF.

Presentation of the object of research: the e-administration development dynamic within the CAF

In 2002, 123 decentralized structures known as CAF made up the ‘Family Branch’ of the French Social Security system. This network aims to help just over 10 million users in their daily life by paying particular benefits related to family, housing and poverty.

In addition to the traditional means of contact and reception (counters, telephone, mail), since 1999 the CAF has developed an electronic service offering, in practical terms, a website, terminals, voice servers – to allow benefit recipients to obtain information and contact the CAF officers (called ‘technicians’) without geographical constraints and outside opening hours. To secure the homogeneity of the service nation-wide and to benefit from economies of scale, these electronic communication tools are designed at national level by the National Family Allowance Fund (CNAF).

Some technologies (such as the establishment of the website www.caf.fr) considered to be structural for the service offered are imposed on local agencies. Other technologies, however, are left to the discretion of the CAF managers. These technologies include the opening of an area (called a ‘dialogue box’) on the website allowing benefit recipients to interact with their CAF by email.

In 2002, the start date of this research, the CNAF’s information system department observed an ‘overheating’ or slowdown of the e-administration development dynamics. Specifically, this overheating took the form of:

a lack of homogeneity in the number of ICTs embedded in each CAF (a number between 5 and 18);

The ‘innovative’ digital services with which we were primarily concerned were the introduction of remote services or procedures on the website (www.caf.fr) such as the possibility for users to communicate by email with public officials to answer their questions. These two technologies are in fact characteristic in the e-administration development dynamic of the transition from a user information phase to a user transaction phase (Saint Amant and Renard, 2004).

Research methodology

To study the dynamics of this process of using ICT as part of the modernization of public services, we conducted intervention research (David, 2000; Moisdon, 1984). ⁴

This research focuses on the content and the process of change. Many interrelated variables (related to the context, content, process) must therefore be taken into account in the analysis. In addition, e-administration is an issue dominated by a great many ideological discourses. One of them states that new technologies simply need to be embedded for public services to be modernized. But these discourses are out of step not only with the most commonly accepted theoretical frameworks (see previous section), but also with practices, as, on the contrary, a situation of overheating was noted. Finally, this situation of overheating was relatively puzzling to both the actors in the field and the researchers. For all of these reasons, it struck us as difficult to grasp the e-administration development dynamics from the outside. A qualitative approach and more particularly intervention research therefore seemed appropriate to carry out this research. With this methodological choice, we had to develop an iterative and recursive process between fieldwork and theoretical work. The plan of this article takes this into account; our theoretical framework was fine-tuned as we gained a better understanding of the context.

The corpus of field data was built up by crossing several information collection methods. In other words, this intervention research fits into a methodological pluralism (Martinet, 1990) since both qualitative and quantitative data and data processing methods were used.

More specifically, the research results presented here are based on:

intervention research at a national level that led us to successively integrate the two management structures of electronic administration at the CNAF. In these two structures, our position was defined by a management assistance mission;

Combining these five methods of data collection allowed us to understand in depth the process of ICT enactment in the CAF, and also to implement the recommendations for action in relation to a model of effective management of ICT in the modernization of services. As in any intervention research, managing change is a key element of the research mechanism. Indeed, it generates a certain amount of feedback throughout the research process (Chanal et al., 1997). Not only does our presence to implement our recommendations for action offer an opportunity to extend our analysis in the field of project management, it also fine-tunes our modelling of the structuring process around technologies by testing its relevance among different actors.

The research was conducted up to the phase supporting the deployment of management models co-designed to encourage the e-administration development dynamic (our recommendations for action having been accepted by the family branch, as we will expand upon below). We returned to the field four years after their implementation to check on their take-up and thus the relevance of our analysis.

Values and the management of change in public services

The main proposition put forward by this research is that values were a structuring (accelerating or blocking) element of the e-administration development dynamic within the CAF. Previous studies (Brown, 2005) have already shown that public service values (including consistency and coherence) have been refreshed by ICTs (in particular network technologies, such as email and databases), but our research also focuses on the inverse relationship, i.e. the role of values in the process of modernizing public services through ICT. The analysis of the interaction between values and e-administration is therefore dynamic.

Before presenting the results of our empirical analysis, it is first necessary to clarify the concept of value. As noted by Dose (1997), despite the use of the term value in a large number of articles, very little research (Clare and Sanford, 1979) defines the term with any precision. Values have in turn been compared to beliefs, attitudes, needs, interests, personality traits or to standards or criteria.

The term ‘values’ will be used here in a conception similar to the general definition given by Kluckhohn (1952). For this author, ‘a value is a conception, explicit or implicit, distinctive of an individual or characteristic of a group, of the desirable which influences the selection from available modes, means and ends of action’ (Kluckhohn, 1952: 403). Let us go over the key terms of this definition to better understand it.

Values are conceptions, because they are first and foremost abstractions. They are not directly observable. They are preferences chosen from a ‘moral’ point of view, by ‘reasoning’, or according to an ‘aesthetic’ judgement. Conceptions of what is desirable underpinned by values are relative to the individual but also to the social system that surrounds it. Indeed, values are not only the translation of psychological needs but also the emanation of a social and institutional demand. It is a psychological and sociological reality. Values are both a filter allowing each individual to differentiate their responses towards the same external stimulus in line with the needs or motivators specific to each of us, and they also express a certain social desirability. In other words, values are both individual and collective data, the main objective being the implementation of the commitments that bind individuals to the organizations in which they work.

The implicit or explicit nature of values is the consequence of the fact that they are not always clearly explained. Usually, people do not verbalize the content of the values that prompted them to act. Nevertheless, according to Kluckhohn (1952: 408), ‘social life would be impossible without them [values]. The functioning of the social system as a whole would be defeated in achieving collective goals; individuals could not get what they need from their peers, in personal and emotional terms ….’ Therefore, values and social action are linked. Values are an essential element of social functioning, as they trigger action.

Finally, following the clarification of this definition, the action selected by the individual is not governed by a conscious forms of rationality. Sometimes it is a conscious, well-thought-out choice. Sometimes it is an imposed remedy, without there being any apparent selection in the choice of the action performed. The individual then makes a selection based on values they carry within them.

Values are central to public action. Not only because the concept of public value is not indisputable but also because with the emergence of New Public Management, the traditional public service values are often reconciled with new values from the private sector (Chappoz and Pupion, 2013; Chevallier, 2012; Emery and Martin, 2008; Salminen, 2006). Often, ‘it is difficult to reconcile traditional values while adding to them new values related to the requirements of results (efficiency, effectiveness, quality, etc.)’ (Chappoz and Pupion, 2013: 2). These contradictions influence ‘public services at every moment of every day’ (Pollitt, 2009: 416). Sometimes, even, ‘the hybridization of cultures and public and private management practices leads to a potential disruption of benchmarks and … it can also lead to a conflict of values’ (Emery and Martin, 2008: 561).

We find these features in our fieldwork. The concept of value is very important in the discourses of the managers and the orientation of the action of the CAF. For example, in 2003, the club of managers devoted an entire meeting to this issue. It emerged that the CAF combined the following values:

public service values: neutrality, equality, solidarity, permanence, strength, cohesion;

Some values are particularly significant for the CAF as their meanings and practical implications were detailed and included in the 2005/08 strategic action plan of the family branch. These are the values of fairness, cohesion, participation, proximity, performance and transparency. But our research shows the existence of conflicts between these values in an ambiguous e-administration development dynamic.

The importance of values in an ambiguous structuring process

The dynamic of change that we analysed was the introduction of ‘new’ information and communication technologies. The opportunity for managers to allow the officials in charge of casework to interact with benefit recipients by email was particularly significant in the process of structuring around these technologies. One question could sum up the dilemma of the managers of the family branch in the face of this technology in 2002: could the CAFs, in line with the principle of mutability (or adaptability) of the public service, promote a discriminating service offer as it was faster and a priori restricted to an audience with a certain economic and cultural capital (since they had access to a computer and an Internet connection)?

Faced with this question, the reflexivity of the CAF managers was called into play, the sensemaking of the actors around these new technologies proved to be diverse, and a range of attitudes were observed. ⁶

Some managers (28 percent of the network according to our survey of managers throughout the CAF), considering that one of public service missions is equal treatment, did not open the dialogue box on their website. In fact, the Caisse Nationale imposed that the CAF implementing this technology should respond to an email within three days, compared to 21 days at that time for a letter. Two quotes are published that shed light on the motivations of this category of actors; ‘You know what, I am frankly suspicious of new developments that are more or less imposed by the national level, and I do not hesitate to say so openly’ (attitude of resistance of the local against the national fund) or ‘Why should I give benefit recipients the opportunity to send emails when I know that those who use this medium are not the worst off… . In addition, if I want to meet the service commitments, I will have to answer their messages within three days. But it shouldn’t be forgotten that a CAF is a social public service! I have other priorities’ (more specific attitude of opposition to the characteristics of e-administration).

A ‘broken’ reflexivity (De Vaujany, 2009) also came to light among other managers since they opened this area on their website, but instructed ‘technicians’ to send benefit recipients a simple acknowledgement of receipt of their email within three days and to process them within the same deadline as the letters. These managers demonstrated inertia (Orlikowski, 2000). We cannot quantify the size of this category throughout the family branch because this reaction was considered by the national fund to be a transgressive behaviour. We nevertheless observed this reaction in one of the four CAF managers who hosted our participatory observation, the manager clearly mentioning in the interview other ‘colleagues’ who had adopted the same posture. For these managers, their behaviour is seen as ‘juggling’ between the realities in the field (the large volumes of flow of applications to be processed and the needs of the recipient beneficiaries) and the national guidelines.

Finally, other managers clearly embraced the change. Considering that their mission was governed more by fairness than equality, they demanded that their technicians answer the emails within three days. These managers also indicated that some features of the website (including automatic injection of data relating to an application for housing allowance) allowed them to save time so that the new communication (with all its features) should be promoted to allow technicians to spend more time at the counter to process more complex applications (in the name of the efficiency value promoted within the CAF network). This email technology was finally welcomed by some benefit recipients, as evidenced by the national satisfaction survey, making it necessary to undertake the rollout of these new technologies (in the name of the value of mutability and adaptability of public service). If we take the volume of emails that reached the fund (relative to the number of beneficiaries) to assess the number of organizations where this behaviour was adopted, these managers account for 42 percent. An analysis of interviews with this group of actors reveals characteristics similar to ‘innovators’ (Alter, 1985). These managers show a constant desire to take up the new tools so as not to be dominated by either the tool or by their social environment (that is to say by others). Through this process of appropriation, their goal is to make sense of their work and contribute significantly to the improvement of the performance of the CAF.

This different sensemaking in response to the same object shows, on the one hand, that take-up of public service values by each is differentiated (what definition to adopt of the value of equality that is one of the pillars (Crozier, 1964) of public service in France?) but, on the other hand, that prioritization of public service values is highly differentiated from one officer to another (differentiation of individual and/or professional values).

Let us consider other examples of conflicts of values generated or exacerbated by the proliferation of ICT in the CAF to back up our research results.

The networking of organizations is facilitated thanks to these technologies. Faced with its potential, which stance should be adopted by the organizations? To offer a high-quality service (value of mutability), should they determine potential entitlements on the basis of the information/life events sent by other public services (or private service) or is it better to empower users by continuing to ask them to report their information before studying their potential entitlements? This was another conflict of values with which CAF managers were faced with the development of e-administration. Similarly, as the databases on users are accessible nationwide, should only the officers of a decentralized agency handle applications from users on their territory (proximity principle) or should assistance be organized between organizations in the event of congestion to improve the processing time of applications (value of adaptability and performance)? Many questions have been raised and are still outstanding on the values generated or raised by the e-administration development dynamic.

From a theoretical point of view, the contributions of this research are twofold. First, while structuring theory is increasingly being used as a framework for analysing the technology take-up processes within organizations, this theoretical framework is also considered complex, involving concepts and general propositions that are highly abstract. It thus seems laborious to use this approach empirically. Moreover, we speak of the ‘meta-theory’ (Autissier and Wacheux, 2000) of social change. The main value of this research is therefore to have contributed ⁷ to the operationalization of concepts of structuration theory by means of an in-depth description of the e-administration development process.

This process analysis then prompted us to highlight the importance of values (personal, professional and public service) in the technology enactment process. It would be incorrect to claim that these aspects were totally absent from previous work. However, this point was not very explicit. For example, Saint-Amant and Renard, in their work on the organizational capacity of e-administration (2004), refer at best to the importance of change management to explain the speed of the e-administration development dynamic but the role of the values in the process is obscured. Similarly, in structurationist studies, the role of values in the structuring process has already been demonstrated, especially with the concept of ‘spirit of the technology’ put forward by DeSanctis and Poole (1994). But according to them, ‘the spirit of the technology’ represents ‘the set of values, intentions and goals underlying a well-defined set of structural devices inherent to a technology’ (DeSanctis and Poole, 1994: 126). This makes the spirit of the technology a kind of ‘general intention’ outlining a framework for normalizing and legitimizing the use of technologies. In our analysis, on the contrary, we observed sensemaking on this general intention: what did the CAF network set out to do in a proactive perspective by using these new technologies? The spirit of the technology is therefore not underlying or inherent to the technology but is constructed in and through the action by the sensemaking of the actors.

Due to the ambiguity of the e-administration development dynamic and dissonant values, there was no clear line of action that was part of a simple and homogeneous management rationality in the network of the 123 CAFs. At first, the electronic flow of communication with the benefit recipients being restricted and the local margin for manoeuvre being a constitutive principle of the organization of the family branch, this requisite variety of attitudes and values was a random but coherent method of regulation (with the operation of the family branch network and the importance given to this issue in the institutional action plan) and not disturbing. However, it gradually became an obstacle to a dynamic of change promoted by the national fund and welcomed by a majority of benefit recipients. This triggered reflections on the appropriate types of management to encourage the use of ICT in the modernization of public services, as we will detail in a third and last part.

Managing ambiguity in the family branch of the French social security system in a pre-project phase

At the end of 2005, the Directorate-General of the CNAF instituted 12 priority projects through its new institutional action plan. Of these 12 projects, one of them was intended to ‘simplify access and management of entitlements, and facilitate the development of e-administration’. The implementation of this new management structure came at a time when our research was coming to an end on the ambiguous nature of the use of ICT in the modernization of public services. Yet this analysis in terms of ambiguity was not without effect on the systems of action that seemed appropriate to ensure an efficient use of technologies in the CAF. Indeed, if it was admitted that the variety of attitudes hindered progress in the use of ICT for the modernization of the CAF, then a direct implication of this research was to establish that the sensemaking of the actors should be explained and discussed in a discussion forum (Detchessahar, 2003). ⁸ In our organizational structure, these discussion forums were positioned in a pre-project phase as a new management structure (a project group) had just been set up to encourage greater use of ICT in the modernization of the CAF.

As a first step, we proposed to bring together members of the project (35 executive managers from the family branch) in two seminars. Discussions around the values of fairness and equality marked the debates that took place during this pre-project phase, making them worthy of further explanation.

As explained above, certain managers (six executive managers of the 35 people gathered at these seminars, or 17 percent) did not wish to develop digital services on their website, as they believed they would increase the social divide with this initiative. Others, however (67 percent of participants in these seminars) clearly encouraged the development of e-administration in the name of the principle of mutability; these digital services were an expectation of some benefit recipients, so it was necessary to develop these services as part of a logic of distributive justice (equality of all to consideration for the diversity of their needs/expectations). The project manager heading up these discussion forums therefore encouraged the managers to further clarify the values underlying their actions. Very quickly, the dissonance between the values of mutability and fairness appeared. The project manager then looked back at past actions of the family branch where certain services (Minitel, voice server, etc.) had been developed even though they were targeting only a segment of the population and not necessarily the poorest. Moreover, a survey conducted by the research centre into the study and the observation of living conditions on the use of the Internet was presented along with an internal analysis by the research department of the family branch relativizing the digital divide. With these elements in mind, the CAF managers concluded as to the non-opposition between the development of e-administration and the joint promotion of the values of equality and mutability.

This pre-project phase resulted in the drafting of a ‘doctrine’ of the use of ICT in modernizing the CAF. This doctrine then became a reference document for the family branch since it was approved by the Directorate General of the CNAF in December 2006. The introduction of this doctrine note reveals the role assigned e-administration in the strategic action plan for the branch to improve its performance: ‘While service quality has been at the heart of the strategic approach of the family branch for many years, the development of e-administration enables and even requires the transition from a notion of service relationship to the notion of customer relationship management. Our mission is no longer only to deal quickly and effectively with all the entitlements but to acknowledge the needs of our public and satisfy them. There is a variety of new needs … these are the strong values that will shape our image in the future among our customers.’

In November 2011, all the managers and presidents of CAF met to discuss the theme: ‘Service quality in the era of e-administration’. The observation of a workshop involving a few branch actors and an analysis of the content of the reports of the seven workshops indicate that the actors are fully aware that the discussions about their values and the establishment of the doctrine note for the network drove the development of e-administration within their organizations. One quote is significant on this subject: ‘we had to take this route. When e-administration came onto the scene, there were too many unknowns, disparate positions. By clarifying the issues at hand but also exchanging on the values of the family branch – values that are affected by these tools – the strategic approach subsequently became clearer for each of us.’

In conclusion, the creation of discussion forums on values served, in the case of the family branch, as a means of driving increased use of ICT in the modernization of the CAF. However, this conclusion drawn from an analysis of a particular case (although it is considered exemplary in view of its similarity to the problems of other public services) cannot be generalized, unless it is the subject of a critical analysis on these rollout conditions, as well as a theoretical discussion. The next section therefore sets out to discuss the analytical generalization of our recommendation for action.

Discussion: how useful is a discussion on values to encourage change?

The formalization of a discussion forum on the conflicts of values generated or exacerbated by the development of e-administration was a necessary condition for the gradual changes in representations and therefore of behaviour. Indeed, ‘the work of clarification and confrontation prompted by the discussion serves as the backdrop for the adjustment of discourses, the acquisition of collective benchmarks and the development of language routines. In a Habermasian perspective, the “real debate” aims at mutual understanding, adjustment of subjectivities, agreement’ (Detchessahar, 1999: 18).

However, as a general rule it is not a sufficient condition for two main reasons. On the one hand, it is never certain that the actors are actually involved in the exchange mechanism. According to J.-M. Ferry (1987), discussion is based on two fundamental principles: the publicity of information and personal opinions, and acceptance of the law of the better argument as the sole driver of the decision. But achieving these principles is obviously problematic. It is true that the members participating in the priority project were executive managers who had chosen to become involved in this project, and they were therefore motivated and interested in their participation in the discussion forum formed by the project meetings. However, their involvement in the project resulted in four main types of costs (Detchessahar 2003: 75): cognitive, political costs, accountability of the discussion and social costs.

In our research, these costs were not significant. The quality and intensity of the exchanges show, on the contrary, that these difficulties were quickly overcome. Yet this does not necessarily strike us as generalizable for two main reasons. On the one hand, the discussion forum that we studied is not formed of middle managers coordinating to respond to uncertain situations, but of managers selected for their knowledge of the subject. Yet while a public and collective deliberation generally requires a strong reflexive activity that is therefore potentially costly for officials, a public of managers is more accustomed to explaining its reasonings in a politicized space, to discussing the opinions of others and possibly to modifying its representations after examining them.

In addition to the existence of costs related to the discussion that may reduce future stakeholder involvement, the formalization of a forum of exchange between managers is not necessarily a sufficient condition for gradual changes in representations and therefore in behaviours, as the interactions between differentiated representations of individuals or groups do not necessarily lead to the creation of systems of shared representations (Ehlinger, 1998).

In particular, our recommendation for action in this pre-project phase was not to define a precise and unique interpretation of the possible development of e-administration, in order to impose it on the network, but rather a mutual understanding of the situation and that for three main reasons. First, in light of the propositions developed by the theorists of the strategic approach of organizations (Crozier and Friedberg, 1977, Pfeffer, 1982), any participatory formula that seeks to eliminate conflicting interests and to promote acceptance, in a consensual mode, of one possible interpretation, runs the risk of coming up against the ‘opacity’ of social life, marked by compromises between groups of actors.

This formalization of policy principles and not of specific operational practices also had another advantage. E-administration is currently undergoing a dynamic of change. New value conflicts and therefore new processes of creation and destruction of sense are therefore to be expected to adjust to possible modifications of the environment. Therefore, while the aim of the discussion forums was certainly to construct, by examining and arguing the opinions of each, pathways or principles of action that seemed plausible at the time, another object was to establish more general principles that will enable managers not to be overwhelmed by the different possible interpretations of future situations.

In other words, with the establishment of discussion forums, the goal was not to initiate a process of conformation of individuals to a majority or a group, to standardize a hierarchy and value take-up, but to create transversal means of interpretation that could help reduce the ambiguity of the dynamic of evolution of e-administration that is yet to come or rather the variety required.