Review of Public Personnel Administration

This article challenges conventional wisdom put forward by the motivational crowding literature by examining whether hypothetical changes to incentive structures can cause variation in employee motivation. It links such motivational adjustments to theories of cognitive dissonance and self-rationalization, and thereby offers a more nuanced perspective on government reforms in the area of human resource management. The article puts forward the idea that expectations of few extrinsic rewards can raise employees’ levels of intrinsic and prosocial motivation; this response is seen as a cognitive coping mechanism to self-justify the value of one’s work. A randomized experiment with 129 public administration students provides partial evidence for the hypothesized effect. Students who were confronted with media information suggesting that few extrinsic rewards can be expected in a public-sector career reported higher scores of intrinsic motivation than the group whose vignette suggested the opposite. No effect was found with regard to students’ public service motivation.

Public service motivation (PSM) has many bright sides, but recent studies also find dark sides, connected to, for instance, higher stress and burnout. However, results on the PSM–absenteeism association are inconclusive. One reason could be that PSM increases presenteeism (going to work even when ill), which in turn increases absenteeism and counteracts—or even exceeds—PSM-based reductions of absenteeism. Based on a three-wave panel study of Danish public and private sector employees, we find a strong positive association between PSM and presenteeism and indications that the PSM–absenteeism link is mediated by presenteeism. The findings suggest that going to work even on days when employees feel ill is a potential dark side of PSM and that it may have long-term consequences for the extent to which employees are absent from their jobs due to sickness. This cautions managers not to expect that high PSM automatically guarantees high performance and low absence.

The foundational goal of civil rights legislation is to reduce discrimination, in both the public and private sector. To understand the levels of perceived discrimination in the federal government, this research note examines 9 years of data reported under the requirements of the Notification and Federal Employee Antidiscrimination and Retaliation Act of 2002 (No FEAR Act). From 2006 to 2014, less than 1% of federal employees filed discrimination complaints each year, and the discrimination complaint rate did not significantly change over the time period. Race, color, and national origin were the most frequently claimed discrimination bases. Approximately half of all complaints alleged retaliation after filing an initial discrimination claim. In addition, federal employees most frequently claimed that discrimination occurred in the context of nonsexual harassment. This research note describes other trends in discrimination claims and proposes directions for future research.

Public administration scholarship needs to strike a better balance between large sample studies and in-depth case studies. The availability of large data sets has led us to engage in empirical research that is broad in scope but is frequently devoid of rich context. In-depth case studies can help to explain why we observe particular relationships and can help us to clarify gaps and inconsistencies in theory. Our argument for more case studies aims to encourage researchers to bridge insights from qualitative and quantitative research through triangulation. We describe the value of case study research, and qualitative and quantitative design options. We then propose opportunities for case study research in public personnel scholarship on patronage pressures, performance management, and diversity management.

Since politicization persists, threatening public sector governance and management, there is a need to further understand this phenomenon and its consequences. Previous empirical studies conducted predominantly in the United States have found a negative impact of politicization on performance; however, the reasons behind this relationship remain elusive. In this article, we inquire into the effect of politicization on organizational performance, and we propose that such influence can be explained by a deterioration of human resource management (HRM) practices. Using data from a national survey of municipal managers and mayors in Chile, our results confirm the negative impact of politicization on the performance of public agencies, which is partially mediated by politicization’s deleterious effect on their HRM practices.

Many public organizations implement teleworking: an organizational innovation expected to improve the working conditions of public servants. However, it is unclear to what extent teleworking is beneficial for public servants. This study adds to the literature by studying the effects of teleworking on a day-to-day basis. We used a daily diary methodology and followed public servants across five consecutive working days. Studies that apply a daily survey method are more accurate than cross-sectional measures because they reduce recall bias. The results highlight that public servants experience quite negative effects from teleworking, including greater professional isolation and less organizational commitment on the days that they worked entirely from home. Contrary to predictions, working from home did not affect work engagement. We also found that higher leader–member exchange (LMX) reduced the impact of teleworking on professional isolation. These findings not only contribute to the literature by showing the unfavorable effects of teleworking but also highlight that LMX can, to some extent, reduce these negative effects.

Research by Reese and Warner and Llorens, Wenger, and Kellough assesses the relative pay of women in the United States. However, research on the relative pay of women of color remains scant. What kinds of factors predict relative pay for women of color, and are they the same as for White women? The author utilizes ordinary least squares (OLS) regression on an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) panel data set on public sector employment by state to analyze the pay of Black, Hispanic, Asian, and American Indian women relative to men for 2005-2013. The author reaffirms that whether a woman lives in a state that has implemented a major gender pay equity measure is a significant factor determining her relative pay. Furthermore, the intersectional nature of public sector pay for women of color is numerically verified. Women fare better in states where they are descriptively represented in terms of gender and race/ethnic group.

More than 800 international governmental organizations employ thousands of civil servants. Whistleblowers in them confront problems that are both common and uncommon compared with their nation-state counterparts. Drawing upon the relevant literature, as well as stakeholder interview data, a research framework is developed identifying whistle-blower challenges. These dilemmas focus on loyalty, impartiality, and immunity, as well as the desire to hold organizations accountable in a governance system lacking in sufficient checks and balances. In addition, significant hurdles confronting whistleblowers include definitions and policies, retaliation and restitution concerns, visa and short-contract constraints, and a resource gap along with judicial composition issues. Future research is needed because international public servants play a significant role in ensuring a transparent and accountable global system.