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Managing the impersonal in a personalized public service
Author(s) -
Gretchen Kay
Publication year - 2003
Publication title -
public administration and development
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.574
H-Index - 44
eISSN - 1099-162X
pISSN - 0271-2075
DOI - 10.1002/pad.247
Subject(s) - personalization , scope (computer science) , service (business) , affect (linguistics) , public service , public relations , scale (ratio) , space (punctuation) , resource (disambiguation) , knowledge management , business , sociology , marketing , computer science , political science , computer network , physics , communication , quantum mechanics , programming language , operating system
What happens when an apparently personalized small public service enters the information highway? How does it integrate the new frame of mind implied in the impersonal, open approach to information? The practical implications of implementing information technology as a means to use information strategically in the Maltese public service, with its apparently paradoxical administrative style, prompted the pilot study in early 2000 upon which this article is based. Using a simplified empirical approach, the study tested the hypothesis that small scale could affect the way leaders deal with the impersonal, such as information resource management. Although limited in scope, the results of the study support a qualified conclusion that small scale, through its link with personalization and associated informal mechanisms, does affect the way top managers in the public service deal with the impersonal, at least in the short and medium term. To what extent it does so, or the space for change, are subjects for further research. The article concludes with suggestions for further investigation into this topic, both in its narrow and wider applications. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.