Effective governance is important and this year I have had the pleasure of working with a number of public sector agencies that are working on improvements to their governance processes.
The essentials of good governance are similar across public sector and private sector entities and there are a number of governance publications that are written with this in mind. For example, the NZ Institute of Directors describe their “Four Pillars of Governance” which apply to all types of entities as follows:
1. Determination of purpose
2. An effective governance culture
3. Holding to account
4. Effective compliance
However, there are a number of different challenges in the public sector space, which are not addressed by the majority of governance materials (which focus on the private sector). Our public sector clients have mentioned to us that they struggle to find high quality governance materials specifically targeted at the public sector.
Recently I read the “Public Sector Governance Better Practice Guide” published by the Australian National Audit Office in June 2014. This guide is available online. It is an update to their 2003 guide and reflects ongoing maturity in the public sector governance space in Australia (with the guide timed to align with the Public Governance, Performance and Accountability Act changes in Australia).
The guide gives greater attention to the “importance of leadership, engaging in beneficial stakeholder relationships, and working collaboratively across entity, jurisdictional and sector boundaries to enhance policy outcomes. The guide emphasises the importance of a highly performing public sector, particularly in the light of fiscal constraints and public expectations for continuous improvements to public sector services, more transparent processes and increasing levels of engagement with citizens and other stakeholders”.
The guide is available on a Creative Commons licence, and may be of use to public sector entities looking to improve their governance processes.