Rethinking public strategy
By: Sean Lusk and Nick Birks
Contributors: Birks, Nick
Series: The public management and leadership series; Public management and leadership series
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Published: 2014
Language: eng
Number of pages: 245
ISBN-13: 9781137377562; 9781137377579
Subjects: Social service; Human services; Municipal services; Public administration; Strategic planning
Description: "Strategy is vital to effective and efficient public service delivery as well as successful governance and leadership. This new text provides a concise yet systematic overview of the achievements, downfalls and complexities of public strategy in today's globalized and often market-driven world. It describes the place of strategy in civic societies whose citizens are more interconnected and vocal than ever. It shows that successful strategic planning goes well beyond problem-solving to developing adaptable plans that can evolve as requirements and circumstances change. And it explains why muddling through simply won't work. Emphasizing the importance of applying a variety of techniques to the process of strategy-creation, Rethinking Public Strategy reassesses the key factors that can deliver significant improvements in public services and build public value. It looks at why public strategy is distinctive, as well as the principles it has in common with the corporate domain. This text includes numerous case studies from around the globe - from South Africa to Singapore, the USA to Germany, and from China to the Czech Republic - that ground the exposition in real experience. Based on state-of-the-art research by two expert practitioners in the field, it offers an essential guide to the art of strategy in the contemporary public sector, and encourages readers to evaluate critically the various approaches to strategy. "--
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (pages 225-238) and index.
Table of contents: title: 1. Introduction: Strategy; title: Everywhere and Nowhere; title: 2. Public Strategy; title: 3. Corporate Strategy and Public Strategy; title: 4. Barriers to Strategic Thinking; title: 5. Thinking Strategically; title: Methods and Approaches; title: 6. Acting Strategically; title: Building Strategic Appetite; title: 7. Delivering Strategically; title: Performance and Accountability for Results; title: 8. Imagination, Curiosity and Strategic Judgement; title: 9. Conclusion.