Abstract
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The public sector, especially in new EU member states and those aspiring to join EU structures, is under big pressure to improve its performance and make better use of all its human resource potential to strengthen the quality of policy making and service delivery.
New technology, new ways of organizing work, new means of delivering services and an increasing reliance on temporary employment have redefined the nature of public service. Duties are becoming multifaceted and very complex: they may encompass policy advice, management of human, financial and other resources, the provision of critical services and others (United Nations, 2005). Such an environment makes extraordinary demands on all civil servants. Meeting all these challenges requires a unique combination of knowledge, skills, attitudes and effective human resource development systems, as well as policies and strategies to nurture these competencies.
This calls for a significant transformation of the human resource function in general and human resource development (HRD) responsibility in particular, creating particular opportunities for civil servants to develop and enhance the necessary capabilities and encourage greater self-development opportunities to facilitate an effective implementation of public management reforms and improve public service delivery.
Studies report that some aspects of the HRD role in the public sector have changed during the last decade. Some of the reports suggest that training and development within organizations has been changing in significant ways in terms of what it does and how it does it (CIPD, 2001, 2006). However, evidence suggests that the HRD function is still underutilized in the process of reforms and the implementation of HRD policies have been piecemeal at best (World Bank report, 2006). A number of studies report a lack of alignment and integration of HRD policies with organizational strategies, including goals and objectives of Public Management Reforms (SIGMA, 1997; Chlivickas, 2007; United Nations, 2005).
It is evident that current approaches to HRD are insufficient to ensure the development of a new set of competences of civil servants and to create enabling environment within government institutions that enhance the organization’s capacity to take on large scale learning process associated with major cultural and procedural change brought by public management reforms.
Therefore, the key question addressed by this paper is what are the essential characteristics of the HRD system in the government institutions, which would enable the development of appropriate competencies and behavior to facilitate the implementation of public management reforms? Consequently, the goal is to develop and substantiate the model of the Human Resource Development system in the context of public management reform.
Thus, the first part of the paper will analyse different approaches and perspectives of HRD. It will also discuss the key characteristics of the modern HRD system, including specific characteristics, which are typical for the government institutions. It will conclude with construction and substantiation of the theoretical model of the HRD system in the context of public management reform. The Second part of the paper will present the research and data collection methods for the empirical research. In the last part the results of the empirical research carried out in central and local government institutions of Lithuania will be presented and the congruence of the theoretical model of HRD system with current HRD system in Lithuania will be examined and gaps identified. Finally, the conclusions and policy recommendations will be presented on how to improve and strengthen the HRD system in the central and local government institutions of Lithuania, including the considerations regarding the applicability of the model of the HRD system in other countries.
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