Prosessien hallinnastako avain tuloksellisempaan valtionhallintoon?

Valtionhallinnon muutosprosessissa on huomattu tulosohjaukseen liittyvät rakenteelliset ongelmat. 2000-luvun puolivälissä prosessiajattelu nousee uudelleen esiin. Sitä esitetään aidosti ratkaisumalliksi julkisten palvelujen järjestämiseen. Prosessit ovattulleet ajankohtaisiksi. Tutkielman päätavoitteena oli prosessijohtamisen ja muutosjohtamisen lähtökohtien syventäminen. Alatavoitteina olivat prosessien suoritusmittarit ja onnistuneen muutoshallinnan avaintekijät. Tutkimus perustuu lähdekirjallisuuteen ja asiantuntijoiden haastatteluihin. Prosessilähtöisyys valtionhallinnossa on huomion kiinnittämistä ulkoisen asiakkaan tarpeiden tyydyttämiseen sekä yhteiskunnallisten vaikuttavuustavoitteiden saavuttamiseen. Muutos vaatiinimenomaan johtamista sekä sitkeyttä ja vastarinnan sietämistä. Lisäksi se vaatii johdon sitoutumista ja määrätietoista työtä tavoitteiden saavuttamiseksi. Rohkeus ja avoimuus uusille asioille ovat myös tärkeitä. Valtionhallinnon organisaatioissa tarvitaan lähitulevaisuudessa entistä enemmän muutosagentteja, muutosjohtajia ja uudenlaista osaamista.

Diffusion of Administrative Innovation: TQM Implementation and Effectiveness in a Global

The main objective of this dissertation is to create new knowledge on an administrative innovation, its adoption, diffusion and finally its effectiveness. In this dissertation the administrative innovation is approached through a widely utilized management philosophy, namely the total quality management (TQM) strategy. TQM operationalizes a self-assessment procedure, which is based on continual improvement principles and measuring the improvements. This dissertation also captures the theme of change management as it analyzes the adoption and diffusion of the administrative innovation. It identifies innovation characteristics as well as organisational and individual factors explaining the adoption and implementation. As a special feature, this study also explores the effectiveness of the innovation based on objective data. For studying the administrative innovation (TQM model), a multinational Case Company provides a versatile ground for a deep, longitudinal analysis. The Case Company started the adoption systematically in the mid 1980s in some of its units. As part of their strategic planning today, the procedure is in use throughout the entire global company. The empirical story begins from the innovation adoption decision that was made in the Case Company over 22 years ago. In order to be able to capture the right atmosphere and backgrounds leading to the adoption decision, key informants from that time were interviewed, since the main target was to clarify the dynamics of how an administrative innovation develops. In addition, archival material was collected and studied, available memos and data relating to the innovation, innovation adoption and later to the implementation contained altogether 20500 pages of documents. A survey was furthermore conducted at the end of 2006 focusing on questions related to the innovation, organization and leadership characteristics and the response rate totalled up to 54%. For measuring the effectiveness of the innovation implementation, the needed longitudinal objective performance data was collected. This data included the profit unit level experience of TQM, the development of the self assessment scores per profit unit and performance data per profit unit measured with profitability, productivity and customer satisfaction. The data covered the years 1995-2006. As a result, the prerequisites for the successful adoption of an administrative innovation were defined, such as the top management involvement, support of the change agents and effective tools for implementation and measurement. The factors with the greatest effect on the depth of the implementation were the timing of the adoption and formalization. The results also indicated that the TQM model does have an effect on the company performance measured with profitability, productivity and customer satisfaction. Consequently this thesis contributes to the present literature (i) by taking into its scope an administrative innovation and focusing on the whole innovation implementation process, from the adoption, through diffusion until its consequences, (ii) because the studied factors with an effect on the innovation adoption and diffusion are multifaceted and grouped into individual, organizational and environmental factors, and a strong emphasis is put on the role of the individual change agents and (iii) by measuring the depth and consistency of the administrative innovation. This deep analysis was possible due to the availability of longitudinal data with triangulation possibilities.

Competence foresight: linking the identification of HR competences and competence management alignment with business strategy

The objective of this study was to increase understanding of the link between the identification of required HR competences and competence management alignment with business strategy in a Finnish, global company employing over 8,000 people and about 100 HR professionals. This aim was approached by analyzing the data collected in focus group interviews using a grounded theory method and in parallel reviewing the literature of strategic human resource management, competence-based strategic management, strategy and foresight. The literature on competence management in different contexts dismisses in-depth discussions on the foresight process and individuals are often forgotten in strategic frameworks. However, corporate foresight helps in the detection of emerging opportunities for innovations and in the implementation of strategy. The empirical findings indicate a lack of strategic leadership and an alignment with HR and business. Accordingly, the most important HR competence areas identified were the need for increasing business understanding and enabling change. As a result, the study provided a holistic model for competence foresight, which introduces HR professionals as strategic change agents in the role of organizational futurists at the heart of the company: facilitating competence foresight and competence development on individual as well as organizational levels, resulting in an agile organization with increased business understanding, sensitive sensors and adaptive actions to enable change.

A recent change in size distribution of blue mussels (Mytilus edulis) in the western part of the Gulf of Finland

Markus Öst & Mikael Kilpi