Public Personnel Management

Distinguished by its coherent values perspective, Public Personnel Management focuses on the conflicts, political processes, and management techniques that provide the context for personnel administration in the public sector. Organized around the four principal personnel functions that must be fulfilled in any complex organization, this book provides a comprehensive exploration of the planning, acquisition, development, and sanctions within public personnel management.

Now in a thoroughly revised 7th edition, Public Personnel Management focuses on the critical issues and common processes in the management of public sector personnel. In keeping with prior editions, the text centers on the core processes within public human resource management: strategic workforce planning, effective recruitment and retention, workforce development, and employee relations. Designed to further address the ways in which expectations for human resource managers have changed and developed in recent years, the 7th edition includes several new features and improvements: Substantially restructured, updated, and additional case studies and student exercises. Coverage of how the field of Public HRM has been influenced by the two most recent national recessions, economic downturns at the state and local level, privatization and contracting trends at all levels of government, the growing presence of millennial employees in the workplace, issues surrounding social media use within the workplace, the evolving goals of social equity and diversity, and the shifting role and influence of labor unions. Discussions of how the growth in information technology capabilities has influenced the major processes within HRM, from workforce analysis through big data analytics to the explosion in automated recruitment, assessment, and instructional technologies. For the first time, the text includes an online Instructor's Manual, PowerPoint slides, discussion questions, and suggestions for further reading to make it even easier to assign and use this classic text in the classroom. Providing the most up-to-date and thorough overview of the history and practice of public human resource management for both undergraduate and graduate students, Public Personnel Management, 7e remains the beloved text it ever was, ideal for introductory courses in Public Personnel Management, Public Human Resource Management, and Nonprofit Personnel Management.

Government and those executing its policies face the daunting task of delivering essential services to a dispossessed and hugely disadvantaged electorate. The authors of The Fundamentals of Public Personnel Management argue that, although the state controls a wide range of limited resources, only the effective management and judicious administration of its primary asset, its personnel, will allow it to translate physical, financial, material and technological resources into synergistic founts of national well-being. Trained and motivated public employees schooled in the ethics of their profession are essential to transforming inanimate structures and resources into people-oriented dispensers of sustainable service delivery.

A comprehensive introduction to contemporary public human resource management, this text incorporates analysis of the impact of the private sector-oriented reforms over the last few decades that have aimed to bring greater efficiency and productivity to the public sector.

Recognizing the inherent tensions and contradictions that result from managing people in organizations, Human Resource Management in Public Service: Paradoxes, Processes, and Problems offers provocative and thorough coverage of the complex issues of management in the public sector. Continuing the award-winning tradition of previous editions, this Sixth Edition helps students to understand complex managerial puzzles and explores the stages of the employment process, including recruitment, selection, training, legal rights and responsibilities, compensation, and appraisal. Grounded in real public service experiences, the book emphasizes hands-on skill building and problem solving. New to the Sixth Edition: Ethics case studies have been added to all the chapters, enabling students to learn about a variety of ethical situations that come up in management. Updated and consolidated recruiting strategies offer students a window into the most current methods used in the recruitment process and provide insight into the job seeker’s perspective. New examples from a broad range of local, state, federal, and international settings enable students to apply key concepts to common management issues.

Public Personnel Management has served as an essential, concise reader for public personnel and human resource management courses in the fields of public administration, political science, and public policy over the last 25 years. Since the first edition published in 1991, the book has offered professors and students alike an in-depth look at cutting-edge developments beyond standard textbook coverage, to provide a broad understanding of the key management and policy issues facing public and nonprofit HRM today. Original chapters are written expressly for the text by leading public administration scholars, each focusing on specific and often controversial concerns for public personnel management, such as pensions, gender and sexuality, healthcare, unions, and a multi-generational workforce. Now in an extensively revised sixth edition, Public Personnel Management presents new, original chapters to examine developments of interest to researchers and practitioners alike, including: remote working, cybersecurity, public service motivation, the abandonment of traditional civil service at the state and local levels, the Affordable Care Act and its implications for practice, pension systems and labor relations, affirmative action, social equity, legislation surrounding LGBT rights, and – as the field of public personnel management becomes more internationalized – a chapter addressing public personnel management across Europe. This careful and thoughtful overhaul will ensure that Public Personnel Management remains a field-defining book for the next 25 years.

With over 20 million people on its payroll, the government continues to be the largest employer in the country. Managing people who do the nation’s work is of critical importance to politicians and government leaders as well as citizens. The great recession of 2008 put enormous strains on governments, highlighting the key role personnel play in managing under times of austerity as well as prosperity. A thorough examination of political and historical aspects, Personnel Management in Government: Politics and Process, Seventh Edition provides students with a comprehensive understanding of human resource management within its historical and political context in the public sector. It discusses the development of public sector human resource management, the present status of best practices, and important insights from current scholarship on all three levels of government: federal, state, and local. See What’s New in the Seventh Edition: Personnel reforms under the Obama administration Pension developments at state and local levels of government Labor relations reforms at state and local levels, e.g. recent experiences in Michigan, Ohio, and other states making big changes to labor laws and policies Changes to diversity and affirmative action initiatives across the nation Developments in performance outcome initiatives at all levels of government During the 36 years since the publication of the first edition, the authors have addressed issues that were not yet considered mainstream, yet have become so over time. The seventh edition is no different. It examines progress that public personnel professionals are making to address changes in the political, legal, and managerial environment of the current decade. Exploring developments and innovations in the management of people who carry out the government's work, the book introduces students to public sector personnel management.