Rhetoric and Realities of Institutional Complexity in Pakistan: The Case of Federal Training Institutions

Organizational complexity is created when organizations face different and even conflicting demands from multiple institutional logics. Institutional logics are basically the demands posed by the external environment.... [ view full abstract ]

Organizational complexity is created when organizations face different and even conflicting demands from multiple institutional logics. Institutional logics are basically the demands posed by the external environment. Traditionally, public sector follows state logic in which the overarching principles are quite different from market logics operated in the private sector. Keeping in view the Meyer and Hammerschid (2010) distinction of the state and market logic, most of the principles like rationality, legitimacy, core values, mission and vision, mode of governance, evaluation criteria and employment status are applicable to the public sector in Pakistan also. During 2001, civil service reform agenda prescribed different changes in the structure of the federal and provincial governments. These changes have posed certain pressures on federal training institutions to improve performance and service delivery. The central theme for this research paper is to determine the level of complexity faced by public organizations in Pakistan. Research objectives pertaining to present study are: 1) to identify actors involved in creating complexity, 2) to develop a contextual framework to study institutional complexity in Pakistan, 3) to identify dominant institutional logics in public organizations of same organizational fields and 4) to find whether state logic of public organizations has changed or not? It is imperative to study whether training institutions faced competing logics while restructuring and to what extent. This study will measure the extent to which agency faced the multiple prescriptions like use of performance contracting (internal performance-based steering, planning and internal performance-based allocation of resources to organizational units on the basis of results), managerial autonomy and control. Institutional complexity is still a nascent concept in the context of developing countries hence this study will create a groundbreaking framework to study complexity in Pakistan. Moreover the concept has also drawn attention in strategic organizations that actually bridging up the gap between the strategic management and organizational theory. According to this debate there are certain potential gaps in the literature that can be filled through the empirical analysis of complexity at the field level to determine how multiple logics interact and how these logics are shaped by collective agencies (Hoffman, 2011). This study will be an abductive comparative case study of federal training institutions of Pakistan. To reduce the potential disadvantage of a single case, this study will focus on the variations within cases by taking into account different organizations within the same policy field. Target population selected for the study is federal training institutions in Pakistan. Semi structured interviews will be used to collect data from higher management in the organization. Interviews will be coded and documents will be analyzed to find significant relationship between data and the emerging patterns and themes. Directed content analysis and thematic analysis will be employed for analyzing qualitative data and most popular themes will be categorized and meaningful interpretation will be drawn to support the quantitative data. The results of the study will determine the actors involved in creating institutional complexity, level of complexity and what actually constitute complexity in public sector in Pakistan.