When it comes to public management, we should approach with understanding culture and climate. Especially, considering the cultural background and rapidly introduction of westernized perspectives to the society of Korea,... [ view full abstract ]
When it comes to public management, we should approach with understanding culture and climate. Especially, considering the cultural background and rapidly introduction of westernized perspectives to the society of Korea, organizational culture and the value emphasized within the organization should receive a lot of attention. To be specific, Korea is culturally grounded on Confucian value as one of the Eastern Asian country, which means that for Korean people ethical value have been stressed for a long time. Meanwhile, after Korean War, Korean government actively introduced and adopted a number of systems, rules, and practices from western country. Moreover, the New Public Management (NPM) reforms underlining the improvement of capacity, entrepreneurship, and performance management have been adopted to Korean public sector since early of 2000s. Such a distinct contextual background was regarded as a root which has affected on organizational culture. Thus, this study aims to adopt the historical and cultural background to the research framework, and prove the effects of them with implementing both quantitative and qualitative research methods.
Drawing on the result of 1,216 respondents from “Public Sector Entrepreneurship Survey” collected from March to August 2015, and 10 interviewees from Interview conducted from June to August 2016 targeting public employees working in Korea, this research investigates four main questions. First, what types of organizational culture (i.e., Performance-driven culture, Ethic-driven culture) could most significantly enhance public service motivation of public employees? Second, does trust in manager affect public service motivation of public employees? Third, does it interact with the organizational culture in a way that increases the level of public service motivation (i.e., moderating the effects of the organizational culture)? Using Hierarchical Multivariate Regression, this study proves how organizational culture and trust affect the public service motivation. In addition, this study not only suggests theoretical and practical implications for future research in Korean public sector but also provides the possibility of comparative research across countries with different cultural and historical background.
