The Profession of Public Administration (Essay Sample)

IDEAL TRAINING AND SKILL SETS FOR PUBLIC ADMINISTRATORS
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The debate on the professionalization of public administration has been existent for over a century. Proponents have argued that professionalism in the field would ensure better service delivery to the citizens; tangible social amenities being delivered and not amorphous and impulsive expenditure on petty issues such as burial money. The proponents remain optimistic that there is room for professionalizing public administration and have offered their advice as discussed by McDonald (2008). Proponents on the other hand remain skeptical that there is no way whatsoever that public administration could become a profession. They argue that the field is restrained by such factors as politics and the power effect. This paper looks at a brief history of the evolution of public administration: successes and failures of professionalization attempts. The paper uses the New York Bureau of Municipal Research as a point of reference and regards it as a pioneer to the professionalization of public administration. The paper also discusses the core skills that a public administrator ought to possess and the ideal training that they ought to have received.
According to Long, there ought to be a clear cutline between politics and administration. Long inquires into past occurrences where politics have led to the failure of administrative roles and have led to miserable losses. Such a case is the launch of the Challenger in 1986, a space craft that failed and led to the demise of all its crew (Long, 2009). This was despite attempts by the organization responsible for designing the O-rings, warning that they would not operate properly in snow conditions. Long explains that NASA ignored the warning to launch owing to political pressure. NASA had to lobby for more Congressional funding just like the Pentagon (Long, 2009). At this note Long tries to explain the importance of public administrators being able to read the lines between quality judgment and influence from external forces. Mac Donald (2008) explains that autonomy from the powers outside the profession is vital for efficiency to be articulated. Woodrow (2007) in his article emphasizes on the need to have independence granted to public administrators by the separation of powers from the politically elected people. He also attempts to draw a boundary between politics and effective public administration.
As much there is ambiguity on how professionalism should be articulated in public administration, there are various qualities that administrators should adopt and observe various standards for there to be efficiency and effectiveness. With such standards in place, there will be an achievement of a certain level of professionalism by the end of the day. Professionalization of public administration, as explained by McDonald (2008), began with the inception of The New York Bureau of Municipal Research. The Bureau was mandate with investigating the public service delivery and to offer advice and recommendations for improvement. As a watchdog of the highly esteemed leader, the Bureau was able to foresee remarkable developments of public administration towards professionalism. Before its collapse, the Bureau could be recognized for advancing important strategies and forcing order into the field of public administration (McDonald, 2008).
The Bureau observed that it was important to begin with the training of public administrators. They pushed for the starting of schools in which courses related to public administration were taught (McDonald, 2008). The number of schools offering public administration courses has since increased and there has been diversification of curriculum to suit various areas of the profession. This was a major milestone in the professionalization of public administration as the power of education and training is indomitable, in its ability to bring changes a field. Training serves as the foundation on which professional public administrators are founded.
Through training, public administrators are imparted with skills that enable them to be effective in the field. The study of public administration has a well developed curriculum as at present as professionals in the faculty expend a lot of effort into ensuring that graduates receive enough knowledge and skills to execute their duties in accordance with the modern public necessities. For instance, public administrators are trained on ethics relating to the nature of their obligations. Public administration has been tainted with negativities such as corruption and embezzlement of public funds. Administrators have been reported to have put their interests before those of the public they serve. This issues point to ethics. Training in public administration will help in sensitizing students on the importance of avoiding the conflict of interests and the dangers of engaging in unscrupulous activities for self-gain. Unlike a system where public administrators would be untrained and clueless of societal needs such as ethics, training fosters efficiency and sets the pace for professionalization of public administration.
The training of ethics in schools should not end at that. There ought to be a code of ethics that public administrators ought to be looking up to (Woodrow, 2007). A code of ethics acts as a guiding light and is a milestone towards the professionalization of public administration. As much as there are different level of governments, there ought to be nationally acceptable codes of ethics that every public administrator can identify with. This could best be done through governing bodies that oversee the performance of public administrators. They should come up with common codes so that they would be effected on equal level to every public administrator. All the same the codes of ethics should be flexible to adjustments and modification but should be void of loopholes through which corrupt minds would want to get away with unethical behavior.
To further the concept of professionalization in public administration, there ought to be professional associations through which public administrators should join as members as a prerequisite for the accession to their positions. These associations ought to be legally established and enforceable by the law. This will ensure that public administrators are further bound by the rule of law in such a way that there are implications for the breach of the law. The associations should regulate the duties of public administrators and act as watchdogs to ensure that codes of practice are adhered to. This argument is based on Long’s (2009) proposition that power is obtained not from an individual position but from the lower echelons and it flows up in the bureaucratic system. This means that even the president would not have the power he has were it not for the people below him, including the citizenry that ascended him to power. A public administrator should, therefore, not just issue orders to articulate individual interests but should reflect on the interests of those who have held him up to power (Woodrow, 2007). As much as power and public administrations are inseparable, there ought to be associations that supervise the actions of those in powerful positions.
The associations should, however, act in a way that they do not interfere with the normal running of activities. This is because, as noted by Long (2009), external pressure could contribute to inefficiencies in service delivery. The productivity of public administrators will be inhibited when they are exposed to politicking and other factors from outside their responsibilities. This will foster the other step towards professionalizing public administration. Public administrators also ought to posses the ability to operate under minimum supervision; they should be self regulated. This variable is multidimensional in that it would imply that the individual administrator should be independent from too much regulation and moderation, or it would mean that the individual should be apt to operate on themselves. The earlier is more applicable than the latter but it should not rule out the importance of having associations to monitor their operations.
It is imperative that public administ...