Summary Of Incentives As Reform Model For Street-Level Bureaucracy

Name: Abbas Sibai Class: Public Policy - Fall 2014 Professor Mikhail Pryadilnikov

Incentives as Reform Model for Street-Level Bureaucracy

Michael Lipsky in his research on “Street-Level Bureaucracy: The Critical Role of Street-Level Bureaucrats” examines the role of front-line public employees in the bureaucracy. Street-level bureaucracy is the subset of a public agency or government institution containing the individuals who carry out and enforce the actions required by laws and public policies. Those individuals who interact directly with citizens. There are many street-level bureaucrats in public service agencies such as welfare offices. In fact, it seems that the poorer

On average, over 80% of gross fares end up in the hands of street level bureaucrats. What’s more, of the percentage that is retained by public institution, a large portion goes to cover variable expenses within the service. These expenses include payment processing, payment fraud, refunds, customer service, dispute resolution, logistics and service fees for the street level bureaucrats, and local regulatory efforts.

- Input: Public Institutions, Street-Level Bureaucrat, Clients

- Transformation: Connecting the (Street-Level Bureaucrats) and Clients via public institutions to deliver service upon request from the client.

- Output: Service provided to the client upon their desired request

- Flexibility: refers to how quickly operations processes can adjust to changes in the market.

This can be achieved through: - Increasing the provider's skill level: Public Institutions are able to do this easily, as they freely hire licensed Street-Level Bureaucrats. By increasing restrictions, it allows public institution to find higher skilled Street-Level Bureaucrats to provide the service.

- Improving the level of technology: Buying new technologies increases flexibility and capacity

- Dependability: Refers to how consistent and reliable a business' products are. In services, it is the consistence of service standards and reliability. A measure for this is the number of complaints received.

This process allows the public institutions to create and maintain a decent and respectful environment for clients and Street-Level Bureaucrats.

- Real-time feedback allows public institutions to respond quickly to issues, and may result in a Street-Level Bureaucrats being deactivating due to their unreliable service.

- Quality of Design: arises from an understanding of clients and their preferences. It extends to how well a product is made or a service is delivered.

- Quality of Service: Quality of design and quality of conformance can be applied to the design and delivery of services. In this sense quality refers to:Reliability of service Public institutions promises that when an clients requests a service, the allocated Street-Level Bureaucrats will be available to track. The client will be informed when their service is ready and the Street-Level Bureaucrat name and details will be indicated.

How the service meets the specific need of the client?

Public Institutions uses a feedback system whereby the client's feedback is noted. This allows them to meet the specific needs of the client next time they use the