International Comparison of Public and Private Employees’ Work Motives, Attitudes, and Perceived Rewards

• Date: 01 May 2015
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/puar.12356
• Published date: 01 May 2015

Justin B. Bullock is assistant professor

in the Bush School of Government and

Public Service at Texas A&M University. His

research interests include public manage-

ment, public policy analysis, bureaucratic

discretion, decision-making theory, and

research methodology.

E-mail: jbull14@tamu.edu

Justin M. Stritch is assistant professor

in the School of Public Affairs and

senior research aff‌i liate in the Center of

Organization Research and Design at

Arizona State University. His research

interests include public service motivation,

human resource management, organiza-

tional social capital, decision making, and

organizational performance.

E-mail: jstritch@asu.edu

Hal G. Rainey is the Alumni Foundation

Distinguished Professor in the School of

Public and International Affairs at The

University of Georgia. His research concen-

trates on organizations and management

in government, with emphasis on change,

leadership, incentives, privatization, and

comparisons of governmental management

to management in business f‌i rms. His book

Understanding and Managing Public

Organizations was recently published

in its f‌i fth edition. He is a fellow of the

National Academy of Public Administration.

E-mail: hgrainey@uga.edu

International Comparison of Public and Private Employees’ Work Motives, Attitudes, and Perceived Rewards 479

Public Administration Review,

Vol. 75, Iss. 3, pp. 479–489. © 2015 by

The American Society for Public Administration.

DOI: 10.1111/puar.12356.

Justin B. Bullock

Texas A&M University

Justin M. Stritch

Arizona State University

Hal G. Rainey

The University of Georgia

Abstract:  is article presents a conceptual perspective on the distinctive characteristics of public organizations and

their personnel.  is perspective leads to hypotheses that public organizations deliver distinctive goods and services that

inf‌l uence the motives and rewards for their employees.  ese hypotheses are tested with evidence from the International

Social Survey Programme in order to compare public and private employees in 30 nations. Public employees in 28 of

the 30 nations expressed higher levels of public-service-oriented motives. In all of the countries, public employees were

more likely to say they receive rewards in the form of perceived social impact. In most of the countries, public employees

placed less importance on high income as a reward and expressed higher levels of organizational commitment.

Practitioner Points

•  e f‌i ndings presented here add to previous evidence that public employees seek and attain more altruistic

and public-service-oriented rewards than private sector employees. In particular, we add evidence that these

dif‌f erences hold in many dif‌f erent nations and cultural contexts.

• Compensation and incentive system reforms in many governments have often concentrated on f‌i nancial

incentives and streamlining procedures for discipline and removal. Such matters are important but should

not drive out concerns with showing public employees the impact of their work on the well-being of others

and on the community and society. Leaders and managers should invest in incentive systems that emphasize

such motives and rewards.

• Leaders and managers should invest in the use of altruistic and socially benef‌i cial motives and rewards in

recruiting systems.

In this article, we propose a conceptual perspective on

the institutional context and societal roles of public

organizations, the public and quasi-public goods and

services they provide, and the governmental functions

they discharge.  is perspective leads to hypotheses

that public organizations deliver distinctive goods

and services that inf‌l uence the motives, work atti-

tudes, and rewards for their employees. We test these

hypotheses across 30 nations using evidence from the

International Social Survey Programme (ISSP).

While organizational theorists have tended to place

little emphasis on a distinction between public and

private organizations, public administration research-

ers have provided numerous theoretically based

empirical analyses of the distinction.  e many exam-

ples include studies of public and private employ-

ees’ motivations (e.g., Buelens and Van den Broeck

2007; Crewson 1997), sector values (e.g., Boardman,

Bozeman, and Ponomariov 2010), leadership (e.g.,

Andersen 2010; Trottier, Van Wart, and Wang 2008),

and organizational performance (e.g., Amirkhanyan

2010; Meier and O’Toole 2011).1

International Comparison of Public and Private Employees’

Work Motives, Attitudes, and Perceived Rewards

Scholars in public administration, political

science, and economics have written that the

distinctive characteristics of public organizations

and the people in them have signif‌i cant implications

for public administration and for governance (e.g.,

Dahl and Lindblom 1953; Downs 1967; Lindblom

1977; Wamsley and Zald 1973). Organization theo-

rists, however, have usually downplayed the impor-

tance of public sector distinctiveness (e.g., Daft 2012;

Simon 1995;  ompson 1962). Additionally, more

and more empirical research in public administra-

tion represents authors and samples from dif‌f erent

nations (among many examples, see Andersen and

Kjeldsen 2013; Andersen and Pedersen 2013; Dur

and Zoutenbier 2014; Kim et al. 2013; Vandenabeele

2008).  e dif‌f ering perspectives about public

distinctiveness, coupled with the growing interest in

international research, raise two questions of theoreti-

cal and practical importance: Do public organizations

and their personnel have characteristics that make

them dif‌f erent from other types of organizations such

as business f‌i rms? Are such distinctions generalizable

across nations?