MOTIVATION AND RECRUITMENT OF PUBLIC SERVANTS - THE ETHOS OR THE MANAGERIAL MODEL?

The need to continue the reduction of the state bureaucracy and the orientation towards the managerial models from the private sector, the usage of financial incentive systems, generally in the form of merit base promotion and financial rewards, have introduced in the public system the incentives of the market, aiming to lead towards the efficiency and the effectiveness of the private organizations. Those practices considered that the labor force in the public and private systems is substantially the same, avoiding the essential differences between the public and private employees. The public servant does not answer only to financial incentives; a variety of nonfinancial motives affect the behavior: trust, sense of duty, altruism or community reputation. Public managers need to carefully balance the incidence and consistency of financial motivation in time with the impact on the organizational performance as well to avoid treating the public organization as a private company because such a measure does not identify the specific motives of public service and the way a bureaucracy works.