THE INFLUENCE OF EMPOWERMENT, TASK DIFFICULTY AND SITUATIONAL CONSTRAINTS ON ACCOUNTABILITY IN MALAYSIAN LOCAL GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS

ROHANA OTHMAN
Universiti Teknologi MARA, Malaysia 

DENNIS TAYLOR
University of South Australia, Australia 

MALIAH SULAIMAN
HAFIZ-MAJDI ABDUL RASHID
International Islamic University Malaysia

INTRODUCTION 

The past two decades is marked by proposals for change in the focus of accountability to meet demands for reforms to the roles of public sector agencies.  The international emergence of ‘managerialism’ movement has focused on outputs (efficiency) and outcomes (effectiveness) of performance and accountability (Pollitt, 1993; Kloot, 1999; Brignall and Modell, 2000).  There has now emerged a paradigm shift bringing about significant organizational changes in the local government sector as a consequence.  In relation to local government accountability, demand for greater disclosure by LAs to the local community and concerns for the right of redress for aggrieved ratepayers are all part of a movement towards re-defining the notion of discharging accountability.  This shift has involved the introduction of a private sector management model, discarding bureaucracy as well as ensuring organizational and managerial accountability (Pollit, 1990; Kloot, 1999). 

The problem arises from the need to consider determinants of those accountability dimensions which take the departmental manager into dimensions of managerial and public accountability.  A likely determinant of these less measurable and less controllable dimensions of accountability is a departmental manager’s cognition of his or her own self-determination in the work environment.  Such cognition is embodied in the variable, psychological environment.  In addition, departmental managers of LAs in Malaysia are likely to face considerable situational constraints in their work setting arising from inadequate funding, lack of skilled employees and time pressure.  They are also likely to face high task difficulty due to the complexities of managing various types of service users and resource providers.  Thus the research problem in this study is whether the inclusion of psychological empowerment alongside contextual workplace variables in a contingency model can provide greater insights into what influences the departmental manager’s discharge or lack of discharge of managerial and public dimensions of accountability.

As already indicated, this study will be focusing on the way heads of functional departments in Malaysian LAs perceive how they render managerial and public accountability.  The specific objective of this hypo-empirical study is to explain the extent to which psychological empowerment, task uncertainty and situational constraint linked to the manager’s immediate work environment have a direct influence on the rendering of managerial and public accountability. 

The sample of the present research was drawn from all 97 local authorities in Peninsula Malaysia (source: MHLG).  The subjects for this study are the heads and the supervisory executives of functional departments that provide direct services to the Malaysian public.  Survey questionnaires were distributed to 665 departmental heads and their supervisory subordinates.   

LITERATURE REVIEW 

In its broadest sense, accountability means the giving and demanding of reasons for conduct in which people are required to explain and take responsibility for their actions (Roberts and Scapens, 1985; Parker and Gould, 1999).  A person is obliged to provide an explanation for his/her actions to those who have the right to receive such explanations.  Accountability is an assurance that a certain task is performed in a responsible manner.  A person is held accountable for achieving expected results, or conversely for failure to do so.  Hence, accountability implies holding individuals and organizations answerable for their actions and performance. 

Managerial accountability has gained recognition in the public sector by the late 1980’s through the notion of ‘managerialism’.  Taylor and Pincus (1999:360) believe that managerial accountability will invariably affect the disposition of Malaysian LA departmental managers towards the fulfilment of departmental performance responsibilities to service users and resource providers.  In addition, Kloot and Martin (2001) also found that managers throughout local governments have strong notions of public accountability.  Public accountability deals with issues that ensure public officials to respond to public interests with regard to their projects, services and financial implications.

This study chooses contextual factors associated with the manager’s immediate work environment where attitudes about the rendering of managerial and public accountability by the department are likely to be influenced.  Results of prior literature have shown that a relationship exists between psychological empowerment and performance (e.g. Chen and Klimoski, 2003.  Psychological empowerment of managers in their work unit refers to their individual and collective cognitions of responsibility, authority, control, impact and self-efficacy. It is reasonable to expect that when these cognitions are strong, the disposition to render accountability that goes beyond compliance to embrace managerial and public accountability would be enhanced.

As already demonstrated in prior research by Tushman and Nadler, 1978; Tushman, 1979; Fry and Slocum, 1984; Brownell and Dunk, 1991, task difficulty affects aspects of organizational efficiency and effectiveness.  A study by Brownell and Dunk (1991) has provided evidence that under circumstances of low task difficulty, managerial performance and hence the rendering of accountability is enhanced.  This study puts up an argument that higher task difficulty faced by departmental managers will make managerial performance more difficult, and by extension, will make the rendering of managerial and public accountability more difficult. 

Equally important, studies have shown that situational constraints may affect performance.  This study considers whether the collective effects of situational constraints on departmental managers might extend to the ability of those managers to render managerial and public accountability.  Peters and O’Connor (1980), Peters, O’Connor and Rudolf (1980), Blumberg and Pringle (1982), O’Connor, Peters, Pooyan, Weekly and Erenkrantz (1984) and Steel and Mento (1986) have provided evidence that situational constraints have a negative impact on performance. 

Hence, this present study seeks to determine whether these contextual variables have an impact on the managerial/public accountability in Malaysian local authorities. 

DATA ANALYSIS 

This present study proceeds to explore the direct relationships between the contingency and cognitive variables and managerial and public accountability that may exist in Malaysian LA departments.  Using the multiple regression analysis, the direct effects of psychological empowerment, the task difficulty, and the situational constraints were determined in order to provide evidence that these three chosen contextual variables will enhance accountability.  The equation is as follows: 

MGLPUB =    a + b₁ EMPOW + b₂ TSKDIF + b₃ SCONST + e 

Where,             MGLPUB is managerial/public accountability, EMPOW is psychological empowerment, TSKDIF is task difficulty, SCONST is situational constraints 

Table 1.1 provides the result for the above-mentioned equation.  The overall explanatory power of each regression equation is not high.  As indicated in Table 1.1 the adjusted R-square is .205 and the regression model is significant with F = 27.430 and p= .000.  

TABLE 1.1: Multiple Regression Results for the Effects of Cognitive and Contingency Variables on managerial/public Accountability

The result for EMPOW in Table 1.1 reveals that standard error coefficients are low and the beta coefficients are positive and highly significant.  This evidence of a positive relationship between EMPOW and accountability points to the importance to local governments of providing departmental managers with psychological empowerment.  The results confirm that that the greater the extent of this empowerment of the departmental manager, the greater will be the department’s discharge of accountability. 

 Table 1.1 also shows that task difficulty (TSKDIF) is, indeed, significantly inversely related to managerial/public accountability.  The positive effect of EMPOW is offset when TSKDIF becomes greater for the departmental manager.  Managerial/public accountability is adversely affected when departmental managers face greater task difficulty.  

Finally, the regression result in Table 1.1 also reveals that the direct effect of SCONST on managerial/public accountability is not significant.  This result suggests that the presence of situational constraints in the departmental manager’s working environment such as on dealing with ‘red tape’, lack of necessary supplies or equipment, do not impact on the discharge of managerial and public accountability in local government departments in Malaysia.  However, such constraints may affect the quality of service provided.  

DISCUSSIONS ON THE FINDINGS 

The identification of the importance of psychological empowerment should be of interest to the top management of LAs.  This study has identified psychological empowerment as an emerging, non-traditional aspect of management.  Manager’s cognition of their impact, competency and self-determination in the workplace were all found to be related to the managerial and public dimensions of accountability.  The result extends the work of Spreitzer (1995), Peccei & Rosenthal (2001) and Chen & Klimoski (2003) by taking evidence about the positive effects of psychological empowerment beyond performance to accountability.  It is apparent that a manager’s psychological empowerment is particularly useful to encourage excellence in service delivery. 

The finding of this study also shows that task difficulty is significantly inversely related to managerial/public accountability in Malaysia.  The result of this study is parallel with Brownell and Dunk (1991) and it shows that a low task difficulty situation may lead to improved managerial performance.  This gives the notion that when task difficulty is low, performance is significantly higher.  The results indicates that the LA managers require more task specific information, better task planning and more time available to complete tasks in order to improve accountability outcomes of their departments. 

Finally, situational constraints, is not found to impact on accountability. The result suggests that situational factors do not influence the rendering of accountability in the LA departments under study.  Prior studies have ascertained that the performance of organizations which expect and put into effect high work and performance standards would be adversely be affected by situational constraints (Peters et al., 1985; Peters and O’Connor 1988).  However, Kane (1993) has suggested that situational constraints would not adversely affect performance outcomes unless work and performance standards are attained by individuals.  Apparently, work and performance standards would utilize a person’s abilities and motivations as well as promote individual performance.  

LIMITATIONS AND FUTURE RESEARCH 

In assessing the findings of this study, it is important to interpret the results in the light of the study’s limitations.  First, the reliability of the data collected from field surveys depends largely upon how carefully the questionnaire is developed.   Lack of prior testing of the variables does present a limitation of internal validity.  However, the items developed for these measures have been adapted from various sources of prior literatures.  Subsequently, this study undertook validity tests (factor analysis) and reliability tests (Cronbach Alpha) on each of the multi-scale constructs from the questionnaire data.  Moreover, since data are drawn from the middle and lower level managers in departments’ of LAs in Peninsula Malaysia, the results may be generalizable only to that population. 

The above limitations present opportunities for future research.  Future research could focus on several related opportunities for further enquiry.  First, a future study could provide further evidence confirming the results of this present study while overcoming some of its limitations.  This study represents a first attempt to model and test hypothesis about the link between contextual variables and managerial/public accountability of heads and supervisory subordinates of LAs in Malaysia.  More research is needed to confirm the present findings and to extend and develop the ideas further.  Further, the findings in this study can be developed further to establish deeper meanings by adopting a case study approach. 

CONCLUSION 

Overall, this study provided a contribution to theory and practice.  From a practical standpoint, public sector management, particularly LA top management and their departmental managers, stand to gain from the findings of this study.  Finally, for all types of LAs in Malaysia facing greater demand for accountability in their service provision, the adoption of appropriate cognitive and contextual variables should be a priority in achieving managerial and public accountability.