Why Public Authorities Are More Adaptable Than They Believe

Many senior managers in public administration regard their organisation as rigid and hard to change. A closer look at the structure often shows the opposite.

Anyone discussing modernisation with public authorities hears the same sentence over and over: “That won’t work here, we’re too set in our ways.” The view is understandable. Responsibilities have grown historically, workflows have settled in over years, and regulations set narrow limits. Even so, the conclusion is wrong. Public authorities are systems made up of structures, people and resources, and all three elements can be shaped. The question is not whether change is possible, but how to approach it systematically.

The Misconception Starts With the Underlying Mindset

Before an organisation even considers concrete measures, its underlying mindset determines what counts as feasible. Anyone who sees an administration as a fixed structure will only propose small, cosmetic adjustments. Anyone who instead understands it as a system that can be shaped, made up of adjustable components, opens up the view to real alternatives. This distinction is not an academic nuance. In practice, it decides whether a modernisation project stays on the surface or actually changes something.

An authority that believes its organisational structure has “grown historically and is therefore untouchable” will shut down any discussion of scope and responsibilities from the outset. An authority that instead views the same structure as one of several possible solutions can examine whether it still matches today’s tasks. The difference does not lie in the legal framework, which is the same for both, but in the mindset of those responsible. This mindset rarely develops on its own. It requires senior managers who make early examples of successful change visible and thereby demonstrate that room for manoeuvre genuinely exists.

Three Levels That Together Give a Complete Picture

For this mindset to become more than a statement of intent, a systematic analysis is needed. Three levels provide a complete picture: what structures already exist, what potential could be developed, and what resources are actually being worked with. These three questions sound simple, yet in practice they are rarely kept consistently apart. Stocktaking and wishful thinking often blend together, so that in the end neither the as-is situation is clearly described nor the development potential realistically assessed.

A clean separation pays off. Anyone who first records the existing structures soberly can then search specifically for potential without losing themselves in wishes. And anyone who realistically assesses the resources actually available avoids plans that fail during implementation because the necessary staff or budget was never accounted for. This last point in particular is often overlooked in practice. A concept may be convincing in content yet fail because the capacity needed for implementation was never planned in.

Why Reducing Complexity Is No Contradiction to Thoroughness

A common misunderstanding holds that a thorough analysis automatically means an elaborate one. The opposite is true. Overly detailed surveys overwhelm the resources available to an administration and often mean that projects get stuck at the data-collection stage. Overly superficial analyses, in turn, lead to superficial solutions that miss the actual problem. The practical path lies in between: an analysis that focuses on the essentials while still delivering robust findings.

This also means basing decisions on evidence rather than assumptions. Anyone who justifies change with robust data generally finds more support than proposals resting on gut feeling alone. Involving staff is just as important. Solutions developed without input from those affected meet resistance even when they are substantively right. Participation is therefore not a concession to staff but a precondition for workable results. A standardised analysis matrix helps bring these different perspectives together and document the findings so that they remain comprehensible to everyone involved.

From Analysis to Implementation

A good analysis remains ineffective if it is not translated into concrete implementation steps. This requires three levels of design that link different time horizons: strategic decisions with long-term impact, structural adjustments with a medium-term horizon, and operational measures that can be implemented in the short term. An administration that only acts at the operational level fine-tunes details without questioning the underlying structures. An administration that only plans strategically, without defining operational steps, produces concepts that end up in a drawer.

Only the interplay of all three levels makes modernisation effective. Strategic goals set the direction, structural adjustments create the organisational preconditions, and operational measures ensure that staff actually notice the change in their day-to-day work. If one of these levels is missing, the result stays incomplete, even if the remaining steps were carefully worked out.

This linking of the levels is the real core of methodical administrative modernisation, as I set out in my book Verwaltungsmodernisierung mit Methode. It leads from the conceptual foundation through analytical structuring to practical tools and finally to strategic implementation planning. Anyone who follows this path consistently finds that the room for manoeuvre is greater than the initial assessment of “that won’t work here” would suggest.

What Senior Managers Can Take Away

The first step towards greater capacity for change is rarely a new structure or a new tool. It is a shift in perspective: seeing one’s own organisation as a system that can be shaped rather than a fixed entity. Only then do structures, potential and resources become levers that can actually be moved. Public authorities that take this step usually discover more room for manoeuvre than they expected. The path there is rarely straightforward, but it begins with the willingness to look closely at one’s own organisation instead of accepting it as unchangeable.