icegov2012 proceedings

creating different incentives and public recognition has also been
influential to e-government success [21,34,37].
3. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS
This research applied a questionnaire to civil servants from
various ministries and government agencies of the federal and
state governments. The data of participants were collected from
the lists of staff who participated in the official training of the
PbR-SED initiative during 2009 and 2010 and contact information
of high officials at the federal and state governments available
online. 2.048 potential participants were first invited to participate
during the month of June 2011. 566 emails were not valid or
rejected by security measures from their organizations’ email
administrators. Only 1,482 emails were sent back and valid. Only
221 questionnaires were completed with a response rate of 14.9%
in general. This rate is considered normal for research via
electronic or online [4]. However, there are sections of the
questionnaire that reported lower rates of response (in particular
the last sections of the questionnaire). The questionnaire was
designed and developed using an electronic tool called
SurveyMonkey. The tool offers a platform that makes the
questionnaire available online for participants. The questionnaire
contains seven sections of questions (see Table 1). The first
section welcomes and provides information about the study. The
second section includes 12 questions of multiple choice about the
general characteristics of the project (it considers an option for
"others" in several questions). The third to the sixth sections, the
questionnaire includes 105 questions using a 7-point Likert scale
(from “totally agree” to “totally disagree” options), asking
“Was… [factor]… influential for PbR-SED success?” or
“Was…[benefit]…derived from the successful adoption of the
PbR-SED?”.
Only 54 questions are reported in this study in blocks of factors (8
for benefits, 12 for contextual, 5 for budgetary, 5 for information
systems, 9 for collaboration, 9 for knowledge, and 6 for trust).
The last section of the questionnaire contains 8 questions about
demographic aspects of respondents (see Table 1 for each
dimension and type of factor). The results are presented in
percents of two modalities of response: agreement and
disagreement. The percent of respondents “agree” coded the
opinions under the categories of "somehow agree", "agree" and
"totally agree". The percent of respondents “disagree” coded the
opinions under the categories from “neutral” to “totally disagree”.
The average, standard deviation, and level of agreement of each of
the 54 questions are reported.
The questionnaire registered the opinion of public officials at
different levels of responsibility in the areas of budget,
management programs, information systems, and other areas. On
average, respondents reported 16.4 years of job experience in
government and 6.5 years of experience in actual position. The
most common levels of education were undergraduate and
graduate level mainly in the fields of accounting, economics,
management, information systems, law and various engineering
fields. The average age of respondents was 45 (with a minimum
of 25 years and a maximum of 69 years). Gender of respondents
was reported as 33.6% women and 66.4% men.
Questions
Table 1. Factors and Questions
338
Benefits
1. Increase efficiency
2. Cost reduction
3. Improve public services
4. Strengthen accountability
5. Increase communication based on performance information
6. Improve collaboration between different staffs
7. Improve collaboration between your organization and others
8. Increase knowledge sharing
Contextual Factors
1. Influence of present economic situation [Economic]
2. New law, crisis or elections [Social]
3. Social demand [Political]
4. Support of top officials in your organization [Political]
5. Support of congress people [Political]
6. Budgetary norms and regulations [Institutional]
7. Public investment norms and regulations [Institutional]
8. Civil service norms and regulations [Institutional]
9. Strategic planning in your organization [Organizational]
10. Standards for processes and tasks in your organization [Organizational]
11. Level of decentralization of decision making in your organization [Organizational]
12. Size and number of jurisdictions in your organization [Organizational]
Budget Factors
1. Budgetary methodology for performance information
2. Top-bottom strategy of implementation from the ministry of finance
3. Strategy of implementation from the ministry of finance
4. Flow for enter, revise, and authorize performance information in the budgetary process
5. Official calendar of activities in the budgetary process
Information Systems Factors
1. Development and use of proprietary systems in your organization
2. Previous experience developing information systems and data bases in your organization
3. Official information system of the ministry of finance
4. Definition of roles and accesses in the official information system
5. Sharing data bases, catalogues, and tables with others
Collaboration Factors
1. Use of memos, internal norms and manuals to set rules in the initiative [Authority]
2. Official designation of a responsible of the initiative in the organization [Authority]
3. Use of official memos, internal norms and manuals to support the leader or team members
responsible of the initiative [Leadership]
4. Leadership of the person in charge or team members responsible of the initiative
[Leadership]
5. Designation of a multi-disciplinary team in the organization as responsible of the initiative
[Governance]
6. Meetings and its documents such as minutes, plans and other material [Governance]
7. Staff assigned in the initiative [Resources]
8. Technical infrastructure assigned in the initiative [Resources]
9. Resources for training [Resources]
Knowledge Factors
1. Professional background [Professional Experience]
2. Job experience [Professional Experience]
3. Management operation experience [Professional Experience]
4. Previous reform experience [Professional Experience]
5. Knowledge sharing with members from different areas [Teamwork]
6. Previous experience working with members from different areas [Teamwork]
7. Budget management experience [Budgetary Knowledge]
8. IS and technology use and experience [IS Knowledge]
9. Official training [Training]
Trust Factors
1. Level of budgetary knowledge created confidence to work in the initiative [Confidence
based on budgetary knowledge]
2. Level of IS and technology created confidence to work in the initiative [Confidence based
on IS knowledge]
3. My role and responsibility in the initiative were clear [Clear roles and responsibilities]
4. The role and responsibilities of other organizations and participants were clear to me [Clear
roles and responsibilities]
5. Attractive incentives to participate in the initiative [Motivation]
6. My effort collaborating in the initiative was publicly recognized [Motivation]
* Note: A 7-points Likert scale was used from “totally agree” to “totally disagree”.
4. ANALYSIS OF RESULTS
4.1 General Characteristics
This section of the survey includes the opinion of respondents
about the following features of the PbR-SED initiative: goals, type
of staffs collaborating, organizations involved, roles and
responsibilities, schemes of governance, and type of resources
assigned to the initiative.