Best Practices for Motivation and their Implementation in the Greek Public Sector for Increasing Efficiency

The contemporary socio-economic conditions and the constantly increasing requirements for higher growth rates, shape the eternal need for improvement of the administrative function of the public sector. The current problem of the Greek public administration, questions the productivity of human resources. This problem tends to distend excessively in today’s “memorandum era†, because of the unexpected pay cuts, the stagnation of the grade promotions and the all in all work disappointment caused by the economic crises. An extremely useful management answer to this problem is given by the science of organizational behavior, through the theory of the instigation of the personnel. However, in the case of the Greek public administration, this theory loses part of its capacity, since it cannot provide financial incentives (because of its existing budgetary restrictions). Consequently, this analysis is focused on the improvement of productivity in human recourses based on non-financial incentives, which do not affect directly the public economy. The main mission of this study is to investigate the instigation methods adapted by the Greek public administration, for the improvement of the public sector’s performance. The methodological practice that will be used for the documentation of the above case, is the comparative benchmarking between public and private sector, following the already used instigation model suggested by the business management. During the study, the optimal motivation practices used by the private sector will be found, analyzed and then applied to the public sector. The main aim of this study is to increase the efficiency of the public sector, supplying it with useful modern business tools for the general functional improvement of the public administration.