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Managers’ Productivity and Recruitment in the Public Sector: The Case of School Principals

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  • Prem, Mounu
  • Munoz, Pablo

Abstract

Governments face many constraints in attracting talented managers to the public sector, where high-powered incentives are often absent. In this paper, we study how a civil service reform in Chile changed the effectiveness of a vital group of public sector managers, school principals. We measure principals’ e˙ectiveness using an extension of the canonical teacher value-added model and we evaluate the effect of the reform using a dfference-in-differences approach. We find that public schools appoint more effective managers after increasing the competitiveness and transparency of their se-lection process. Our result shows that better recruitment policies can enhance service provision in the public sector, despite rigid wage schemes.

Suggested Citation

  • Prem, Mounu & Munoz, Pablo, 2022. "Managers’ Productivity and Recruitment in the Public Sector: The Case of School Principals," TSE Working Papers 22-1303, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE).
    • Handle: RePEc:tse:wpaper:126615
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    Cited by:

    1. Bazzi,Samuel & Hilmy,Masyhur & Marx,Benjamin & Mahvish Ifrah Shaukat & Stegmann,Andreas, 2024. "It Takes a Village Election : Turnover and Performance in Local Bureaucracies," Policy Research Working Paper Series 10920, The World Bank.
    2. Bruna Borges & Gabriel Leite & Ricardo Madeira & Luis Meloni, 2024. "Evaluating the impact of a principals' professional development program on school management practices: Evidence from Brazil," Working Papers, Department of Economics 2024_03, University of São Paulo (FEA-USP).
    3. Emma Duchini & Victor Lavy & Stephen Machin & Shqiponja Telhaj, 2025. "Personnel policy in public sector organizations: evidence from England's academy schools," CEP Discussion Papers dp2129, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.

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    JEL classification:

    • I25 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - Education and Economic Development
    • L24 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Contracting Out; Joint Ventures

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