Managing Under Austerity: Delivering under Pressure Performance and Productivity in Public Service

This volume had its genesis in an Australia and New Zealand School of Government (ANZSOG) conference titled Delivering under Pressure. And that is certainly what many public sector managers feel they are doing these days. In a short space of time, many have gone from one extreme to another: from having to expend vast sums quickly on infrastructural and other programs to stem contagion from the Global Financial Crisisand, in Australia, devising large-scale social expenditure programs leveraged by the Mining Boomto having to do their bit to reduce resulting deficits and debt. In Australia at least, this ongoing challenge appears to have been made harder politically by public attitudes and expectations conditioned by the earlier largesse.