Deepening the Public Service Organizational Culture in Human Resource Procurement in Nigeria: Politics-Administration Dichotomy Revisited

Abstract

In the words of a leadership expert, John D. Callos (CEO & Board Advisor, Executive Performance and Accountability Coach), “if you hire well, the benefits are multiplied and seem nearly endless.  If you hire poorly, the problems are multiplied and seem endless” An attempt was made in this paper to examine the Public Service organizational culture vis-à-vis human resource procurement in Nigeria, revisiting Woodrow Wilson’s Politics Administration Dichotomy Model of analysis. Some research questions were raised on the Public service organizational culture in HR procurement in Nigeria. The paper exclusively depended on secondary sources of data collection such as textbooks, scholarly journal articles, internet materials, and relevant government publications, establishment circulars and reports.  The paper majorly discovered that the roles of politics and public administration with respect to HR procurement in the Nigerian Public Service cannot be separated in water-tight compartments.  It concluded with some policy recommendations that the process of HR procurement in the Nigerian Public Service which is currently bedeviled with undue interference from the political office holders and other myriad of systemic problems should be evolutionary and pragmatic in nature to meet the yearnings and aspiration of the citizenry in particular and the developmental needs of Nigeria in general.

Keywords: Public service, organizational culture, human resource, procurement, politics, administration