Publications
Publications
- 2020
- HBS Working Paper Series
The Impact of CEOs in the Public Sector: Evidence from the English NHS
By: Katharina Janke, Carol Propper and Raffaella Sadun
Abstract
Abstract
Governments worldwide have sought to reform the delivery of public services by mimicking private sector governance models that grant CEOs greater autonomy and give them responsibility for meeting key government targets. We examine the effectiveness of this approach in the context of English public hospitals, complex organizations with multi-million turnover. We find little evidence of CEOs’ impact on hospital production, though estimated pay differentials suggest that the CEOs are perceived to be differentiated by the market. These findings are not driven by endogenous sorting of CEOs. The results question the effectiveness of top-down managerial approaches to improve public sector performance.
Keywords
Citation
Janke, Katharina, Carol Propper, and Raffaella Sadun. "The Impact of CEOs in the Public Sector: Evidence from the English NHS." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 18-075, March 2018. (Revised September 2020.)