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Featured Public Sector, Management Article, former chief of staff Leon Panetta interview

November 2008 

Perspectives on change: A former chief of staff reflects

Leon Panetta discusses how to make change happen, public–private partnerships and their effect on policy, and the major management challenges confronting the new administration.

Recent Thinking

The Archive

2008

2007

2006

2005

2004

  • December 2004 

    Spurring performance in China's state-owned enterprises

    The government must give a performance-based system space to take hold.

  • November 2004 

    Boosting government productivity

    To pay for the care of the elderly, developed societies face plummeting levels of public services for everyone else—and soaring taxes. Productivity could be the answer.

  • November 2004 

    Organizing for effectiveness in the public sector

    Traditional public-sector organizations can be redesigned to perform more successfully—even when market forces are lacking.

  • August 2004 

    A streetcar named productivity

    Bus and train systems habitually run at a loss. But public-transit agencies could lower costs and raise the quality of service by emulating best practices from around the world.

  • August 2004 

    Battling AIDS in India

    The head of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s Indian initiative on AIDS explains the importance of creating a vast network of public-private partnerships to tackle the problem.

  • May 2004 

    Building on China's construction boom

    Foreign companies must carefully choose the projects they undertake in China if they hope to make reasonable returns.

2003

2002

2001

  • December 2001 

    Mobilizing South Korea's women

    If South Korea is to become one of the world’s most economically advanced nations, educated women will have to play a larger role in its workforce. The first step is getting the government to take childcare more seriously.

  • December 2001 

    Vaccines where they're needed

    Governments and international organizations could reduce the financial risks borne by the developers and marketers of vaccines—and thereby make them cheaper and more plentiful.

  • July 2001 

    Art for more than art's sake

    Public funding for the arts leads to more than just a vague cultural improvement; it yields concrete—and enormous—economic benefits.

  • July 2001 

    Making welfare work

    A customer-focused reorganization of the Illinois Department of Human Services provides lessons for other public-sector and nonprofit agencies about how to improve efficiency and service.

  • June 2001 

    Putting citizens on-line, not in line

    Electronic government can provide faster, more convenient, and more accurate services that will improve the lives of the people.

  • February 2001 

    Agencies of change

    Many Europeans think that employment agencies help businesses circumvent strict employment protection laws and cannibalize permanent jobs. But a McKinsey survey found otherwise.

  • February 2001 

    Better arms for fewer soldiers

    Europe should spend less of its limited defense budget on recruiting and training troops and more on equipping them for modern warfare.

  • February 2001 

    Catching the bus

    Bogota is reforming its transportation system. All aboard!

2000

  • June 2000 

    Rethinking Dutch healthcare

    McKinsey’s Amsterdam office teamed up with health care experts to find a way of preserving the quality of Holland’s health care system while easing the great strains it faces.

1999

  • November 1999 

    A strategy for European defense consolidation

    The European record on joint defense procurement is weak, yet the arguments in favor of more collaboration are strong. The solution: projects should be led by industry, not by government.

1997

1996

  • August 1996 

    The future role of postal operators

    The cozy monopolies that postal operators have so long enjoyed are gradually being prised apart by deregulation, while new forms of communication are starting to erode traditional markets.

1995

  • November 1995 

    US public housing: Big room for improvement

    $400 million could be saved per year. Charleston, Richmond, and Omaha have shown how. Rather than regulate, the federal government could share best practice.

1994