Leadership in e-Government in light of the energy efficiency and Corporate Social Responsibility

Selena Pjeivac, MSc. and Aleksandar Markovi, PhD

Abstract The leadership in e-Government is perceived in this paper as a form of the excellence, enhancing personal and organizational impact on the energy efficiency and CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) Agenda. Leaders are not politicians nor decision makers. Anonymous civil servants should become leaders if they have the vision and behave in responsible way toward citizens, business and environment. Implementation of the high impact key services available to citizens may boost the e-participation in such an important global issue as energy efficiency is. In order to achieve outstanding energy saving results e-Citizenss initiatives become an extensive support for systematic Governments and civil servants efforts to make progress. The authors of this paper believe that there is a correlation between the information availability of current eGovernments services to the citizen and the CSR potential of energy saving initiatives.

Key words: Leadership in e-Government, e-Governance, e-Citizen, civil servants, energy efficiency, corporate social responsibility

The leadership in e-Government

It is enhancing that countries with higher level of e-Government services communicate better with their citizen. They understand the importance of the full online sophistication, interoperability and availability of specific information, including those related to energy management and energy efficiency1. The two ways interaction and personalization level of proactive services becomes a goal of the e-Government new concept of information dissemination on the Worldwide Web. In the book by Grnlund, A. (2002:1) e-Government generally refers certainly to more use of IT, but more importantly to attempts to achieve more strategic use of IT in the public sector. On the other hand, history shows emerging uses rather than strategy-based ones. It can be easily identified that the strategy based uses of IT in e-Government applications are based on the community networking and the current efforts to integrate those with government 2 agendas, locally and internationally. (Grnlund, A., 2000:2). According to Lynch, T. and Lynch, C. (2002:471) intervention theory, to improve ethics in public organizations, leadership is critical because it sets the climate within our public organizations. If this intervention theory is successful, then improving and achieving successful leadership is important for e-Government. Leaders have the vision and they behave in responsible way toward both citizens and environment. Vriendt, D. (2008) suggests that the growing importance has being accorded at the highest political level to e-Government and to the provision of integrated e-Services to the citizens and businesses. One of the messages that came through clearly is the great commitment and innovative thinking on this issue. The innovative approach to the e-Government would be in using ICT to increase government accountability and transparency, reduce corruption, increase citizen participation, improve financial management and delivery of public services, and inform policy dialogue. Vriendt, D. (2008) thinks that there is some difference between eGovernment and e-Governance. E-Governance means using ICT strategically to strengthen democratic governance and to deliver customer-focused government services.(Ibid.) E-Government and interoperability, which are increasingly important in the European Commissions own thinking, have been accorded a significant place in the Commissions new Single Market Strategy for the 21st Century. Both former and new
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All awareness initiatives and measures suggested to industry and the public to save energy.

The term government covers several aspects of managing a country, ranging from the very form of government, over strategic management to daily operations. Definitions of
eGovernment generally also cover all these areas, and mostbut not all . It also contains a better quality of services and increased and better quality of citizen participation in democratic processes.

strategy highlight the importance of the development and use of new electronic technologies to facilitate cooperation between administrations and between the administrations and the public. In fact, Business in society is the strategic model suggested by Caroll, A. (1999). According to Carolls innovative approach, Strategic management refers to the overall management process that focuses on positioning a firm relative to its environment. A basic way in which the firm relates to its environment is through the products and services it produces and the markets it chooses to address. Strategic management is also thought of as a kind of overall organizational management by the firms top-level executives. In this sense, it represents the overall executive leadership function in which the sense of direction of the organization is decided on and implemented. (Caroll, A. 1999:589). Shoop, T. (1994) argued that Leaders normally seek to protect and enlarge their operations. Leaders and subordinates define work as public service to "customers." Organizational communication flows only one level down and one level up. Communication flows within and outside the organization in every direction. (Shoop, T. 1994:24). According to the intervention theory (Lynch, T. and Lynch,C., 2002:472) the older command and control approach meant that organizational designers reasonably divided job tasks into clear and specific job descriptions: They would cluster jobs into units where management could monitor employee performance, including ethical conduct [] Today, knowledge and knowledge workers are more difficult to divide up, categorize, and pigeonhole. Knowledge is a matter of interactions among individuals and data. Web-like organizations require lower-level employees to be more self- or innerdirected, including being more ethical than is necessary in the old-fashioned command and control organizations. Pfeffer, D. (1994) believes that sources of power develop an effective management strategy. Pfeffers account of an effective manager supports the argument that sources of power outside an organization the community are possible through ally-building. Furthermore, although he considers an individuals position in an organizational structure, he seems to lend support to the consideration of external sources of power in that Pfeffer, D. (1994:76) states, We sometimes overlook the importance of situational factors over which we may have more direct influence...[such as]...one possesses power simply by being in the right place by being in a position of authority, in a place to resolve uncertainty []. It seems that e-Government will allow the transformation of itself into e-Governance in upcoming years. As the result, we may

expect the Public relations in Governmental agencies to be transformed into Corporate Social Responsibility practices.3

e- Citizens Innovative approach to energy efficiency issues

The Web-like structure and the more decentralized approach to organizational relationships have important implications to promotion of energy efficiency issues. The question imposed to Public Relations practitioners in the Public Administration is how to implement CSR online and how to make specific information on energy efficiency relevant and atmost available for citizen. Is these information tangible enough for individuals and for the Government itself? Might we suppose that energy saving tips uploaded to the Serbian Energy Efficiency Web site www.seea.gov.rs could lead to the visitors hits without a unique strategybased e-Government applications support ? How to involve whole community, cities and regions to implement corporate social responsible practices by saving energy ? First, according to Hope, D. (2007), corporate responsibility grew up in industry where issues are tangible and relatively easy to understand: fossil fuels are extracted from the ground, refined and burn; food is grown, processed, transported and eaten; and materials are sourced by factory; assembled into product and sold (Hope, D. 2007:1). In the Pew Internet & American Life Project (2002) on the raise of the e-citizen and the way the people use government agencies Web sites in United States, Larsen, E. (2002), suggests that while government site users are certainly taking advantage of all the services and information made available on government sites, a portion are also very active in using the Internet to monitor public affairs. Close to two-thirds of them (62%) have sought out information on public policy issues via government sites. About one in three (34%) has taken the extra step of contacting an official through a site and one in five (19%) has used the Internet as part of a concerted lobbying campaign. That activity translates into impressive numbers: It means 42 million Americans have used government Web sites to research public policy issues; 23 million Americans have used

Here e-Governance means using ICT strategically to strengthen democratic governance and to deliver customer-focused government services.

the Internet to send comments to public officials about policy choices; and 13 million have participated in online lobbying campaigns.

Table 1. Issues addresses online by the users of government Web sites in United States of America

Hope, D. (2007:22) suggests that with ICT we find ourselves in revolution, not evolution: It has been hard for us to keep up especially governments, which have an increasing difficult time regulating aspects of the ICT industry that have barely been invented but whose impact is immediate. He adds that if the policy makers cant keep with the pace of ICT, then it is the more important the companies do.

Public Access to Information - Right to know everything

In web based community the public participation is a tool for Good Governance (Nagy , M.2006). The Aarhus Convention (UNECE Convention on Public Access to Environmental Information, Public Participation in Decision making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters) contains this innovative approach to sustainability development (Internet 1). The main players are public authorities Government at national, regional and other level; natural or legal persons performing public administrative functions under national law, including specific duties, activities and services in relation to the environment, the public one or more natural persons, in accordance with national legislation or practice, their associations, organisations or groups and finally, the public concerned. In this document the public concerned is the public affected or likely to be affected by, or having an interest in, the environmental

decision-making;

NGOs

promoting

environmental

protection

and

meeting

any

requirements under national law (Internet 1). Web-like organizations are replacing the older pyramid-like hierarchies and newer organizations use web-like structures. In order to take an active part in democratic processes, citizens need various types of Information about possibilities of their own involvement in policy discussion and decision making. (Gross, T. 2000:250).The United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-Making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters was adopted on 25 June 1998 in the Danish city of Aarhus (arhus) at the Fourth Ministerial Conference as part of the "Environment for Europe" process. It entered into force ten years ago, on 30 October 2001(Internet 1)4. Examples of information on the output of current governments are scientific research results, legal documents, surveys, reports and public announcements. Right to knowledge of information enables the citizens to procure information from a public authority. E-Government provide the mechanism for obtaining information. For example, the Serbian Law on Public access to information (2004) enables e-citizens in Serbia to become more proactive in both e-Government and traditional Governments access data. Besides the efforts of the Serbian Public information Commissioner to align the Law implementation with Aarhus convention by making all public authorities aware of the fact that this Law has entered into force in 2004. and must be applicable, practically, its implementation in Serbia is still depending on the willingness of this Public Administration to provide information related to the public interest (Internet 2). The need for raising awareness on energy efficiency issues in such circumstances becomes the need for raising awareness on the corporate social responsibility practices and transfer of e-Government into e-Governance. According to the Triangle Research Institute (RTI) International Group (Internet 3), e-Governance is using information and communication technology (ICT) to increase government accountability and transparency, reduce corruption, increase citizen participation, improve financial management and delivery of public services, and inform policy dialogue. The e-Governance initiatives are designed to (Internet 4):

Strengthen democratic government at all levels by improving the effectiveness, responsiveness, accountability, and transparency of institutions: Build the capacity of civil society to participate in the governing process Support decentralization and democratic local governance

For recent updates and the follow-up process please have a look at the UNECE Convention website.

Help local governments share best practices and improve service delivery Strengthen the advocacy role of municipal associations.

The European Commission has established its own concept of governance in the White Paper on European Governance (2001), in which the term "European governance" refers to the rules, processes and behaviour that affect the way in which powers are exercised at European level, particularly as regards openness, participation, accountability, effectiveness and coherence. These five "principles of good governance" in White Paper was followed by a set of documents, notably an action plan and a report on the European Governance. All subsequent governance-related key documents can also be downloaded. The one-way information flow should be considered as the result of the e-citizens acting by downloading the information from the Website of governmental agency, for example. From the point of view of the information provider, in this case, Serbian Energy Efficiency Agency, the interaction and partnership instead of one way communication is the tool designed for the education and information dissemination online Campaign. Between the administration and community the one-way information flow should be transformed into two ways communication model. There are information on energy efficiency measures and energy audits which the government agency need to be provided by municipal energy management. In view of the fact that these measuring results are not obligatory and still not binding by Law on local government, such information are usually provided from municipalities to the Serbian Energy Efficiency Agency on voluntary basis, as a matter of Citizens Social Responsibility. The goal of Awareness Raising on some specific issues, as energy efficiency is, can not be merely acheived by the Government without e-Government, e-participation of major Stakeholders, personalized external publics and institutionalized citizen. Organisations need to plan their CSR programmes in line with their corporate objectives and this is the best achieved by formulating policy and setting criteria as to what type of projects they will undertake or support. This is a responsibility which should be taken at board level and on the advice of the organisations public relations consultant. (Kitchen, P. 1997) To achieve these desired outcomes, Serbian Energy Efficiency Agency has defined the critical target audiences that need to be influenced via Internet:

Sector

Primary Audience

Secondary Audience

Municipalities

Schools

Medical Centres

Industry

Households

Biomass

President of Municipality Municipal Assembly Members Municipality Energy Managers Coordinator for Street Lighting Coordinator for District Heating Coordinator for Water and Sewage Ministry of environmental protection, mining and spatial planning, RS Ministry of infrastructure and energy, RS Ministry for Local Government School Principals School Teachers School Pupils School Maintenance Staff School Cleaners Municipality Energy Managers Ministry of Education Hospital Directors Medical Staff Patients Hospital Directors Hospital technical and maintenance Staff Ministry of Health Mid-management Operational management Experts Workforce Members of the household Retailers of appliances District heating companies Household Associations Wall and Roof Insulation Companies Banks Elected Municipal officials Senior Municipality Managers Managers of target buildings (schools, medical centres and municipal buildings) Boiler operators in target buildings Farmers, Foresters

Senior Municipality Managers Municipality mid-Managers Other Municipality employees Municipality Service Users Local Media

President of Municipality Municipal Assembly Members

President of Municipality Municipal Assembly Members

Senior management

Electricity suppliers Appliance manufacturers Insulation strip manufacturers Elected Municipal officials

Regional managers in Ministry of Health Regional managers in the Ministry of Education, RS Mid-sized wood companies

Figure 2. Excerpt from the Serbian Energy Efficiency Five Year Strategy and Implementation Plan, Report, April 2006.

In order to determinate the state of energy efficiency in municipalities it is necessary to identify and track the energy efficiency measures by creating an appropriate database which allows calculating values and obtaining relevant indicators. Within the project Establishing a network of energy managers and preparation of municipal energy balances, the Serbian Energy Efficiency Agency has created the methodology for collection of energy data in municipalities and the method of transferring data to relational database. Data are collected by municipal energy managers and prepared into specially designed Excel files, from which data could be automatically extracted and transferred into the database. By using the appropriate SQL transactions, data are structured and standardized by the automation of the business process. Finally, the Web application has been developed. The data analisis and search option might give the opportunity to wider publics to calculate the energy efficiency indicators in the near future and the interactivity between Serbian Energy Efficiency Agency and municipal energy managers will be achieved by Networking. Accotding to the Triangle Research Istitute (RTI) ICT e-governance projects should include (Internet 4):

Delivery of relevant applications and services to civil society and to local and national government institutions Improve public access to information to promote government transparency and fight corruption Provide access to essential information and improve to ;promote government transparency and fight corruption Provide access to essential information and improve processes to encompassing education, culture, policy and regulation, infrastructure, and public facilities Help communicate and promote governmance initiatives by working with community public opinion leaders and national media representatives Share lessons learned and best practices.

CSR a common philosophy of companies and governments

CSR is defined by Pickton, D. and Broderick, A. (2005:720) as a business philosophy that reorganises the social, cultural and environmental consequences of business practices and subsequently demonstrates actions that appear to further social good, beyond the interests of the firm and that which is required by Law. According to Pjeivac, S. (2009:9) it is necessary to analyse not only the level of importance that public bodies place on the information about corporate social responsibility that they put on their corporate websites, but also graphics, the level of interactivity of that information and their interactions with web visitors. Thus, the present conception of CSR/CC/SD5 is based on the stated commitments of an organisation and its relationship with its different kinds of publics in the fulfilment of its economic, social and environmental duties; in the fulfillment of its commitments to information transparency and ethical behaviour; in the management of the company; in the development of its products, services and business; and the evaluation and control of the fulfilment of these commitments (Capriotti, P. & Morreno, A., 2006:85). There are an important link between corporate citizenship is equally important to competitiveness and governance. (Valentino, 2008:17) He concludes that CSR success is based on progress in creating awareness for, solving or at least improving some of worlds large scale problems.[..] Additionally, governments must recognize that there are limits to regulation, and should consider incentives and other means to encourage the private sector, and recognize and reward companies and civil servants that go beyond the legal requirements for better environmental practice. According to Spears, L. (1993:3) the civil servant has several virtues and characteristic for leadeship.
VIRTUE Listening CHARACTERISTIC The servant leader reinforces traditional communication skills with a focus on active listening and reflection on what others have to say in order to identify and clarify the will of the group. Servant leaders try to recognize and accept others for their unique gifts and qualities. They assume the good intentions of others' actions and strive to

Empathy

Corporate Social Responsibility, Corporate Citizenship, Sustainable Development

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Healing

Persuasion

Awareness

Foresight

Conceptualization

Commitment of Growth of Others

understand and empathize with them. Part of the role of the servant leader is to recognize the opportunities to help make the people and organizations they are in contact with whole. A servant leader is a powerful transforming force. The servant leader seeks to convince others rather than use their position of authority to coerce compliance. They are consensus builders. Awareness aids the servant leader in understanding issues involving ethics and values. With a heightened sense of awareness one is better able to approach situations in a more integrated and holistic way. The servant leader consciously works at developing the intuitive mind. The ability to project a likely outcome or consequence from a decision or action enables the servant leader to understand lessons from of the past, the realities of the present and foresee a fuller range of likely events in the future. The servant leader nurtures people's abilities to think in possibilities. They go beyond the day-to-day management realities of what "is" and try to imagine what "could be." To servant leaders, life has value and meaning beyond the tangible contributions that people make as workers. They are deeply committed to the personal, professional, and spiritual growth of everyone within their organization. According to Greenleaf's view of organizations, all members from the top executive to the lowliest member of the office staff play a role in holding the organization "in trust" for the greater good of the society. It is everyone's responsibility to be a good steward. Servant leaders seek to build a sense of community among those within the organization.

Stewardship

Building Community

Figure 3. Characteristics of Servant Leadership

Social and economic strategies and policies, and not just their environmental regulations, should actively encourage digital agenda to be developed to highlight synergies between profit, energy efficiency, environmental protection, civil servants, political decision makers and citizens. The leadership in e-Government is the excellence

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perceived by personal and organizational skills establishing the open and proactive Internet community. E-Government Leaders have the vision as they behave in responsible way toward citizens, business and environment. Thus, e-Government is becoming nowadays a practical tool for e-Governance and communication excellence, leading citizens toward their common CSR roadmap of energy efficiency.

Index of tables: Table 1. Issues addresses online by the users of government Web sites in United States of America Table 2. Excerpt from the Serbian Energy Efficiency Five Year Strategy and Implementation Plan, Report, April 2006.

References: Carroll, A. B. and Buchholtz A.K.(1999) Strategic Management and Corporate Public Policy: Business & Society. Ethycs and Stakeholders management. South-Western Pub, 4th edition, p. 589 Capriotti, P. & Moreno, A. (2006) Corporate citizenship and public relations: The importance and interactivity of social responsibility issues on corporate website, Public relation Review, 33, March, p.85 Caroll, A.B. (1979) A three-Dimensional Conceptual Model of Corporate Performance, Academy of Management Review, 4 (4), pp. 497 -505 Grnlund, A. (2002) Electronic Government: Design, Application and Management. Grnlund, A. at al (2002) (eds) Electronic Government: Design, Application and Management. Idea Group Publishing, p.1 Gross, T. (2002) Electronic Government: Design, Application and Management. In Grnlund, A at al (eds) e-Democreacy and Community Networks: Political Visions, Technology, Opportunities and Social Reality, Idea Group Publishing, p.1 Hope, D. New Complexities, New Dilemmas. Leading Perspectives: Trends and solution publication from business for Social Reposnsibility,Winter 2007.[online].Available from: http://www.bsr.org/reports/leading-perspectives/2007/2007_Winter.pdf [Accessed on 24.02.2008] e-Government Strategy: Implementing the Presidents Management Agenda for eGovernment, Executive Office Of The President Office Of Management And Budget,

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USA, (2002) [online] Available from: http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budintegration/expanding_egov_2005.pdf Accessed on 25.02.2008. Kitchen, P. (1997) Public Relations:Principles and Practice.International Thomson business press,London. Larsen, E. and Rainie,L. (2002) The rise of the e-citizen: How people use government agencies Web sites, Pew Internet & American Life Project (april):8 [online], Research Available from: http://www.pewinternet.org/pdfs/PIP_Govt_Website_Rpt.pdf [Accessed on 29.02.2008] Lynch, Thomas D., Lynch, Cynthia E. (2002) Virtue ethics: A policy recommendation., Public Administration Quarterly, 07349149, Winter 2002, Vol. 25, Issue 4, p 471-472. Ebsco host, Thessaloniki International Library. Database: Business Source Premier [Accessed on 23rd of February 2008]. Pickton, D. and Broderick, A. (2005) Integrated Marketing Communications, Prentice Hall, 2nd edition, Pearson Education Limited, Essex, England Pfeffer, J.( 1994), Managing With Power: Politics and Influence in Organizations. Harvard Business School Press, Boston,Oct1993, p1, 400p Shoop, Tom (1994). Brave New Leadership. Government Executive 26(7) (July):23-30. Spears, L. (1998) in Virtue ethics: A policy recommendation., Public Administration Quarterly, 07349149, Winter 2002, Vol. 25, Issue 4, p. 36 Vriendt, D. (2008) Rolling out ICT. Synergy the IDABC Quarterly, jan 2008, vol 1,p.2 [Online]. European Commission, Directorate-General for Informatics, IDABC Unit Available at: http://ec.europa.eu/idabc/servlets/Doc?id=30266 [Accessed 25.02.2008] Valentino, B. (2008) MBA Toolkit for CSR: CSR and Public Relations, february [online] Available at: www.chinaCSR.com/download-print-magazine.pdf [Accessed 25.02.2008] Internet resources: Internet 1 : UNECE Aarhus Convention (1998) [online] Available at : http://www.unece.org/env/pp/contentAI.htm http://www.unece.org/env/pp/documents/Bosnian_Aarhus_Convention.pdf [Accessed on 2.03.2008] Internet 2: Official Messager of the Republic of Serbia Guide for the Public Access Low , special edition (sept 2005) [online]: Available at http://www.poverenik.org.yu/dokumentacija.asp?ID=2 [Accessed on 29.02.2008] Internet 3: Research Triangle Institute (2007), Electronic governance: e-governance online] Available at: http://www.rti.org/brochures/ICT_E-gov.pdf [Accessed on 25.02.2008]

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Internet 4: Research Triangle Institute (2007) [online] Available at: http://www.rti.org/egovernance [Accessed on 02.03.2008]

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