Implementation of policy initiatives to foster public sector innovation in Malaysia: the need for measurement

Abstract

The emergence of public sector innovation in the last two decades has been an important aspect of the solution for pressing global economic and social problems. There is rapidly growing interest for measuring innovation in the public sector as part of the goal to improve its overall performance. In the context of Malaysia, the public sector has been dedicated to fostering innovation through the implementation of various policy initiatives. Despite this dedication, there remains a lack of measurement strategies for public sector innovation performance. The existing performance measurement strategy mostly focuses on efficiency and object centric, while the current focus of performance measurement in leading governments such as the United Kingdom, European Union and Australia is shifting towards measuring the effectiveness and capability of public innovation to deliver expected public values. This situation established a critical need for a holistic approach in measuring Malaysian public sector innovation performance, through the implementation of subject-based innovation performance measurement. The existence of such a measurement will be able to provide indicator of achievement, as well as valuable insights to support policy formulation processes, debates and the evaluation of existing policy initiatives.