Title: Ideas Generation and Innovation in Bureaucracies: Evidence from a Field Experiment and Qualitative Data

 joint with Margherita Fornasari [World Bank], Daniel Rogger [World Bank] and Martin J.Williams [Michigan]

 Abstract - We study the process of sparking innovation through ideas generation in bureaucracies, combining qualitative and quantitative evidence on workplace cultures, workplace climates, ideas generation and sharing, and bureaucratic performance. We study these issues at-scale, working with bureaucrats in all ministries served by the Ghanaian Civil Service. Our qualitative evidence suggests these organizations have strong hierarchical cultures, where juniors feel unable to raise ideas, they are not listened to when they do, or even fear being sanctioned for doing so. Our quantitative evidence comes from a field experiment training bureaucrats how to break down problems into simple solutions and raise these new ideas with colleagues. We implemented training at the individual level, and at the division-level to bureaucrats working together day-to-day. Our key finding is that individual level trainings were more effective in shifting workplace climates towards being open to new ideas, measured 6-18 months post-training. This led individuals to be more likely to raise and discuss new ideas, ultimately improving administrative processes and public service delivery. Division-level training was less effective because action plans drawn up by divisions after training failed to integrate in key aims of the intervention in terms of the nature of innovations proposed and collective steps to implementation. Rather, division-level plans reflected pre-existing workplace cultures that unrealistically aim for resource intensive systems-wide change, rather than bottom-up incremental innovation.