عنوان

Interagency communication:

TLpq304049640

انگلیسی

Interagency communication:

[Thesis]

D. Ngidang

A case study of organizational interdependence in Sarawak, East Malaysia

J. Fett

The University of Wisconsin - Madison

1993

198

Ph.D.

The University of Wisconsin - Madison

1993

This study investigates factors affecting interagency communication in an integrated rural development project (Kalaka-Saribas IADP) in Sarawak, East Malaysia. Twelve government agencies involved in the project were included. Each of the 12 agencies was combined with every other agency to form 66 organizational dyads. The three dependent variables were frequency, perceived importance and reciprocity of communications between agencies forming the dyads. Three groups of independent variables were investigated. These were: (1) government mandate for agency collaboration in the project; (2) forms of interdependence (joint programs, need for resource exchange, and need for information sharing); and (3) the basis of needs for coordination (resource scarcity, complementary goals and leadership influence). The most striking finding was the very low level of communication among agencies despite the fact that this was a usd84 million integrated development project. Half of the organizational dyads exchanged information five times or less during the previous year via letters, reports, phone calls and meetings. Meetings were the most used form of communication. The mean for perceived importance of communication with other agencies fell between "moderately important" and "very important." The high point on the five-point scale was "extremely important." Respondents' attitudes about the importance of communication were not backed up by the behavior of their organizations. All hypotheses, linking each of the independent variables were confirmed at p <.01. Correlations of the seven independent variables with frequency of communication were all above.75. The correlations with perceived importance of communication were all above.72. Correlations with reciprocity of communication ranged from.35 to.53. A step-wise regression showed that the need for resource exchange was the best predictor of frequency of communication, accounting for 78 percent of the variance. Mandate explained an additional 6 percent and joint programs 3 percent. Mandate explained 80 percent of the variance for perceived importance of communication. Resource exchange added 6 percent and complementary goals added 1 percent. For reciprocity, mandate accounted for 29 percent of the variance. No other variable made a significant contribution to explained variance. Caution needs to be taken in interpreting results of the regression analysis because of the high multicollinearity among independent variables.

Communication and the arts

Mass media

Public administration

rural development

Social sciences

D. Ngidang

J. Fett

p

[Thesis]

276903

a

Y