Underground Merit Systems and the Balance Between Service and Compliance

Abstract

Current advocates of "reinvented" government call for more responsiveness to the needs of customers. This is true for internal as well as external customers, including government agencies seeking services from central personnel offices. Most states have adopted merit systems as a way to ensure open and competitive hiring for governmental service. The numerous rules and regulations that accompany these merit systems make the process of hiring qualified individuals slow and cumbersome and do not always ensure that the most qualified individuals are hired. This study of the state personnel system in Idaho reflects many of the problems that have been discussed by scholars and practitioners alike since the inception of the merit system. Agency officials are resolving these problems in an effort to be responsive to their customers by finding ways to circumvent many merit system rules in what has been referred to as an "underground" merit system.