FRED THOMPSON
Grace and Elmer Goudy Professor of Public Management and Policy Analysis
Director, Center for Governance and Public Policy Research
B.A., Pomona College
Ph.D., Claremont Graduate School

EML:  fthompso@willamette.edu
Homepage: www.willamette.edu/~fthompso
Public Policy Center Page: www.willamette.edu/centers/publicpolicy

How can business be more successful in the competitive world economy? By being more productive - by finding better ways to provide value to customers, by adopting technologies that create products of better quality at lower cost, by removing unnecessary costs and burdens, and by implementing marketing efforts that sell goods and services in a competitive fashion.

Government can also do many things to increase productivity. But sometimes the most important thing it can do is nothing, to allow industries and firms that can't make it to disappear.

The world in which we live increasingly requires mutual understanding of business and government. Government officials must understand what makes business tick. And business leaders must appreciate the functioning of government. The Atkinson School is committed to this mutual understanding.

We believe in “know how.” We have tried to make dramatic changes in the way we deliver instruction, sequencing courses around multi-disciplinary projects and experiential learning. We also try to practice high-commitment human-resource management techniques:

1. Careful recruitment of faculty and students based upon the right attitudes, values, and cultural fit.
2. Reliance on self-managed multidisciplinary instructional teams, made up of students as well as faculty, and decentralization of decision-making as basic principals of organizational practice.
3.Comparatively high grades contingent upon team and school performance.
4. Extensive, shared training involving everyone in the community (the IKEWS for example).
5. Extensive sharing of performance and financial information throughout the community.
6. Reduced status distinctions throughout the community.

Professor Thompson draws inspiration from his faculty colleagues and students - making every day at the Atkinson School worthwhile. On a personal note, he enjoys the Cascade Mountains in Oregon and reading.

Economics of Organization, Budget Theory, Public Sector Financial Engineering

Recipient of the 2005 Aaron B. Wildavsky Award for Outstanding Lifetime Scholarly Achievement of the Association for Budgeting and Financial Management and the 2000 NASPAA/ASPA Distinguished Research Award. Consultant; United Nations Development Program; Arthur Andersen, LLP; Institute of Chartered Accounting, New Zealand; Consulting and Audit, Canada; Air Force Material Command; Office of Management Improvement and Business Process Reengineering, DOD; Economic Council of Canada, House of Commons (Canada); Defense Secretary's Commission on Base Realignment and Closure; Academic Advisory Board, Cascade Policy Institute Executive Council; Past President, Association for Public Budgeting and Financial Management. Current Editorial Boards: International Journal of Public Administration, Journal of Public Procurement, Municipal Finance Journal, Policy & Society ( Singapore), Public Administration and Management: An Interactive Journal, Public Budgeting & Finance, Public Finance and Management, Public Money and Management ( UK), Founding Editor International Public Management Journal, Associate Editor Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis. Visiting Professor, Interdisciplinary Institute of Management (2007-8), and Fellow, Centre for Risk and Regulation, London School of Economics. Recipient of the 2000 NASPAA/ASPA Distinguished Research Award. Consultant; Arthur Andersen, LLP; Institute of Chartered Accounting, New Zealand; Consulting and Audit, Canada; Air Force Material Command; Office of Management Improvement and Business Process Reengineering, DOD; Economic Council of Canada, House of Commons (Canada); Defense Secretary's Commission on Base Realignment and Closure; Academic Advisory Board, Cascade Policy Institute Executive Council; International Public Management Network, ASPA Section on Theory and Research; Past President, Association for Public Budgeting and Financial Management. Editorial Boards: Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis, International Journal of Organization Theory and Behavior, Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, Municipal Finance Journal, Policy Sciences, Public Budgeting & Finance, Public Administration Review, Public Administration and Management: An Interactive Journal; Founding Editor International Public Management Journal.

Publications:

Digital State at the Leading Edge. University of Toronto Press, 2007 (with lead authors Sandford Borins and Kenneth Kernaghan, and Nick Bontis, David Brown, and Perri 6).

From Bureaucracy to Hyperarchy: Netcentric and Quick Learning Organizations. Information Age Publishing, 2007 (with L.R. Jones).

Public Ethics and Governance. Elsevier JAI, 2006 (edited with Denis Saint Martin). Handbook of Public Finance, Dekker, 1997 (edited with M. Green).

Achieving Dynamic Economic Growth: Report of the Blue Ribbon Commission on the Republic of Macedonia. United Nations Development Program, Bratislava, 2006 (with Josef Brada and Taki Fiti, team leaders, and others).

The Political Economy of Public Administration. Chapter 28 of the Handbook of Public Administration (third edition) edited by Rabin, Hildreth, & Miller. Marcel Dekker, 2007

Case Teaching and Intellectual Performances in Public Management. In Thinking Like A Policy Analyst, edited by Iris Geva-May. Palgrave-Macmillan, 2005 (with Michael Barzelay)

Articles:

"A Better Budget Rule," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management (forthcoming). With Michael Dothan, Willamette University.

"All Aboard? Evidence-Based Management and the Future of Management Scholarship." International Public Management Journal (forthcoming). With Michael Barzelay, LSE.

"Making Public Management a Design Science," Administration & Society (forthcoming). With Michael Barzelay.

"Las Tres Caras de Gestión Pública," Gestión y Política Pública. 17/2 (summer 2008) 487-510. Reprinted online in English as The Three Faces of Public Management, International Public Management Review, 9/1 (2008) 1-17.

"Appraising Commitments and Guarantees with Option Prices," Public Budgeting & Finance, Vol. 27, Issue 4, pp. 99-112, Winter 2007 (with Søren Hansen and Michael Dothan).

"Betting on the Future with a Cloudy Crystal Ball? How Financial Theory Can Improve Revenue Forecasting and Budgets in the States", Public Administration Review, 67/5 (Sep-Oct 2007) 825–836 (with Bruce Gates)

Response to Commentators: "Responsibility Budgeting in the Air Force Materiel Command" Public Administration Review, 66/1 (Jan-Feb 2006) 127-138 (with Michael Barzelay)

"Does Oregon Need a Rainy Day Fund? Like a Fish Needs a Bicycle." State Tax Notes, Vol. 36, No. 2, (April 11, 2005) 48-56 (with Bruce Gates, Jessica Brown, and Jason Page); Vox Populi: Tax and Expenditure Limitation Initiatives in Oregon. Public Budgeting & Finance, 24/4 (Winter 2004) 73-88 (with Mark Green)

"Organizational Process Models of Budgeting," (with M. Green), Research in Public Administration, 2001.

"Responsibility Budgeting," (with L.R. Jones), International Public Management Journal, 2000.