United Nations Public Service Awards Case Studies

The administrative reform introduced by the Thai government in the 1990s focused on the efforts in loosening the tight legal and political authority over the bureaucratic establishment to create room for a new public management policy under the modernization strategy which centers around decentralization, structural reform, and the use of managerial tools of the business world of marketing and efficiency/consumer-oriented measures. This resulted in bureaucratic reform that introduced and stressed the importance of performance-based management. The whole system, then, shifted from an authoritative mindset to a service mindset with the creation of performance targets subject to service agreements.
This new paradigm of the bureaucratic system has assisted in the Treasury Department’s (TD) continuous efforts in providing efficient service to the public. TD is an agency under the Ministry of Finance responsible for minting and monetary management, state property management, property valuation, and national treasure conservation and exhibition. TD’s management philosophy encompasses the “3PI” concept of Proactive/Innovation, Participation/Integration, and Public Relations/Information Technology which reflects TD’s commitment to achieving the highest degree of management efficiency in order to optimize the sustainability of the economy for the maximum benefit of the state and the people. Thus, the Improvement of the State Property Management Process (ISPMP) is a key project that illustrates TD’s commitment in providing efficient services to the public.

What is the initiative about? (the solution)
TD oversees the management of state property in Bangkok and the 75 provinces throughout Thailand which includes the allocation of state property for government use and the lease of state property not utilized by the government. Thus, TD has 75 provincial treasury offices and the Bangkok State Property Management Bureau (BSPMB) to manage about 80,000 leases throughout the country whereby the majority are residential land leases and commercial building leases (shophouses) to middle and lower income range tenants who could not afford to purchase their own home. The TD’s Improvement of the State Property Management Process (ISPMP) initiative was introduced at the BSPMB which manages over 6,000 leases in Bangkok. ISPMP is a 5-year project that commenced in 2004 with the aim of cutting down the work process by 50% and a target of a one-stop service and a paperless transaction at the completion of the project. For the past 3 years, the BSPMB has been successful in providing a more efficient and speedier service to our tenants. For example, the approval for the transfer of the right to lease land or buildings usually takes 16 days to process but under the ISPMP initiative the transfer could be approved within only 8 days. Consequently, improvements have been made in the same manner to a total of 39 work processes related to state property management within the past 3 years. In addition, a survey of the tenant’s satisfaction about the work process concerning the approval of the transfer of the right to lease land or buildings showed a 88.47% level of satisfaction which proves that TD is moving in the right direction towards becoming a professional in providing quality services to the public. Factors that has contributed to the success of the ISPMP initiative have been the installation of the state property management computer system, the training of staffs not only about the use of the system but also about the concept of providing services to the public (customer-minded and service-oriented), the monitoring of the project, and the evaluation of the project by conducting surveys. TD believes that this project is an on-going process in the development of the organization as a whole but also specifically in state property management which will transform the ‘old’ bureaucratic system into a ‘new’ fast, efficient, and paperless bureaucratic system with the aim of delivering effective and efficient services to the public.

Who proposed the solution, who implemented it and who were the stakeholders?
2004 pilot project in Bangkok 12 work processes 2005 continued 12 work processes 2006 continued 15 work processes 2007 extend to Bangkok Metropolitan Area 2008 extend to other provinces

Describe how and when the initiative was implemented by answering these questions
a. What were the strategies used to implement the initiative? In no more than 500 words, provide a summary of the main objectives and strategies of the initiative, how they were established and by whom.
The TD oversees the management of state property utilized by the government and leased to the public. The lease of state property to the public involves various procedures starting from minor requests such as the transfer of the right to lease both land and buildings, the request for building improvements, the request for the removal and the building of houses on state property to the request for state property development which has to pass through the process of a bid and tender. In the past, TD had set up a timeframe for the various procedures but due to the lack of staffs and office automation, the process took quite some time. But with the recent improvements in the TD's organizational structure and work processes with the addition of computers, TD has been able to shorten the time in processing requests from the public. This has led to the initiation of the improvement of the work process project and has been successful due to our management's emphasis on providing quality service to the public.

b. What were the key development and implementation steps and the chronology? No more than 500 words
The priorities and purposes of this project is to primarily simplify and cut down the current work processes which TD believes that if this priority is met, it will lead to customer satisfaction from receiving fast and efficient service. With a simplified work procedure, staffs would be able to service more requests. This project involved the development of a computer program to process the various requests which not only speeds up the processing time but the program enables the TD to develop a historical database of our leased state property and our tenants.

c. What were the main obstacles encountered? How were they overcome? No more than 500 words
The TD's strategies involved the installation of a computer network to support the project, the training of staffs not only in the area of computer use but also to instill the concept of developing "customer satisfaction" (an important concept lacking in Thailand's government agencies), setting realistic targets and conducting surveys to evaluate our staffs' performances. All these strategies have been aided by TD's recent organizational restructure which resulted in the careful selection of young and energetic staffs in working with the public and equipping them with the needed office automation and computer network in providing quality service to the public.

d. What resources were used for the initiative and what were its key benefits? In no more than 500 words, specify what were the financial, technical and human resources’ costs associated with this initiative. Describe how resources were mobilized
The Improvement of the State Property Management Process Project has enabled the TD to provide efficient and speedy service to the public which resulted in lower transaction costs and the ultimate goal of increasing customer satisfaction. In turn, customer satisfaction has become a catalyst to increased competition among our staffs in working harder and faster which has boosted the morale of our staffs in general.

Is the initiative sustainable and transferable?
This project was initiated as a pilot project specifically for state property management in the city of Bangkok and has become an on-going project to be replicated in the Bangkok Metropolitan Area and extended to the provinces. This project in Bangkok has become a key performance indictor for TD and has proven to be very successful due to our performance evaluation of almost 90% customer satisfaction, very rare among government agencies.

What are the impact of your initiative and the lessons learned?
The most difficult obstacle in the implementation of this project was changing the mindset or culture of the organization and staffs, followed by the development of a sustainable system that would not only maintain the current efficient work process but also improve the current process. Not only was the software a problem (the human resources and the organizational structure) but also the hardware involving the incompatibility of the MIS and GIS data used in the computer system. All these difficulties were overcame with time but one lesson learned is that planning has to include both software and hardware because in the past, TD, like most government agencies gave much importance and emphasis on hardware problems such as insufficient computers, lack of suitable software or system or network but hardly focused on the improvement of its software or its people. This project reflects TD's new image in become a "3PI" agency - proactive/innovative, participatory/integration and public relations/information technology.


Institution Name:		Treasury Department
Institution Type:		Government Agency
Contact Person:		Wisudhi Srisupha
Title:		Director-General
Telephone/ Fax:		662-618-3102
Institution's / Project's Website:		662-273-0904
E-mail:		wisudhisri@treasury.go.th
Address:		Rama 6 Rd., Samsennai, Phayathai
Postal Code:		10400
City:		Bangkok
State/Province:		Bangkok
Country:		Thailand

The Problem

Solution and Key Benefits

Actors and Stakeholders

(a) Strategies

(b) Implementation

(c) Overcoming Obstacles

(d) Use of Resources

Sustainability and Transferability

Lessons Learned

Contact Information