Project Director Larissa Bezo, Deputy Project Manager Oksana Kikot’ and Project Expert
Ivanna Ibragimova took part in the 19^th Annual NISPAcee Conference (Network of Iinstitutes and Schools of Public Administration in Central and Eastern Europe). Due to the support of the HRM-Project, some representatives of the Main Department for Civil Service of Ukraine also had the possibility to attend the conference. Namely, the list of participants included Sergiy Bondarenko, Head of the organizational and analytical provision of the HR Department (Press Secretary) and Maxim Subota, Chief specialist of policy coordination and monitoring activities in the regions of the Department of Civil Service Modernization.

The conference, entitled “Governance of the Future”, was held in Bulgaria (Varna) on the basis of the Free University of Varna “Chernorizets Hrabar”. Experience sharing of scientists, teachers, practitioners, experts in public administration was the most important part of the conference. Seven main working groups (dedicated to local management, electronic government, civil service, public administration reform, public sector funding, research network development on public administration and policy analysis) still continue their activities at the conference. One of the key topics of the opening panel session of the conference was the role of communication in development and implementation of policies (report of Laszlo Vassa, Hungary). Particularly interesting was the session devoted to the discussion of mdern trends in public administration in the U.S. and, accordingly, the lessons for Europe.

The topic of leadership was discussed at several sessions. In particular, at the meeting of the Working Group on Public Administration (research of Iwona Sobis, Sweden, and Michael De Vries, the Netherlands) the main stress was on the role of team-minded employees, working together to achieve a common goal (followership). Leadership was the main topic on one of the meetings of the Working Group on Public Administration. During the session Polona Kovac (University of Ljubljana, Slovaeniya) presented her research on selection criteria for senior civil servants and Eve Kimbach-Pirn (Office of Government of Estonia) reported on innovation in the development of competencies for senior civil servants.

Ivanna Ibragimova, Project Expert, presented the experience of leadership development in the civil service of Ukraine. The presentation, in particular, touched upon the cooperation of the Main Department of Civil Service of Ukraine with the School for Senior Civil Service. This cooperation is conducted in the direction of defining core competencies of leadership, application of innovative approaches to learning needs and development of a new leadership development program for senior civil service. The report not only received positive feedback from the rest of the participants, but also some experts asked for permission to use it in further work during the discussion of the given issue at the international level.

It is interesting to note that some special features, typical for particular countries, affect the specific tools for identifying competencies and conducting research. Nevertheless, the trends are similar, and approaches and standards are common. As a matter of fact, European countries pay great attention to the improvement of procedures and mechanisms of senior civil service management, recognizing the importance of corporate leadership and leaders, who can serve as an example for others and to rally a team of professionals, who are able to act strategically and efficiently. Definition of leadership competencies required for the senior staff, and application of these skills in all processes of human resource management, in particular, as key criteria for selection, evaluation and staff development was among the common basic approaches.