7. Discussion and conclusion
The initial inquiry of this research was derived from the central question—can a top manager’s public management, driven by the pursuit of managing upward, downward, and outward, induce a satisfactory financial condition at the local level.
To explore the complex nature of public management in the specific context of school districts, this study empirically examined the relationship between superintendents’ interaction with other key local stakeholders and the districts’ financial condition (here, the unreserved general fund balances of school districts). By investigating the Texas K-12 educational system by using superintendents’ management surveys and school district financial data, our sample appears to rule out the possibility of a connection between theory and practice, despite an increasing concern for the management-performance link. Even though the empirical results partially supported our hypotheses, thefindings suggestthat a topmanager’smanagingupward toward political leaders above and downward toward line subordinates will have a significant impact on district fund balances. It seems that the public manager’s primary managing strategies have markedly changed toward facilitating resource sharing in an effective manner to ensure a satisfactory level of organizational performance. As such, our empirical evidence is reminiscent of Moore’s (1995) argument that “public managers can become strategists rather than technicians.. . . They engage the politics surrounding their organization to help define public value as well as engineer how their organizations operate” (1995, p. 20).
