Institutional Reform and Capacity Building of Public Managers: Effects of Decree No. 2018/666 of 5 November 2018 Reorganising the ISMP on Cameroonian Public Managers

The modernisation of Cameroon’s public administration depends largely on the development of the competences of managers responsible for steering public policies and organisations. It is within this perspective that Decree No. 2018/666 of 5 November 2018 reorganised the Higher Institute of Public Management (ISMP), the principal institution responsible for the continuing education and professional development of senior State officials. Yet, despite the strategic importance of this reform, few studies have examined its concrete effects on the capacity building of decision-making managers, particularly in the field of educational management. Drawing on the author’s doctoral thesis, this article analyses the effects of implementing the 2018 Decree on the capacity building of decision-making managers in educational management in Cameroon. The study is grounded in a theoretical framework combining Bertalanffy’s systems theory, the transactional leadership theory of Burns and Bass, and positive-feedback theory inspired by Wiener’s work. A mixed-methods approach with an interpretive orientation was adopted. Data were collected from twenty-five former ISMP trainees through semi-structured interviews and analysed through a thematic procedure informed by NVivo software.
The findings show that the reform has served as a lever for the professionalisation of training, promoting a closer alignment between pedagogical content and the professional realities of public administrations. Participants also reported substantial improvements in their strategic-analysis, leadership, change-management and decision-making capacities. The reform introduced by the Decree strengthened their professional autonomy and their capacity to act within public organisations. Nevertheless, the study also reveals certain limitations, notably inadequate post-training follow-up arrangements, difficulty in transferring some acquired skills to professional settings, and the persistence of content considered overly theoretical. These findings confirm the importance of institutional reforms in developing the strategic competences of public managers, while underlining the need for organisational support capable of consolidating the effects of training over time. The study thus contributes to an understanding of the mechanisms of public decision-maker capacity building in Cameroon and opens avenues for improving continuing professional development policies within the civil service.

ISMP; Decree No. 2018/666 of 2018; educational management; public managers; leadership; institutional reform; continuing professional development; strategic decision-making.

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