ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on both meaning and action of productivity. It considers why the meaning of productivity is not clear. The chapter presents a developed model of the improvement or action process. One of the biggest problems facing the public productivity movement is the assumption that everyone shares a common definition of the term productivity. Economists usually emphasize the need for getting more from resources in the society, and define productivity precisely as the ratio of outputs to inputs with some consideration for output quality assumed or stated. Administrators have a managerial orientation. For them productivity is usually an ambiguous, shifting concept cantered on the over-all performance or functioning of the organization. The economists have tended to focus on all managerial work associated with systematic change in ongoing organizations. The chapter investigates the outcomes of improvement actions and the means. Administrators with an action orientation usually equate the meaning of the concept with the over-all performance of the system.
