Any reform process (whether in a scandal and strife ridden government or one that is seeking to get a new start) should start with values - and keep coming back to them. The start of the process should involve the articulation of the values that the reform is intended to promote and those values should inform the rest of the reform. As we have long argued, those values should provide the core of the ethical standard setting, the principles informing the drafting and interpretation of the laws and a standard for judging the effectiveness of the institutional reforms.

Those values should also inform choices about detailed policies, procedures, and management systems. Do they advance or hinder the achievement of the values declared for the public institution or agency to be reformed?

When a new management idea/process/plan/system/'fad' emerges from the business schools, we should always ask whether it would support or undermine public sector ethics. Some ideas might sound great but create temptations and dilemmas for managers. Other ideas will pose potential ethical problems in the form in which they are put forward but can be amended to be supportive rather than inimical to public sector ethics.

Value based reforms have important educational and motivational benefits. First, if values are used to make reforms consistent and coherent, then they will be more easily integrated -not only in practice but also in the minds of those who must pursue that practice.

If the values and the ethical and legal principles derived from them are used to organize the reforms, then they can also help to integrate the reforms conceptually for public sector managers. It is easier to remember a general principle than a detailed rule or policy. If the principle can help make sense of the rules, then the rules are more likely to be remembered, making them easier to teach. Just as importantly, where there are grey areas, or areas of overlap, or potentially conflicting rules and policies, then reference to the principle can frequently help produce a solution -the one that furthers the principle and underlying values.

Most importantly of all, if the values are used to provide organizing principles to make the reforms cohere, then management will know that if they follow the principle, they are unlikely to go wrong (conscientious public servants deserve no less!).

Secondly, value based reforms of the public sector should help to reinvigorate morale of the public sector. Public servants have been under relentless pressure and frequent attack in many contemporary societies. They have been attacked and compared unfavorably to the corporate sector. They have been constantly told to adopt the same management approaches as corporations and to learn from their corporate superiors. Value based reforms ask public servants to consider what justifies their activity. In providing answers, they not only rightly seek to justify their agencies to the community but they also justify their work to themselves.

Thus, they can rediscover and, frequently, reinvent and modernise their role. Universities have done this again and again over their 1000-year history. Other public agencies should do so as well.