Employees of the public employment services (PES) are street-level bureaucrats who shape activation policy on the ground. This paper examines how PES staff use enhanced discretion in an innovation project carried out by the German Federal Employment Agency. Applying a bottom-up perspective, we reconstruct PES employees’ logic of action and the dilemmas they face in improving counselling and placement services. According to our findings, placement staff use enhanced discretion to promote more individualised support and an adequate matching of jobseekers and employers. The use of discretion is framed by organisational norms and reward mechanisms and by the current labour market situation. Our analyses are based on qualitative interviews and group discussions with placement staff.

中文翻译：

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作为创新者的安置顾问。专业人士如何在德国公共就业服务中使用增强的自由裁量权

公共就业服务 (PES) 的员工是街头官僚，他们在当地制定激活政策。本文探讨了 PES 员工如何在德国联邦就业局开展的创新项目中使用增强的自由裁量权。我们运用自下而上的视角，重构了 PES 员工的行动逻辑以及他们在改善咨询和安置服务方面面临的困境。根据我们的调查结果，安置工作人员使用增强的自由裁量权来促进更加个性化的支持以及求职者和雇主的充分匹配。自由裁量权的使用取决于组织规范和奖励机制以及当前的劳动力市场状况。我们的分析基于定性访谈和与安置人员的小组讨论。