The Role of Accountability and Islamic Work Ethics on the Relationship between Human Capital and Public Services Performance: The Case of Public Sector Organizations in Bahrain

The accountability of public sector employees is an important issue in both developing and developed countries. The aspect of ethics among public sector employees is at the core of professionalism, effectiveness and efficiency of services delivery. This research examines the role of accountability as a moderating variable and Islamic work ethics as a mediating variable in the relationship between human capital and public services performance in the public sector organizations of Bahrain. The lack of previous studies in this area is the main motivation to undertake this study. The results of this research are that there is a positive, significant and direct relationship between human capital, accountability and Islamic work ethics and public services performance. The results also reveal that Islamic work ethics, as a mediating variable, has a highly positive effect on the relationship between human capital and public services performance at 35%. On the contrary, the effect of accountability, as the moderating variable, on the relationship between human capital and public services performance is not significant.