Performance Measurement in the Public Sector

Published by: American Productivity & Quality Center

Published: Feb. 28, 2006 - 117 Pages

Table of Contents

• American Red Cross
• City of Coral Springs
• Florida Department of Health
• State of Washington
• Tennessee Valley Authority

Abstract

KEY FINDINGS

• Every organization needs a strong catalyst that moves it off the fence. No one wakes up in the morning and just decides, "I need to manage and measure performance." With each of our partners, there were one or more significant events that acted as a catalyst to drive performance improvement within the organization.
• Without an engaged leadership team, enterprise-wide performance management and measurement efforts tend to stall and eventually die until the next greatest thing comes along. Each of our partners had fully committed leaders who not only provided the go ahead on the initiatives but also jumped right in and helped mold and craft the efforts of the organization.
• With the engaged leadership comes a singular sense of strategic direction. Each partner had the benefit of understanding exactly where they needed to go and what they needed to do to get there.
• Each partner identified the importance of making the proper investments to enable an organization to embrace a program that meets the needs of the organization and its constituents. Proper investment for the partner group included funding for the program but also manpower and the time necessary to accomplish the tasks required to set up a beneficial performance management and measurement program.
• Each of the partners invested the necessary time and effort to develop a well defined structure and hierarchy that would allow them to be successful. This investment allowed the partners to manage the expectations of all stakeholders and supported the change management efforts during implementation.
• Partners came to the realization during the design and implementation of their various programs that, in order to be successful in their endeavors, they would need to link the performance data and analysis to other strategic programs.
• In each organization studied, the leadership and the implementation team worked hard to lay the groundwork to shift the organizational culture from
a "service at any cost" mind-set to one where the effort was placed on being a good steward of the public's faith and trust.
• To support the culture shift, it was important that everyone get the message on the coming changes within the partner organizations. Each partner fully realized that accurate and timely was needed to support the change not only at initial implementation but also through the entire life cycle of the program if there were any hopes for long-term success.
• Partners not only excelled in training the staff to collect data, but each also provided detailed training on the analysis and use of the data for effective decision making in support of the organization's strategic goals.
• Each partner clearly understood that the work was not finished upon implementation, but on the contrary, partners had to continually work toward achieving the goal of sustainability by recruiting and assigning strong managers to oversee the ongoing program.

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