Using performance measures to improve performance: governments today operate in an environment characterized by growing demand for services, continuous fiscal stress, and global competition. Performance measures are an effective tool for successfully meeting these challenges.(Solutions)

A growing number of local governments are establishing performance measurement systems to systematically collect and report data on organizational performance. What are the benefits of collecting and reporting all this data? Robert Behn has identified eight purposes for measuring performance: evaluating, controlling, budgeting, motivating, promoting, celebrating, learning, and improving. (1) While all of these uses are meaningful, perhaps the most important is improving. After all, why go to all the effort if it doesn't lead to better results? This article offers some ideas on how to use performance measures to improve performance.

AN EXAMPLE FROM THE WORLD OF SPORTS

For years, college and professional athletic teams have been using performance measures--statistics--to improve performance. They set goals and specify detailed objectives that must be met in order to achieve those goals. Consider the example below of how a college basketball team used performance measures to improve their results on the court.

As part of a team meeting before the start of the season, the team agreed that a goal of 18 wins for the year was reasonable and achievable. To achieve 18 wins the team and coaches determined that they would need to score an average of 72 points per game and hold their opponents to 68 points per game. The team also set targets for things like rebounding, steals, and field goal percentage that contribute to overall offensive and defensive performance. Once these team goals and objectives had been established, each player met individually with the coaching staff to define their individual contributions. Exhibit 1 shows how these targets are linked.

That the team set performance goals is not as interesting as how they used these goals throughout the season. After each game the team would sit down and assess how they performed against each target. They found that if they achieved 75 to 80 percent of their targets for things like rebounding, steals, and field goal percentage, they usually won the game. They were able to use these statistics to better use their time in practice sessions. If they missed their goal for rebounding, they spent more time in practice working on individual and team rebounding drills. The team used performance measurement data to improve performance.

USING PERFORMANCE MEASURES IN GOVERNMENT

Likewise, government agencies can use performance measures to improve organizational performance through better planning, budgeting, management, and communication.