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Performance indicators have taken a back-seat recently, and I have to say that I am pleased to see this. While I agree that it is essential to measure your performance, you should be very careful what you do with the information. Ideally you embed it in a cycle of plan-do-check-act and use your measurement to make sure that your decisions are having the effect you want. What you cannot do is make your measurements and then publicise them in a league table to shame the failing organisations. Well you can, but the data will cease to be a useful measure of how well you are doing. Most of my time in local government was occupied by the obsession with performance indicator league tables. Nothing wrong with them you might say, but when you take management information and oblige the organisation to publicise it, it looses its value. No-one can use it to measure the effect of management decisions because it has always got to look as if you are a permanent winner.

For a while we all took them seriously and did our best to improve them, but then one day we heard a senior official in the Best Value Inspectorate say ‘ it is disappointing to see how many councils are still delivering below-average performance’. We all looked up at the speaker expecting to see a smile on his face while he waited for the joke to sink-in but no, he really did expect all councils to be in the top 25% for performance. Now, it is possible that he meant 'it is disappointing to see how many councils are not aspiring to be where the to 25% are now', but that is a very different thing. The point is - if you are going to measure your performance, it is very important that you understand what you are measuring and why it matters.

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Last modified: 08/31/11