Developments: Coping with Ambiguity: Reconciling External Legitimacy and Organizational Implementation in Performance Measurement

Goals versus institutions: the development of performance measurement in the Swedish university sector

“…As far as PM is concerned, an NIS perspective may lead to a more pragmatic stance, seeing the apparent "over-proliferation" of PIs and lack of coupling to clearly stated goals as less of a weakness, but rather a natural response to the need to provide information to a broad range of constituencies with vaguely defined and occasionally conflicting interests (Brignall and Modell, 2000;Feldman and March, 1981;Meyer and Gupta, 1994;Modell, 2004). A primary theme in empirical research informed by this approach has been to explore how public sector managers and organizations respond to external pressures to adopt various PM practices (see Johnsen, 1999;Johnsen et al, 2001;Lawton et al, 2000;McKevitt and Lawton, 1996;Modell, 2001;Townley, 2002). However, little attention has been paid to the development of models and standards for PM at the macro level of different organizational fields and the processes involved in establishing PIs and evaluation procedures that organizations are expected to comply with.…”

The Effect of Funding Changes on Public Sector Nonprofit Organizations: The Case of Bushcare NSW

“…Numerous studies (Johansson 2003;Lawton, McKevitt, and Millar 2000;Modell 2004;Myers and Sacks 2003) into public sector accountability and performance measurement overseas report similar economic changes as to those that have occurred these past few decades within Australia. More specifically Myers and Sacks (2003) offer their comments on the emerging challenges for public sector organizations and highlight the reality that there is a growing emphasis on accountability tools and techniques borrowed from the business sector.…”

A strategy framework for performance measurement in the public sector

“…This means that different services (for example health, culture, infrastructure or social services) can have different measurement solutions. This approach supports learning and development by providing relevant operative information on the performance of different departments and units (Lawton et al, 2000). It also links a particular individual's work to the results achieved (Cavalluzzo and Ittner, 2004).…”