Government’s Productivity Council is advocating that there ought to be “a more holistic approach to performance management” in the public sector.

Senior Economist with the Council, Olivia Chase, made this observation recently during an interview, noting that such an approach would help to improve public sector performance and overall productivity.

According to her, there were some relevant questions which should be answered in order to have such management in place. These include: “How does the organisation identify its mission? What are the broad or strategic objectives that it is looking to achieve in a specified time period? What are the activities? And, how do they link to its budget?”

She said if the public sector were able to create that link between the four item areas, then the various departments would have happy customers. “You would have a client or customer that walks into a department, sees things working as they ought to be, efficiently, and he is reaping the benefits – perhaps reduced waiting times, getting a response to a query from the first person he asks, and so on.”

Indicating that there were a few departments which had adopted a comprehensive approach to performance management, Ms. Chase said it was not as concerted an effort as the Council would like to see, but it “was happening in a piecemeal way” across the public sector.

She pointed out that the Council’s next effort would be to get this practice endorsed at the highest level so that all departments would embrace performance management methods.

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