Convincing Legislators with Performance Measures

Abstract

This study uses an analysis of public managers' own words to increase legislative use of performance measures in budgeting. Using data from a survey designed from a content analysis of local administrators' descriptions of effective approaches, it shows that high quality budget analysis, political consideration, and effective communication can increase the chances for effective performance-based legislative funding. The findings can help managers effectively prepare and present their performance-based budget requests. The findings also speak to budgetary decision-making theory.

Keywords:

• performance measures
• performance measurement
• performance budgeting
• accountability

Notes

3. Rubin, I. The politics of public budgeting, 3^rd edition. Chatham, NJ: Chatham House Publishers, 1997; Wildavsky, A. The politics of the budgetary process, 3^rd edition. Boston: Little Brown, 1997.

4. Thurmaier, K. Decisive decision making in the executive budget process: Analyzing the political and economic propensities of Central Bureau analysts. Public Administration Review 1995, 55 (5): 448–460; Willoughby, K. Decision making orientation of state government budget analysts: Rationalists or incrementalists. Public Budgeting & Financial Management 1993, 5 (1): 67–114; Giannatasio, N. A. Budget decision making at the grass-root's level. Journal of Public Budgeting, Accounting & Financial Management 2001, 13(1): 48–82.

5. Gosling, J. Patterns of influence and choice in the Wisconsin budgetary process. Legislative Studies Quarterly 1985, 10 (November): 457–482; and Thurmaier, K. Decisive Decision Making in the Executive Budget Process: Analyzing the Political and Economic propensities of Central Bureau Analysts. Public Administration Review 1995, 55 (5): 448–460.

9. Mascarenhas, R. C. Searching for efficiency in the public sector: Interim evaluation of performance budgeting in New Zealand. Public Budgeting and Finance 1996, 16 (3): 13–26; Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB). Performance measurement for government: State and local government case studies on use and the effects of using performance measures for budgeting, management, and reporting, 2000. Taken from www.Seagov.org August 1, 2001. Jones, L. R., & McCaffery, J. Implementing the chief Financial Officers Act and the Government Performance and Results Act in the Federal government. Public Budgeting and Finance 1997, 17 (1): 35–55.

11. GASB, Op. cit.

12. Three methodological steps were used in this analysis. First, the researcher applied a content analysis to summarize and code the GASB studies. In this step, the researcher conducted reading of the cases and selected the key words and sentences. Examples concerning performance funding practices in the cases were carefully examined. (For a discussion on the content analysis approach adopted by this study, also see Babbie, E., The basics of social research. New York: Wadsworth Publishing Company, 1999). Second, these words, sentences, and examples were analyzed and coded to categories of “Yes,” “No,” “Maybe,” or “no discussion.” “Yes” is assigned when a case explicitly indicates that a jurisdiction experiences performance funding. “No” is assigned when a case explicitly indicates that a jurisdiction does not experience performance funding. “Maybe” is applied when a case indicates that a jurisdiction may experience performance funding (For example, some interviewees reported an increase use of performance budgeting, while other interviewees did not observe such increase). Third, uniformed and standardized wordings were used to summarize these findings. The selection of words in question statements was based on the words in these cases if possible.

13. The selection of cities with large populations is based on an assumption that large cities have more resources and therefore are more likely to use performance measurement. Also, a limited budget of this self-funded study restricts the scope of this study. A city address file was obtained from the National League of Cities in 2001. The file includes the latest officials' names and addresses after the 2000 election. City names and addresses were also verified with ICMA's Municipal Yearbook. The initial instrument was pretested on a group of 50 city officials to ensure that the instrument was appropriately designed. Corrections on question wording, question sequence, and grammar were made after the pretest.

14. Among the commentators, 38.4 percent were City Managers (or Chief Administrators) or Assistant City Managers. 29.3 percent were chief finance or budget officers (finance directors or budget directors). 12.1 percent were management or budget analysts. Other commentators include performance measurement directors (coordinators), directors of administrations or operations, directors of planning, organization development coordinator, directors of organizational effectiveness, and other high-level city officials. 91.1 percent commentators say they are “familiar” or “very familiar” with performance measurement experiences in their cities. Response cities use performance measurement for an average of 7.5 years. In 63.3 percent of the cities, more than 50 percent of their agencies use performance measurement. 62.0 percent of cities use outcome measures and 60.0 percent have citizen or client satisfaction measures.

15. The coding process includes examination of the content of a comment. First, a commentator was asked to express a “view” regarding the question statement. In this step, key words of the commentators were examined to discover the response. In the second step, an overall assessment of the commentator's comments and examples was performed to identify whether he or she agreed or disagreed to the question statement. This mode of the analysis is suggested and used by social scientists for voluminous qualitative information. See Babbie, 1999; Creswell, J. W. Research design: Qualitative and quantitative approaches. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, 1994; Milinki, A. K. Cases in qualitative research. Los Angeles. Pyrczak Publishing, 1999; Harris, J. (1995). Service efforts and accomplishments standards: Fundamental questions of an emerging concept. Public Budgeting & Finance, 15 (Winter): 18–37.