Harry P. Hatry

The Status of Productivity Measurement in the Public Sector

Unless you are keeping score, it is difficult to know whether you are winning or losing. This applies to ball games, card games, and no less to government productivity for specific services and activities. Productivity measurements permit governments to identify problem areas and, as corrective actions are taken, to detect the extent to which improvements have occurred. This status report deals first with what productivity measurement is, then presents a viewpoint on the current status of productivity measurement in government in the United States, and-finally-briefly examines the likely prospects for the future, including consideration of facilitating and inhibiting factors.

Issues in Productivity Measurement for Local Governments

costs; and an unrealistic treatment of productivity considerations by higher budget review authorities. A valid data base is important. However, the economics of auditing work counts and man-hours precludes minute controls. Therefore, varying degrees of probable validity exist in the data element counts. Machine counts or documents provide the most reliable source of count and are considered controlled counts. Lower-level counts consist of those for which a reasonable relationship to controlled counts can be established and tracked.

Improving Responsiveness@@@Customer Surveys for Agency Managers: What Managers Need to Know

This practical volume provides a wealth of information and advice on planning and conducting customer surveys. Topics include the types of information that should and should not be sought from surveys; categories of respondents; options for administering surveys and the advantages and disadvantages of each; conducting surveys in-house versus contracting; steps in the survey process; sampling strategy; sources of survey error and suggested remedies; and tradeoffs among timeliness, accuracy, and cost. Its a must for all agency managers, public or private, seeking to make their customer surveys more useful to their agencies and to make their agencies more responsive to customers.