Jarmo Vakkuri

Performance auditing in local government: an exploratory study of perceived efficiency of municipal value for money auditing in Finland and Norway

Performance auditing, or value for money (VFM) auditing, has been a long-standing component of accountability in public administration. During the 1980s and 1990s performance auditing has allegedly been increasingly adopted in the new public management. While there has been much research on public management and performance auditing in central government, local government has been relatively neglected in the literature. Municipalities and counties in local government have an important role in public sector service production in most European countries, and especially in the Nordic countries. It is therefore surprising that performance auditing in this context has received so little scholarly attention. This study is aimed at filling some of this gap. The purpose of this comparative study is, therefore, to explore how performance auditing practices, including performance measurement, are used to assess and verify value for money in local government and to enhance the accountability of municipalities and counties. This study analyses how informants from both auditors and auditees in Finland and Norway perceived the efficiency of conducting performance audits in local government. Despite some problems related to the quality of the performance audit reports, the informants perceived performance audit to function as a useful, rational public management tool.

The impact of culture on the use of performance measurement information in the university setting

The paper examines the performance measurement (PM) of knowledge organizations as problems of search (design mode) and application (use mode). The argumentation of the paper focuses on university organizations as a case of illustration in examining limitations in PM systems, culturally shaped assumptions for designing and using PM systems and unintended consequences of using performance measurement information. The paper presents a conceptual model created to demonstrate the relationship between the cultural features of a knowledge‐intensive organizational context, the ambiguities in the objectives of PM systems and the behavioral consequences of performance measurement. It is argued that PM systems in universities are seen as structures of attention rather than formal systems of accountability. Consequently, given the cultural background, universities tend to diminish the significance of PM systems by practising game rationalities and politics of representation.

Distinctive research patterns on public sector performance measurement of public administration and accounting disciplines

Abstract This article explores distinctive research patterns of public administration and accounting disciplines concerning public sector performance measurement (PSPM). Our review shows that accounting researchers from Europe investigate reasons for limited PM use and factors explaining a rational or symbolic PM use, inspired by organization theory and institutional theory and conducting case/field studies. Public administration researchers from Europe and the USA prefer to study PM design and PM impact respectively, mainly using surveys in combination with various theories, like political theory. Public administration research from the USA examines the types of performance indicators in PM systems and contingent factors for PM design. Public administration research from Europe shows an interest in evaluating public sector reforms like Best Value and explaining learning processes for improvement. We argue that PSPM research could benefit from interdisciplinary efforts and intensified mutual communication between public administration and accounting.

Research Techniques and Their Use in Managing Non-Profit Organisations - an Illustration of DEA Analysis in NPO Environments

This article examines nonprofit organisations from the managerial viewpoint. The objective is to study the applicability of efficiency information in managing NPOs. For this purpose important conceptual and methodological aspects are addressed. An efficiency measurement technique (DEA) is then analysed as a case in point, and its main characteristics critically reviewed. DEA applications in four NPO environments are examined. The aim is to pinpoint possibilities and limitations in using DEA-based efficiency information in the management process of NPOs. The article argues in favour of a more profound comprehension of the use of efficiency information and the application of research techniques.

The life cycle approach to performance management: Implications for public management and evaluation

This article discusses how performance-management systems may be conceptualized as tools with a life cycle consisting of several stages. Studies on public-sector performance management generally concern the question of how management can design these systems or address dysfunctional effects when they are used. This article, however, argues that the research in this field should cover the entire life cycle of performance-management systems: it should focus on both their benefits and costs and needs to recognize a broader spectrum of actors involved in the life cycle than that normally associated with the hierarchical conception of principals and agents. The life-cycle approach facilitates a comprehensive mapping of the various performance-management stages and their contingencies from invention to assessment and re-design, including their interdependence. The framework enables policymakers, managers, evaluators, and researchers to better understand performance-management systems, to identify relevant research areas and to communicate the practical problems and solutions related to the systems’ specific stages.

Shifting from Output to Outcome Measurement in Public Administration-Arguments Revisited

Moving to outcome-based measurement systems in the public sector has been difficult. In this article, we examine the contingent decision-making arguments stimulating output instead of outcome measurement in public management. Based on an argumentative literature review, we conclude that there exist several contingent arguments encouraging politicians and public managers to stick with outputs while ignoring outcomes in performance measurement. Mapping out these arguments contributes to understanding the difficulties in implementation of outcome-based measurement and management systems. This understanding is highly useful in performance management research and policy practice. We also suggest that these contingent arguments may be considered proposals for the future research in the area of public financial management and public sector performance measurement.

Performance measurement of hybrid organizations - emerging issues and future research perspectives

While there is a substantial body of academic literature dealing with hybrids and another stream of literature about performance measurement and management, research on performance measurement and management in hybrids is limited. Our PMM theme presents a set of research papers, new development and debate articles to shed light on these topics. In this editorial, we provide a short overview of the rich and diversified academic debate on hybrids; we connect the broad theme of performance management with the special case of hybrids; and we present a future research agenda. Our aim is to link the research traditions of hybrid organizations and performance management more closely.Theme: Performance measurement of hybridorganizations : emerging issues and future researchperspectives

Introduction: Comparative Performance Management and Accountability in the Age of Austerity

ABSTRACT: The five articles in this symposium examine the issues of comparative performance management and accountability in the age of austerity from different vantage points. Brusca and Montesinos carry out an international comparison of 17 countries studying key issues in the implementation of performance reporting by local governments. Using multicountry survey data, Wynen and Verhoest provide an understanding of the effect of organizational autonomy and external result control on the use of internal performance-based steering toward lower hierarchical levels in public sector organizations. Bjørnholt, Bækgaard and Houlberg study the link between fiscal austerity and politicians’ use of performance information by using survey and documentary data from Danish municipalities. Grossi, Reichard, and Ruggiero examine the interest of politicians and public managers in the use of performance information for decision-making and monitoring the budget cycle provided in the newly established performance budgets of municipalities in Germany and Italy. Poocharoen and Wong examine performance management in different types of interagency collaborations, presenting six case studies of management projects in the field of natural resources. Taken together, these articles deepen our understanding of the fundamental and continuing shift toward use of performance measures in the public sector in the period of austerity, with both internal and external uses of performance information.

Complexities of Productivity Policies in the Finnish Public Sector: Knowing How to Do More with Less?

This paper examines public sector productivity policies as complexities between what is ‘known’ in policy principles and what is ‘done’ in everyday policy practice. Such complexities are explored in two productivity policy cases within Finnish local government: municipal amalgamations, and the low-threshold concept of healthcare service. Utilising quantitative and qualitative data from Finnish local government the article demonstrates the tensions between productivity policy principles, interpretations for productivity improvement (‘knowing’) and final outcomes for actually applying (‘doing’) productivity policy. The paper argues in favour of a new understanding for the research and practice of public policy and management.

Debate: Taming the monster— understanding hybrid organizations and governance

Complex societal problems require sophisticated solutions, but the governance of societal arrangements is largely based upon an assumption of a clear-cut, divisive distinction between public and private categories of institutional life. However, with respect to pursuing important societal goals such as improving the level of education, fighting environmental pollution, and maintaining infrastructure, it is difficult to disentangle the goals of public organizations from the contributions of private activity. For instance, higher education systems cater to the demands of multiple cl ients: individuals pursuing decent employment, governments seeking competit ive advantages, and private business benefiting from the capabilities of the workforce. This gives rise to multiple ownership and control structures within education systems. Therefore, it is important to explore the space between public and private forms of action, the realm of hybrid organizations and hybrid governance (Johanson and Vakkuri, 2017). Consider the current forms of organizing energy delivery and supply and constructing infrastructure worldwide. These societal functions are often organized as state-owned enterprises that aim to combine the politically-driven goals of nation states, while exploiting business logics and operating in global financial markets. The manuals published by international organizations (for example World Bank, 2014; OECD, 2015) are sometimes eager to point out possible pitfalls of combining political and business endeavours. In infrastructure development, modern ‘megaprojects’, such as the Beijing– Shanghai High-Speed Railway or the Airbus A380, not only take time and tremendous resources, but also require institutional collaboration between many public and private actors. While these projects may be formally public or private in terms of ownership, different forms of ambiguity employing parallel institutional logics shape their activities (Grossi et al., 2017).