The link between performance management approaches and institutional reforms: a review in the Kenyan perspective

Abstract

Performance management aims at attaining operational effectiveness which in a broader sense refers to a number of practices that allow an organization to better utilize its resources. The need for productivity, quality and speed has spawned a remarkable number of management tools and techniques; total quality management, benchmarking, re-engineering and change management. All these, if pursued from strategy angle leads to emphasis being put on the wrong place. Lack of clarity can be attributed to the fact that most public agencies have to deal with multiple principals who have multiple interests. This leads to fuzziness in the agencies perception of what is expected of them. Performance is therefore enlightening in many public sector organizations. They begin to ask the right questions and realize that they need to do whatever they have defined well and deliver that efficiently. Reforming the public sector has therefore been slowly shifting in many developing countries more towards operational effectiveness, which entails doing what one is doing better. This paper gives a critical examination of performance outcomes and appropriate benchmarks to measure the outcomes, to examine the rampant lack of focus in organizations in regard to measuring performance and to examine mechanisms managers can utilize to diagnose and resolve problems within an organization