Playing the Game of Outcomes-based Performance Management. Is Gamesmanship Inevitable? Evidence from Theory and Practice

Lowe, Toby and Wilson, Rob (2017) Playing the Game of Outcomes-based Performance Management. Is Gamesmanship Inevitable? Evidence from Theory and Practice. Social Policy & Administration, 51 (7). pp. 981-1001. ISSN 0144-5596

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Abstract

This article presents the case for the need for a re-think in the prevailing orthodoxy of measurement approaches in the governance and management of public services. The article explores the simplification of complex reality that outcomes-based performance management (OBPM) requires in order to function, and the consequences of such simplification. It examines the evidence for and against the effectiveness of OBPM, and argues that both sets of evidence can be brought into a single explanatory story by understanding the theory of OBPM. The simplification required to measure and attribute ‘outcomes’ turns the organization and delivery of social interventions into a game, the rules of which promote gamesmanship, distorting the behaviour of organizations, managers and practitioners who undertake it.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Performance management; Outcomes; Outcomes-based performance management; New Public Management; Information management; Payment by results; Gaming; Gamesmanship
Subjects:	L400 Social Policy N200 Management studies
Department:	Faculties > Business and Law > Newcastle Business School
Depositing User:	Paul Burns
Date Deposited:	21 Feb 2019 12:59
Last Modified:	19 Nov 2019 09:47
URI:	http://nrl.northumbria.ac.uk/id/eprint/38174

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