Harnessing the evolutionary advantage of emergent performance management regimes: Strengthening accountability for challenges of modern public administration and governance

• Published date: 01 September 2023
• Author: Carmine Bianchi,Jeremy Hall
• Date: 01 September 2023
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/puar.13713

GUEST EDITORIAL

Harnessing the evolutionary advantage of emergent

performance management regimes: Strengthening

accountability for challenges of modern public administration

and governance

Carmine Bianchi

1

| Jeremy Hall

2

1

Department of Political Sciences, University of Palermo, Palermo, Italy

2

University of Central Florida, Orlando, Florida, USA

Correspondence

Carmine Bianchi, Department of Political Sciences, University of Palermo, Palermo, Italy.

Email: bianchi.carmine@gmail.com

THE PERFORMANCE MINDSET

Performance management remains a maturing and ever-

evolving field of research and practice. The dynamic com-

plexity shaping organizations and society requires that

the “lenses”needed for framing performance today may

significantly differ from those which were successfully

adopted two decades ago. This phenomenon is leading

to the adoption of new performance management

regimes in public administration and governance. The

performance mindset is characterized by consistency on

one hand, and flexibility and adaptability to meet evolv-

ing goals and standards on the other.

Although such changes have been particularly sustained

in the last decade or so and have been affected by specific

challenges in the public sector domain, they originate from

earlier times. In particular, the need to deal with change and

unpredictability, and to focus on how people and groups

interact is not a new phenomenon in performance manage-

ment and governance. More than 25 years ago, Otley (1994)

recommended that management control systems should

enhance learning processes that could lead to an organiza-

tional evolution by design, with a focus no longer confined

within only the institutional boundaries. In this regard, a pro-

active feedforward performance management logic was

suggested (Otley, 1999, p. 369). This implies that the

emerging problems or opportunities from policy implemen-

tation at the departmental level may suggest possible

changes in the designed policies at both an institutional

and community level. This is the core of a strategic dialogue

that would enhance decision makers’aptitude to perceive

weak signals of change promptly and selectively and to

properly respond to them, for enhancing resilience and

long-term sustainability.

Therootsofsuchperceivedneedsforinnovationinper-

formance management regimes date back to even earlier

times. For example, Hofstede (1978,and1981)observedthat

a condition under which a system is under control on paper

(so called “pseudo control”) often occurs when behavioral

factors lead to divergent actions, with respect to the stan-

dards set by cybernetic control mechanisms. Likewise, Ouchi

(1979) recommended the need to also consider organiza-

tional control mechanisms, as part of the design process of a

performance management system that could go beyond the

use of bureaucratic and market mechanisms. Such extended

perspective in performance management systems design

may contribute to overcome the risk of an illusion of control

(Dermer & Lucas, 1986;Hall,2017;Otley,2012) and of incon-

sistent policy implementation (Argyris, 1990).

Theongoingdebateonhowtocopewiththe

unintended effects of human behavior associated with

inconsistent design of performance standards, and the role

that organizational control could play in fostering learning

processes in dynamic and complex decision-making, has

brought to a flourishing literature characterized by several

interrelated research streams in public administration. Such

emerging topics raise new challenges today for designing

and implementing public sector performance regimes.

The purpose of this symposium is to contribute to this

broad research field, through evidence-based analysis

adopting qualitative and quantitative approaches.

AREAS OF EMERGENT AND EVOLVING

PERFORMANCE RESEARCH

In the described domain, a rising research stream is

behavioral public administration (Bhanot & Linos, 2020).

Received: 1 August 2023

DOI: 10.1111/puar.13713

Public Admin Rev. 2023;83:1083–1087. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/puar © 2023 American Society for Public Administration. 1083