The many roads to reform: a configurational analysis of the conditions supporting performance management implementation

• Date: 28 August 2024
• Pages: 630-648
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/IJPSM-08-2021-0195
• Published date: 28 August 2024
• Subject Matter: Public policy & environmental management,Politics,Public adminstration & management
• Author: Juliet Ann Musso,Christopher Weare,Robert W. Jackman

The many roads to reform:

a configurational analysis of the

conditions supporting performance

management implementation

Juliet Ann Musso

Price School of Public Policy, University of Southern California, Los Angeles,

California, USA

Christopher Weare

Santa Clara County Behavioral Health Services Department, San Jose,

California, USA, and

Robert W. Jackman

Assessment, Data and Evaluation, California State Polytechnic University Pomona,

Pomona, California, USA

Abstract

Purpose –The goal is to illuminate the requisites for the implementation of performance management reforms

in a public bureaucracy.

Design/methodology/approach –The paper employs a configurational approach, qualitative comparative

analysis, that identifies combinations of political and organizational conditions necessary and/or sufficient for

success. The analysis applies the success factor identified in the literature in analyzing the experience of

departments involved in a city-wide reform in Los Angeles. The analysis utilizes two rounds of survey data

combined with case observations to evaluate the presence of these conditions. Cross-case comparisons employ

Boolean logic to identify configurations associated with successful system implementation.

Findings –The analysis identifies several distinct configurations of conditions that appear in departments

that implemented the reform. One emphasizes mayoral support, while others emphasize leadership in

combination with other organizational capacities.

Practical implications –The analysis yields several insights for managers. First, no silver bullet such as

strong leadership assures reform implementation. Second, there are multiple avenues to reform. An

organization that lacks some prerequisites –such as leadership or metrics –may succeed in the presence of

other features such as an innovative culture or external political support. Finally, the study provides a bracing

council that even under favorable conditions, performance management reforms may fail to take root, for

reasons that can be difficult to predict.

Originality/value –The paper highlights the importance of considering configurations of conditions rather

than focusing on conditions independently. Also, it highlights the importance of equifinality, the notion that

observed outcomes can have multiple causes, a perspective typically missing in correlational analyses.

Keywords Performance management, Local government, Organizational reform,

Qualitative comparative analysis

Paper type Original article

Introduction

This paper applies a configurational analysis to illuminate the factors that explain the

implementation of public sector performance management reforms. For several decades,

many public sector organizations have sought to implement performance management

IJPSM

37,5

630

This project was supported by a generous grant from the John Randolph Haynes and Dora Haynes

Foundation.

The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:

https://www.emerald.com/insight/0951-3558.htm

Received 6 August 2021

Revised 8 September 2022

27 January 2023

Accepted 9 March 2023

International Journal of Public

Sector Management

Vol. 37 No. 5, 2024

pp. 630-648

© Emerald Publishing Limited

0951-3558

DOI 10.1108/IJPSM-08-2021-0195

systems –those that reorient management practice to focus on outcome measurement. A

sprawling academic literature has recognized the potential of such reforms to improve service

satisfaction and public sector innovation (Behn, 2003,2007;Van Ryzin, 2004,2006;Walker

et al., 2011) while acknowledging the fraught challenges of system reform (Moynihan and

Ingraham, 2003;Radin, 1998,2008a;Sanger, 2013). As many reform efforts have faltered or

have been recognized as presenting perverse incentives that lead to gaming, it is important to

identify the agency features thought to promote productive reform.

This paper contributes to the debate regarding public performance reform through a

qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) that seeks to identify necessary and sufficient

conditions for successful performance management reform. This approach offers both

theoretical and practical benefits to the field. As an empirical method, QCA differs from more

traditional correlational studies in important ways. Statistical analyses of the factors that

lead to the adoption and use of metrics in public organizations assume that a common model

captures the influence of these factors for all cases being analyzed and then calculates the

marginal impact of each factor on the outcome. In contrast, QCA does not focus on marginal

impacts, but rather whether the presence or absence of conditions in differing configurations

explains success. Importantly, this approach allows for equifinality, the notion that there may

be multiple configurations of conditions that best explain observed outcomes. This analytic

approach facilitates a more nuanced approach to causal complexity, arguably a better

explanatory approach to the complexities of organizational change (Boyne, 2003;Fiss, 2005).

In linking theory and practice, the configurational approach also yields insights that are

more directly relevant to public administrators. Reform-minded leaders require a practical

administrative calculus focused on necessary and sufficient conditions for reform. As Kroll

(2015) points out, with administrative reforms, there is a need to account “for the real word’s

complexity, and in particular, for the fact that some effects will occur in certain environments

and not in others.”The need to account for complexity and the possibility of mediating factors

call for a configurational analysis. For example, imagine that in the absence of technical

capacity, a combination of strong internal leadership with external political support advances

a reform agenda. This would suggest that technical capacity is not necessary, but that the

combination of internal leadership and external political support are sufficient factors to

drive organizational change. If a necessary factor is not present, the agency has no path

forward, and this would be important to know. On the other hand, it is possible that a

recognized organizational asset may not be sufficient to support reform, suggesting the

importance of ancillary factors that can assure success.

Since its initial development 30 years ago, QCA has been widely applied, linking

organizational configurations to business and strategic outcomes (Fiss, 2005;Ragin, 1987,

2000). Recent studies within the public affairs field have examined organizational

effectiveness (Andrews et al., 2015), policy conflict (Schlager and Heikkila, 2009),

collaboration and networks (Raab et al., 2013;Sedgwick, 2016;Wang, 2016;Warsen et al.,

2019), implementation (Thomann et al., 2018), and the distinctions between public and private

organizations (Malatesta and Carboni, 2015). This study extends this literature to apply the

QCA method in an analysis of performance management reform.

After identifying correlates of reform identified in the literature, the paper turns to the

empiricalsetting, 31 departments inthe City of Los Angeles. When Mayor Garcettiwas elected

Mayor of Los Angeles in 2013, he mandated that all departments implement performance

managementreforms. The analysis utilizes data froman assessment of that reform to identify

several distinct configurations of conditions that appeared to enable the implementation of

performance reforms, supporting the importance of analytic frames that countenance causal

complexity. One set emphasizes political support, while another highlights different sets of

organizational capacities as keys to implementation. The analysis also identifies several

configurationswith conflicting findings, including some cases thatimplement the reform and

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