A Contingency Approach to Public Sector Performance Management: The Case of the Canadian Intelligence Community
Creators: name: Faragone, Giuseppe
Publisher: name: Université d'Ottawa / University of Ottawa
Year: 2023
Subjects: Universalism
Particularism
New Public Management / Managerialism
Performance Management
Management Accountability Framework
Contingency Theory / Approach
Canadian Intelligence Community

description: Countries in the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development have experienced a decline in citizens' trust in government in the last few decades. In response, public administration shifted from traditional public administration to New Public Management (NPM) with the goal of increasing trust in government by trying to make government more responsive, work better, and cost less. An important element of NPM is the reliance on managerialism's application of private sector solutions such as performance management whose assumed strength is that it can deliver on efficiency, effectiveness, and accountability. An underlining basis of private sector imports into the public sector environment is that they are based on universalism – the existence of general laws irrespective of the situation or circumstance. Often, referred to as a 'one-size-fits-all' approach. However, after a few decades of implementing performance management based on universalistic principles the evidence suggests that performance management has not fully met expectations. Contrasting universalism is particularism - meaning that different rules and applications will depend on the situation, in other words, context matters. In short, 'no best way'. To explore the universalism vs particularism debate, this research uses the Management Accountability Framework (MAF) which is a Canadian government's long-standing performance management tool. The MAF serves as a proxy for a one-size-fits-all approach to performance management. With regards to particularism, this research employs a contingency approach as the theoretical basis to explore performance management. The contingency approach is premised on three core concepts: external contingent factors, internal contingent factors, and fit. The Canadian Intelligence Community (IC) is used as the case study to explore the primary question of whether a universalism-based or a particularism-based approach is better suited for performance management in the public sector? In seeking an answer to this question, two additional sub-questions are explored. First, what makes the IC different from the other policy domains? Second, what is the fit between the MAF and the IC's contingent factors? To answer these questions, data collection consisted of content analysis of documents as well as interviews with senior officials. Findings from this exploratory study reveal that universalism-based approaches to performance management should at the very least be complemented by particularism considerations. The IC was found to be different from other policy domains in terms of both external and internal contingent factors. The former consists of the threat environment, the legislative framework, and the external expectations of the IC. The latter consists of the intelligence process, the intelligence product, intelligence and secrecy, and the IC as a high reliability organization. It was found that there was more misfit than fit between the MAF and the IC's contingency factors. In exploring these questions, this research contributes concurrently to the public administration and intelligence studies literature in a number of ways. For instance, evidence that universalism-based approach to performance management does not always deliver what it promises, being able to intersect intelligence studies and public administration which is currently lacking, examining the 'hidden' parts of the public sector (i.e., the IC) that tends to be ignored in public administration, peering into the 'black box' of public sector organizations' management tools, the exploration of how practitioners use management tools, analyzing public sector organizations operating in a complex environment, adding to a limited non-historical contemporary Canadian IC literature, looking at the IC's performance-related issues that goes beyond the overwhelming intelligence failure literature. In addition to contributing to knowledge, the research highlights the importance of performance management and intelligence in relation to society.