Challenges of performance dialogue in local government

Many researchers have noted that public sector is struggling with the attempts to use performance information. This study contributes to the previous discussions about the problems in performance information use by focusing on... [ view full abstract ]

Many researchers have noted that public sector is struggling with the attempts to use performance information. This study contributes to the previous discussions about the problems in performance information use by focusing on the challenges of performance information in performance dialogues — a topic that has been largely unexplored previously. More precisely we ask, what kind of challenges relate to performance dialogues taking place in three Finnish local government organizations. We answer to this question by conducting a content analysis on 30 interviews. As a result, three theoretical categories are constructed and under these three categories, we place the challenges impeding performance dialogue in local government. These categories were derived from performance management literature discussing dialog and dialogic leadership. We also empirically tested the three categories when we examined the perceptions of 30 managers on the main challenges they consider impeding the dialogue. Our theoretical findings are useful to academics studying the topic of performance management and to practitioners who are trying to design performance dialogues.