FOI Request - Performance Reporting
Request 21-02-2022
I am writing to you under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 to request the following information from your authority. Please may you provide me with information on how your authority reports on its performance. Please provide written responses below each of the questions listed below (definitions have also been included below the questions):
1. How do you report performance to residents?
2. Do you have a Performance Management Handbook*?
3. What budget do you have allocated towards your performance management* initiatives per annum?
4. How many hours are spent on performance management* reporting each month?
5. Which applications or systems do you use to manage Performance Management*?
6. Do you report departmental performance separately or in a different way?
7. Do you benchmark or baseline your authority’s performance with other similar authorities?
8. Can you evidence improvements to your services based on historical performance management* reporting?
Definitions:
Performance management*: Performance Management is about the practical ways that a council can improve what it does and, more importantly, what it delivers, in terms of good quality services that meet the needs of local people. Performance management is acting in response to actual performance to make outcomes for users and the public better than they would otherwise be.
Performance Management Handbook*: A Performance Management Handbook sets out what a council does to; plan activity, monitor, report and improve performance, in relation to the services they deliver, and linked to the aims and objectives of the corporate plan.
Response 21-02-2022
1. See Page 15 of the Council’s Performance Management Framework, available here.
2. The Council’s Performance Management Framework demonstrates how performance is part of service management and delivery that supports continuous improvement
3. Each service publishes a Service Plan to set out what the service aims to develop, delivery is achieved within existing service budgets.
4. In accordance with Section 17 of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 we can advise that as the number of hours spent on performance management is not recorded, the requested information is not held.
5. The Council uses Pentana software for performance management.
6. The Performance Reporting pages of the Council's website (available here) sets out performance reporting across the Council.
7. The Council uses the Local Government Benchmarking Framework to compare performance and outcomes over time
8. Improvements are captured in routine reporting to Service Committees, these reports are available from the Council’s website performance pages for both directorates; Education, Communities and Organisational Development and Economy, Environment and Finance.