Holding Employees Accountable for Performance Measures

1
Holding Employees Accountable for Performance
Measures

• Francis Ziegler
• NDDOT Director

2
Executive Involvement (North Dakota)

• Each DOTs needs to follow the guidance from
  either the Executive Branch or Commission,
  depending on who the CEO reports too.
• Performance measures represent what each state
  wants
• In North Dakota executive strategic planning
  sessions identify the vision, mission, goals,
  objectives, and measures

"Each organization must create and communicate
performance measures that reflect its unique
strategy." -- Dr. Robert S. Kaplan, Harvard
Business School
3
Executive Involvement (Cont.)(North Dakota)

• Performance measures should be linked to the
  strategic plan to make sure objectives are met
• Leadership owns the goals and the objective
  chairperson reports to the goal owners

4
What is Done With The Measures is as Important as
What They Are

• In ND we report to the Governor, Legislative
  body, and public by the use of a report card with
  overarching measures

5
Everyones Responsibility is No Ones
Responsibility

• IN ND the Division Directors (DD) develop
  measures to track their programs
• DDs are held accountable for program successes
  and failures, not individual measures
• Meet biweekly for a Project Delivery Status (PDS)
  to review milestone dates
• Chief Engineer receives a weekly email on any
  milestone dates that have lapsed

Without a yardstick, there is no measurement
without measurement, there is no control. --
Anonymous
6
Everyones Responsibility is No Ones
Responsibility (cont)

• The Departments Strategic Planning office tracks
  the goals objective status and reports to
  Executive Management

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Everyones Responsibility is No Ones
Responsibility (cont)

• Monthly Managers Meetings include all Division
  Directors and District Engineers meeting via
  video conferencing
• Objective owners give a status of their strategic
  plan objective and any performance measures
  associated with it
• Districts report on any project concerns, delays,
  and missed targets

. . . chart a course for every endeavor that we
take the people's money for, see how well we are
progressing, tell the public how we are doing,
stop the things that don't work, and never stop
improving the things that we think are worth
investing in. -- President William J. Clinton,
on signing the Government Performance and Results
Act of 1993
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Holding People Accountable

• What must happen
• Buy in Employees will fight the process until
  they understand and buy into it
• Empower You can only hold employees
  accountable if they have control
• Own it The one that controls the program should
  be the owner of the measure
• Rewards Recognition

Leadership is communicating to people their worth
and potential so clearly that they come to see it
in themselves. -- Stephen Covey, the 8th habit
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Performance Measures Should Cascade Through Your
Organization

• After DDs buy in to the process they start to
  measure their own programs
• Divisions have developed their own mission
  statements linked to the Departments
• Employees are empowered by giving them ownership
  of programs
• Lack of appropriate resources/manpower issues
  need to be addressed prior to holding people
  accountable

It is much more difficult to measure non
performance than performance.  -- Harold S.
Geneen
10
Employees Will Carry Through With The Items That
You Deem Important

• Customer Satisfaction Survey (NDDOT)
• Five areas with an overall satisfaction greater
  than 90
• Low areas indicate a need to refocus priorities
• Major increases in the past four years, but still
  need improvements
• Overall customer satisfaction is 84

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2008 Customer Satisfaction Survey
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Summary

• What were doing is working
• Steady increases in customer satisfaction levels
• Legislative positive about NDDOT processes
• Received additional budget
• Employees are happy For two years running NDDOT
  was voted as one of the top ten employers in the
  state by the Young Professionals Association (the
  only government agency)
• Reason Foundation 2008 report Annual Study
  Ranks States on Highway Performance, Overall
  Cost-Effectiveness, stated the following
• North Dakota's state-owned highway system is the
  nation's most cost-effective, an honor the state
  has held since 2001. North Dakota finished first,
  or tied for first, in five of the report's 12
  categories, including rural interstate condition.

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Questions
"an effective performance measurement system is a
servant of the business, not its master." The
primary purpose of measuring performance is to
develop, deliver, and improve on world-class
products and services not to audit or find fault.
For government offices and business units, the
essential responsibility is to provide services
to citizens, not monitor the behavior of
employees. -- SERVING THE AMERICAN PUBLIC BEST
PRACTICES IN Performance Measurement (June 1997)