Expert comments on Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary’s report on UK crime figures Warwick Business School’s Pietro Micheli researches performance management and has authored Measurement madness – Recognizing and Avoiding the Pitfalls of Performance Measurement.
Pietro Micheli, Associate Professor of Organisational Performance, said: “Although disturbing, it is not the first time the police have been accused of massaging crime figures.The measurement and management of performance should be aimed at understanding and improving how an organisation operates and the result it achieves, not to identify stars and culprits. Otherwise, as Warren Buffett the legendary American investor, put it: managers that always promise to ‘make the numbers’ will at some point be tempted to make up the numbers.
"Performance measures and targets can lead to gaming and, sometimes, cheating, if three conditions exist. First, if measures and targets are given great emphasis and treated as ‘true’ reflections of performance.
"Secondly, if the focus is on whether performance targets have been achieved rather than on how they have been achieved. And finally if there is a very competitive professional culture and climate, ie when organisations are very hierarchical and there is intense competition among colleagues.
“So what could be done? First, instead of treating measures and targets as control tools, they could be used as learning mechanisms, so that reviews of performance could be genuinely used to understand and improve performance, rather than to hide failures under the carpet.
“Second, the focus should be on how results are achieved, rather than just on what was achieved; this also entails understanding performance at the frontline, not just looking at endless dashboards on a screen or as part of thick reports.
“Finally, while internal competition is not necessarily negative, the use of rewards and sanctions – often at an individual level – usually generates perverse consequences, such as the ones observed in UK police forces."