Performance Measurement in the Public Sector: Example of the Building Administration Authorities in Taiwan

Abstract

Modern government, if not well managed, cannot perform well in a pluralist society. Regarding the public administration performance of dealing with construction permits, Taiwan ranked last among the four little dragons in Asia. The primary objective of this study is to devise an innovative performance-measurement approach for the building administration authorities in Taiwan. Differences in performance and the underlying causes are further discussed. A two-stage study framework is adopted in this research. First, data-envelopment analysis (DEA) is used to measure the organizational and individual performance in the building administration authorities. Second, social-network analysis (SNA) is used to investigate the relations between an individual’s centrality in the organization and their performance. There are three major findings of this work, as follows: (1) DEA can distinguish the effectiveness and efficiency of the individuals and work months in the building administration authorities, and the resulting analysis can be used to improve inefficient work months and individuals; (2) the results of SNA prove the positive relations between the organizational members’ intrarelationships and their performance, and that individuals with higher centrality in the organization work more efficiently; and (3) cross efficiency and network centrality appear to be lowly correlated; thus further research is required to see if Chinese culture affected these results. The findings of this study can also be employed to effectively manage and allocate human resources and duties so as to strengthen organizational effectiveness and efficiency.