Ville & Company

Achieving Performance Breakthrough

Nick Ville — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 18:49:00 +0000

In the current climate governments and the voluntary sector face a pressing need to reduce costs and significantly improve performance . There is a large array of problem-solving approaches available yet despite this many performance improvement programmes disappoint and fail to yield the benefits sought. In a briefing paper published today Nick Ville explores why this is and what can be done to avoid it.

Achieving Performance Breakthrough Briefing Paper

Assessing Value for Money: Different Perspectives in Difficult Times

Nick Ville — Thu, 11 Nov 2010 12:08:13 +0000

At a recent NAO symposium Nick Ville explored the variety of approaches to assessing value for money (VfM) that have developed over the last 50 years. There has been little formal evaluation of their comparative effectiveness so it is difficult to draw firm conclusions about which, if any, approach works best. But trends in the use of performance improvement techniques in recent years do give us some clues about how best to approach making reductions in public spending….

For more information please download the attached pdf file:

The Different Approaches to Assessing VfM (PDF, 315KB)

Chartered Management Institute’s comments on Nick Ville’s Times article

Nick Ville — Thu, 27 May 2010 16:45:00 +0000

Today’s Chartered Management Institute blog has some interesting discussion around the article I had published in last Friday’s Times. John Cummings questions whether a rational approach is likely to be successful and refers the reader to Keith Grint’s work on public sector leadership which distinguishes ‘tame’ problems which require a calculative/rational approach from ‘wicked’ problems requiring a normative/emotional approach.

For more details please see:

http://www.managers.org.uk/practical-support/management-community/blogs/tame-or-wicked-%E2%80%93-how-will-you-approach-challenges-ahead

I’m not unsympathetic to the point as a strong proponent of a soft systems approach to problem-solving in the public sector. However I don’t think it is a choice between two poles. My experience is that effective problem-solving combines rational analytic approaches with normative/emotional approaches balanced according to the needs of the situation.

Nick