Measuring and Managing Performance in Organizations

Measuring and Managing Performance in Organizations

by Robert D. Austin, Tom DeMarco, Timothy Lister
Released July 2013
Publisher(s): Addison-Wesley Professional
ISBN: 9780133488425

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Book description

This is the digital version of the printed book (Copyright © 1996).

Based on an award-winning doctoral thesis at Carnegie Mellon University, Measuring and Managing Performance in Organizations presents a captivating analysis of the perils of performance measurement systems. In the book’s foreword, Peopleware authors Tom DeMarco and Timothy Lister rave, “We believe this is a book that needs to be on the desk of just about anyone who manages anything.”

Because people often react with unanticipated sophistication when they are being measured, measurement-based management systems can become dysfunctional, interfering with achievement of intended results. Fortunately, as the author shows, measurement dysfunction follows a pattern that can be identified and avoided.

The author’s findings are bolstered by interviews with eight recognized experts in the use of measurement to manage computer software development: David N. Card, of Software Productivity Solutions; Tom DeMarco, of the Atlantic Systems Guild; Capers Jones, of Software Productivity Research; John Musa, of AT&T Bell Laboratories; Daniel J. Paulish, of Siemens Corporate Research; Lawrence H. Putnam, of Quantitative Software Management; E. O. Tilford, Sr., of Fissure; plus the anonymous Expert X.

A practical model for analyzing measurement projects solidifies the text–don’t start without it!

Table of contents

  1. About This eBook
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright Page
  4. Also Available from DORSET HOUSE PUBLISHING CO.
  5. Dedication Page
  6. Acknowledgments
  7. Permissions Acknowledgments
  8. Contents
  9. Foreword
  10. Preface
    1. Three Central Questions
    2. A Strategy for Reading This Book
    3. What This Book Is Not About
  11. Chapter One. An Introduction to Measurement Issues
  12. Chapter Two. A Closer Look at Measurement Dysfunction
  13. Chapter Three. The Intended Uses of Measurement in Organizations
    1. Motivational Measurement
    2. Informational Measurement
    3. Segregating Information By Intended Use
  14. Chapter Four. How Economists Approach the Measurement Problem
    1. Balancing Cost and Benefit Associated with Agent Effort
    2. The Effort Mix Problem
  15. Chapter Five. Constructing a Model of Measurement and Dysfunction
    1. The Importance of the Customer
    2. What the Customer Wants
    3. Extra Effort versus Incentive Distortion
  16. Chapter Six. Bringing Internal Motivation into the Model
    1. The Observability of Effort
    2. Model Assumptions
  17. Chapter Seven. Three Ways of Supervising the Agent
    1. No Supervision
    2. Full Supervision
    3. Partial Supervision
  18. Chapter Eight. Designing Incentive Systems
    1. A Better Model of Organizational Incentives
  19. Chapter Nine. A Summary of the Model
    1. The Model Setup
    2. Three Ways of Supervising the Agent
    3. The Principal’s Solution
  20. Chapter Ten. Measurement and Internal Motivation
    1. Internal versus External Motivation
    2. Delegatory Management
    3. The Conflict Between Measurement-Based and Delegatory Management
  21. Chapter Eleven. Comparing Delegatory and Measurement-Based Management
  22. Chapter Twelve. When Neither Management Method Seems Recommended
    1. Measurement versus Delegation in Real Organizations
  23. Chapter Thirteen. Purely Informational Measurement
  24. Chapter Fourteen. How Dysfunction Arises and Persists
    1. The Earnest Explanation of Dysfunction: A Systematic Error by the Principal
    2. Misguided Reflexes, Folly, and the Mystique of Quantity
    3. The Difficulty of the Principal’s Inference Problem
  25. Chapter Fifteen. The Cynical Explanation of Dysfunction
    1. Delegation Costs, Inevitable Dysfunction, and Non-Attributional Cultures
  26. Chapter Sixteen. Interviews with Software Measurement Experts
    1. Interview Results
  27. Chapter Seventeen. The Measurement Disease
    1. The Malcolm Baldrige Quality Award
    2. ISO 9000 Certification
    3. Software Capability Evaluation
    4. Similarities Between Methods
    5. The Nature of the Measurement Problem
  28. Chapter Eighteen. Societal Implications and Extensions
    1. Probabilistic Measurement
    2. Firm Integration Theories
    3. The Difficulty of Explaining Cooperation Under Assumptions of Pure Self-Interest
  29. Chapter Nineteen. A Difficult But Solvable Problem
  30. Appendix. Interview Methods and Questions
  31. Glossary
  32. Bibliography
  33. Author Index
  34. Subject Index

Product information

  • Title: Measuring and Managing Performance in Organizations
  • Author(s): Robert D. Austin, Tom DeMarco, Timothy Lister
  • Release date: July 2013
  • Publisher(s): Addison-Wesley Professional
  • ISBN: 9780133488425