Can performance management and related best practices help reduce crime?

Evidence from U.S. police agencies

Obed Pasha, PhD.

Assistant Professor, Levin College of Urban Affairs

Cleveland State University

opasha@umass.edu

Public Management Research Association Conference, Washington, D.C., 2017.

Abstract: As performance management systems are gaining popularity in police agencies, they

are increasingly being criticized for their ineffectiveness in reducing crime and the

encouragement of abuse of authority. On the other hand, scholars and practitioners argue that

these systems can be effective if implemented properly with the use of best practices. This study

contributes to this debate by evaluating the impact of performance management systems and

associated best practices in improving police performance. An analysis of primary survey data of

over 300 U.S. police agencies shows that performance management systems are effective tools in

helping reduce crime across almost all crime categories. The best practices of performance

reporting to citizens and providing discretion to officers are found to have no significant impact

on crime reduction, whereas consulting officers in the target-setting process is found to

negatively impact police performance.

Keywords: Performance Management, Best Practices, Police Management.

June 3, 2017

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Police agencies are essential organs of society that are mandated to maintain order,

enforce the law, and provide services to citizens (Cole, Smith and DeJong 2015). In pursuit of

their mission, these organizations have gone through many reforms transforming their traditional

paramilitary-like structures into service-oriented systems (Coleman 2008; Trojanowicz and

Bucqueroux 1990). Such efforts under the New Public Management and Proactive Police

Management frameworks paved the way for the adoption of performance management systems

in these agencies in the 1990s (Bayley 2008; Thibault, Lynch, McBride and Walsh 1998). Later

on, best practices were developed by scholars and practitioners within the police as well as

general public management literature to improve such performance management systems and

mitigate their flaws.

Performance management systems are now well-established concepts that are

increasingly being adopted by police agencies in the U.S. and abroad (Bratton and Malinowski

2008; van Sluis, Cachet and Ringeling 2008). These systems are hailed for an improvement in

police performance on the one hand (e.g. Behn 2014; Mackenzie and Hamilton‐Smith 2011;

Shane 2010), and blamed for encouraging abuse of authority on the other (e.g. Eterno and

Silverman 2010). Other scholars direct our attention toward the weaknesses of performance

management systems and the absence of best practices that inhibit the success of these systems

(Crisp and Hines 2007; Mastrofski 2006).

This study contributes to this discussion by empirically examining the role of

performance management and accompanying best practices in helping police agencies improve

their performance. Previous studies have produced mixed results on the effectiveness of

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performance management systems in different contexts. Some studies (e.g. Dias and Maynard-

Moody 2007; Soss, Fording and Schram 2011) found negative or no effects of performance

management on actual performance improvement, while others (e.g. Dee and Wyckoff 2015;

Gershenson 2016; Sun and Van Ryzin 2012) found positive effects of performance management

on organizational performance.

In a recently published meta-analysis on the impact of performance management systems,

Gerrish (2016) concludes that the success of these systems hinges on the associated best

practices of benchmarking and bottom-up decision-making. Other scholars emphasize the

importance of best practices of managerial discretion and external communication in designing

effective performance management systems (Melkers and Willoughby 2005; Nielsen 2013).

Building on past research, this study contributes to the literature by evaluating the role of

performance management and associated best practices of officer consultation in target-setting,

sharing performance information with citizens, and providing discretion to employees. These

practices are relevant to the policing literature (Moore and Braga 2003; Shane 2010),

performance management literature (Gerrish 2016; Nielsen 2013), and goal-setting theory

(Miner 2005). This study answers the call of scholars such as Overman and Boyd (1994) and

Lurey and Raisinghani (2001), who emphasize the need to test best practices in different contexts

to verify previous findings and search for generalizable theories of management.

An OLS regression analysis of over 300 small-medium size U.S. police agencies shows

that performance management is significantly related to an increase in police performance. The

practices of reporting performance to citizens and providing discretion to officers were found not

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to be associated with performance, whereas consulting with employees in the target-setting

process was found to be negatively associated with police performance. These results support the

general trend in police agencies toward adopting performance management systems. However,

the null and negative impacts of the related best practices question the focus of these agencies on

officer empowerment and public outreach to improve organizational performance. These results

also highlight the importance of evaluating best practices in different contexts to separate the

universally beneficial practices from context-specific ones.

THE IMPACT OF PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT AND ASSOCIATED BEST

PRACTICES ON POLICE PERFORMANCE

Best practices are procedures that enhance organizational dynamism and capability

(Zahra and George 2002). These practices typically emerge out of theory, empirical research, and

practitioner experience, and are disseminated industry-wide to improve organizational operations

(Gerrish 2016; Reijers and Mansar 2005). The absorption capacity literature (see Cohen and

Levinthal 1990) argues that organizations which adopt these practices sooner perform better and

gain a competitive advantage over their counterparts. In their model showing the impact of the

adoption and implementation of best practices on organizational performance, Zahra and George

(2002) propose that the more an organization acquires, assimilates, and exploits such practices,

the more likely it will out-perform other organizations.

These practices, however, may not always be effective, have differential impact in

diverse contexts, or are dependent on the presence (or absence) of other management practices

(Bracmort, Engel and Frankenberger 2004). Not only can these practices be faulty and weak,

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they can also become irrelevant with time or work only in specific conditions (Newell et al.

2003). It is thus important to selectively observe sets of best practices in different contexts to

save resources, enhance the literature, verify previous findings, and extract better results for

organizations while searching for generalizable theories of management (Lurey and Raisinghani

2001; Overman and Boyd 1994).

Examining the use of best practices associated with performance management is

especially crucial in police agencies as the success of these systems is complicated and daunting

for these organizations (Ashby, Irving and Longley 2007). Police agencies have to maintain a

balance between the demands of the community, social justice, organizational flexibility,

budgeted resources, accountability, fairness, efficiency, and effectiveness (den Heyer, 2011).

Furthermore, there are many problems that have accompanied the use of these systems, such as

abuse of authority, increased sense of marginalization among communities, and data

manipulation (Eterno and Silverman 2010). It is thus important to determine to what extent

performance management practices are important for organizational success.

Following the examples of best practice evaluation research in the business sector (e.g.

Barczak, Griffin and Kahn 2009; Schiffauerova and Thomson 2006; Reijers and Mansar 2005),

this study contributes to the public management and police literature by evaluating three of the

most common best practices relevant to performance management in police organizations:

bottom-up consultation processes, effective external communication, and manager discretion.

These practices are selected due to their emerging importance in the performance management

literature (see Gerrish 2016; Nielsen 2013) as well as their central role in the New Public

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Management movement emphasizing employee discretion, accountability, and consultation

(Osborne 1993; Pollitt and Bouckaert 2011). They form the core of goal-setting theory with its

emphasis on setting clear and challenging goals, internalizing performance targets, and

disseminating performance information. This list of best practices is not complete. It excludes

other important practices such as providing leadership support and training opportunities or

facilitating discussion forums (de Lancer Julnes and Holzer 2001; Kroll and Moynihan 2015;

Moynihan and Pandey 2010; Moynihan, Pandey and Wright 2012).

Performance management

Moynihan (2008, 5) defines performance management as a “system that generates

performance information through strategic planning and performance measurement routines and

that connects this information to decision values, where, ideally, the information influences a

range of possible decisions”. There are, hence, three components of performance management:

strategic planning, performance measurement, and taking actions based on the information

generated through strategic planning and performance measurement. Strategic planning

establishes a direction for the organization, sets broad and specific objectives at various levels in

the organization, and identifies action pathways to reach goals (Poister 2010). Performance

measurement deals with targeting what is to be measured, selecting the indicators, collecting and

analyzing the data, and reporting the results (Halligan, Bouckaert and Van Dooren 2010, 25).

Finally, the action component uses the information generated through the above two components

to make decisions regarding human resources, capital management, information technology,

leadership, and result-based management capacities to improve organizational performance

(Ingraham 2007).

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The beneficial impact of performance management on organizational performance is

supported by goal-setting theory, as “working toward a determinate goal would lead to a higher

level of task interest than would be the case with an abstract goal such as do your best” (Locke

and Bryan 1967, 121). When an organization assigns goals and measures an entity, it conveys to

its employees what it values most and helps establish the importance of the measured entity

among the employees (Locke and Latham 2002). Performance management systems allow these

goals to be expressed through measurable indicators, track employee achievement, and use

performance information to make informed decisions. They help employees gain feedback about

their performance and learn what is expected from them, and also serve the purpose of holding

employees accountable by reducing the information gap between the principals and their agents

(Moynihan 2008). Performance management systems, thus, can help improve organizational

performance by motivating employees and holding them accountable toward the achievement of

organizational goals. The effectiveness of performance management is supported by earlier

studies including Poister, Pasha and Edwards (2013) and Sun and Van Ryzin (2012). See Gerrish

(2016) for a meta-analysis.

Hypothesis 1: A higher use of performance management will help increase organizational

performance.

Employee Consultation in the Target-Setting Process

The importance of including street-level bureaucrats in the decision-making process can

be best understood through the principal-agent perspective, which argues that front-line

employees have more information regarding the on-ground situation than the higher officials in

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any organization. Lower-tier employees may use this information imbalance to sabotage the

goals of the principal through deliberate poor implementation. Alternatively, they may share this

knowledge with their superiors to support the organizational mission (Barnow and Heinrich

2010; Oldham and Hackman 2010). Consulting employees in the decision-making process

provides them an avenue to share their knowledge and ideas with organizational leaders and their

peers. Involving employees in the consultation process also helps increase job satisfaction among

employees, fosters a shared vision within the organization, strengthens employee commitment

toward achieving those goals, and helps reduce the chances of perverse behavior and

dysfunctional opportunism (Miner 2005). Through consultation, the lower tier employees get the

opportunity to take initiative, bring new ideas to the discussion, and learn through collectively

thinking about decisions and their implications (Vroom 2003).

This practice is related to the acceptance component of goal-setting theory, which argues

that goals can help increase employee motivation when they are accepted and internalized by

employees (Miner 2005). Employee consultation in the target-setting process helps build

congruence between the individual and organizational goals, subsequently increasing the goal-

commitment of employees (Jennings and Haist 2004). Also, consulting employees before setting

performance targets helps them take ownership of these targets, and also ensures that they are

realistic (Brehm and Gates 1997; Wright 2004; Yang and Pandey 2009). The consultation

process, thus, helps reduce the chances of performance targets being set too high, which might

reduce the motivation levels of employees who would fail to reach those targets even after

maximum effort. In sum, involving employees in the target-setting process helps them internalize

the targets, take ownership, and subsequently put higher effort in reaching those targets.

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Hypothesis 2: A higher use of officer consultation in target-setting will help increase

organizational performance.

Performance Reporting to Citizens

Sharing performance information with citizens is a recognized practice that encourages

transparency, accountability, and performance improvement (Hibbard, Stockard and Tusler

2005). Public performance reports make agencies answerable to the public, enabling citizens to

be aware of the organizational outcomes and voice concerns if they view performance levels

dropping below expectations. This practice helps maintain accountability, as poor performance

of a public agency may attract negative citizen and media attention, forcing the agency to take

actions to rectify performance issues in order to protect its reputation (Cunningham and Harris

2005).

In addition to accountability, public reporting also helps motivate agencies to improve

performance (Miner 2005). Employees use performance information to enhance their self-worth,

gain public recognition, and impress their superiors and peers when they perform well (Latham

and Pinder 2005). The positive emotions associated with success then motivate the employees to

increase their level of effort to continue gaining recognition. Public performance reports also

generate competition among police agencies to outperform other departments in the region

(Marshall et al. 2000).

Public reports, however, may also have negative consequences such as encouraging

officers to engage in gaming and data manipulation to avoid embarrassment (Eterno and

Silverman 2010). These reports may create unnecessary pressure on officials, especially for

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outcome performance metrics such as crime reduction, which may not always be under police

control. Indeed, police agencies only have so much control on crime rates, as they are impacted

by a host of other factors including economy, male-female ratio, and abortion laws (Blumstein

and Rosenfeld 2008). A failure to reduce crime under such circumstances even after utmost

effort may unfairly dent the public image of police agencies and demoralize officers. As a result,

police officers may stay away from crime hotspots in their jurisdictions if they know that those

crime incidents would not be reported. This is especially worrisome for crimes occurring in areas

populated by marginalized populations, who are less likely to report crime.

Nevertheless, Moore (2003) argues that the public nature of performance reports puts

pressure on the police to improve performance, as the citizens may ask skeptical questions and

raise concerns over increasing levels of crime in neighborhoods. Choosing Gardena Police

Department (California) as an exemplary model for a performance measurement system, Burnett

(2007) found that the department made an effort to disperse performance reports in a timely

manner through e-mails, print, and bulletin boards. Moore and Braga (2003) note that user-

friendly reports played an important part in making the New York Police Department (NYPD)

successful. In sum, making performance reports public helps improve police performance as

officers desire to gain recognition through better performance and are held accountable for poor

performance.

Hypothesis 3: Performance reporting to citizens will help increase organizational performance.

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Employee Discretion

Lipsky (1980) argues that some level of discretion is inevitable for street-level

bureaucrats due to uncertain conditions and ambiguous policy goals for public organizations.

Front-line officials typically have the discretion to make ethical judgments and take quick

decisions in unpredictable and complex environments (Taylor and Kelly 2006). Discretion,

however, is not inherently beneficial or harmful, as it may enhance employee self-worth on the

one hand but may serve as a tool for discrimination against marginalized communities on the

other.

Police officers are the classic example of street-level bureaucrats who interact directly

with citizens and have a wide discretion over the dispensation of resources, benefits, and

sanctions (Lipsky 1980; Hupe and Hill 2007). The issue of discretion within police organizations

is especially salient since a major chunk of police decision-making takes place in one-on-one

interactions, where the citizen(s) has substantially less power or say (Sandfort 2000; Sossin

2005; Pires 2011). Such interactions allow the officers to evade accountability or abuse authority

against vulnerable groups (Radey 2008; Fletcher 2011; Soss, Fording and Schram 2011;

Watkins-Hayes 2011). Epp, Maynard-Moody and Haider-Markel (2014), for example, show that

African Americans are stopped 2.5 times more than Whites when the officers are given the

discretion to use traffic stops to hunt for crimes. No racial disparities were observed for

mandatory stop crimes such as speeding or drunk driving. These attitudes within police officers

may manifest due to mala fide intent or as a result of cognitive load reducing techniques such as

stereotyping and routinization (Halliday et al. 2009).

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The rise of information technology is gradually helping curtail officer discretion through

accountability systems such as CompStat (Ellis 2011). Among the calls supporting a reduction of

police discretion, it is important to examine whether such measures would end up negatively

impacting police performance. In other words, is officer discretion an essential condition for

police performance?

In this study, discretion is characterized by the extent of freedom street-level officers

have in choosing the means of production and processes to achieve their mission (Nielsen 2013;

Verhoest et al. 2004). Providing more discretion allows officers to try innovative ways to

increase performance and have fewer excuses to defend poor performance (Moore 2003). For

these reasons, scholars including Shane (2010) and Loveday (2006) argue that performance

management in police organizations can only be effective in improving police performance if the

departments and their officers have ample discretion and professional autonomy.

From the goal-setting perspective, delegating decision-making power to lower-tier

employees increases ownership and commitment toward an organizational mission by decreasing

alienation among employees (Locke 1996). Lower-tier employees are generally more aware of

the on-ground conditions, resource needs, and areas of strength and weaknesses than their

superiors (see principal-agent theory). Giving them more discretion over decisions, thus,

increases the quality of decisions (Hatry 2006; Gilmour and Lewis 2006). In sum, discretion

helps increase organizational performance by increasing employee motivation, accountability,

and decision-making quality.

Hypothesis 4: Providing more discretion to employees will help increase organizational

performance.

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METHODOLOGY

Data for the study were collected through a survey of 1,000 randomly selected small-

medium city/town police agencies (having populations between 5,000 and 300,000) from a total

population of 3,309 such agencies in the U.S. Not only are performance management systems in

small-medium sized agencies generally ignored in the literature, their organizational and

environmental realities are significantly different from larger agencies. Emails including links to

electronic surveys were sent to police chiefs in October-November 2013, where they were asked

to respond to the questions pertaining to relevant management practice use on a 5-point Likert

scale, ranging from ‘Strongly Disagree’ to ‘Strongly Agree’. 414 responses were received by

mid-November 2013, yielding a response rate of 41%. After removing the agencies with missing

values, the final sample size stood at 308 agencies. The t-test in Appendix 1 does not show bias

between respondents and non-respondents on population, violent crimes, property crimes, and

total crime rates. Population density, however, is slightly higher for non-respondents.

Factor scores for performance management, employee consultation, public performance

reporting, and employee discretion were derived based on the responses using Exploratory

Factor Analysis (EFA), and used as independent variables (see table 2 and 3 for descriptive

statistics and survey items). Survey items pertaining to performance management inquire to what

extent an agency engages in systematic development of strategic plans, conducts situational

analyses, establishes goals, and uses performance information to take decisions. Employee

consultation is defined by the extent to which an agency includes and consults employees in the

target-setting process for units and individuals. Public performance reporting is defined as the

extent to which an agency shares its performance information with citizens using multiple

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methods. Finally, officer discretion is defined as the extent to which the agency allows officers

decision-making autonomy in their day-to-day operational activities.

Information on the control variables of officers per capita (police employees per 100,000

population) and population density (based on 100,000 population) are obtained from the

publicly-available Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) statistics maintained by the Federal Bureau

of Investigation (FBI), while percent non-White and income per capita were collected from the

2000 U.S. Census. Officers per capita helps control for the internal capacity and resource

availability of the police agencies (Kovandzic and Sloan 2002; Marvell and Moody 1996) and

population density controls for the level of urbanization of the police jurisdiction (Nicholson-

Crotty and O'Toole 2004). Percent non-White measures diversity within the population, which

has been found to complicate police work in previous studies (Bianchi, Buonanno and Pinotti

2012; Stacey, Carbone-López and Rosenfeld 2011). Finally, income per capita helps control for

poor economy, which is yet another factor impacting crime statistics (Nicholson-Crotty and

O'Toole 2004). See table 3 for descriptive statistics. Standard errors are clustered at state level

(38 states represented) to control for shared culture, ideology, or state laws.

The statistics on reported crimes are used as dependent variables, explaining

organizational performance. These data are also derived from the UCR. Crime rates have a

central position in determining police performance as recognized by the first Peelian Principle1,

and three out of the seven police outcomes defined by Moore and Braga (2003), namely,

reducing crime, reducing criminal victimization, and increasing safety and security in public

1 See Sir Robert Peel’s nine principles of policing published in 1829. https://www.durham.police.uk/About-

Us/Documents/Peels_Principles_Of_Law_Enforcement.pdf

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places. The other outcomes include calling offenders to account, reducing fear and enhancing

personal security, using resources fairly and effectively, and satisfying customer demands. This

study does not include important police outcomes such as social justice and fair application of

authority and resources. However, the impact of practices associated with abuse of authority and

police highhandedness such as officer discretion are discussed.

This study employs the Meier and O’Toole (2001) model for management that uses past

performance to control for internal and environmental differences between organizations. Used

by previous research on public management in education, police, and local government (e.g.

Kroll 2016; Favero, Meier and O’Toole 2014; Nicholson-Crotty and O'Toole 2004; Poister,

Pasha and Edwards 2013), past performance serves as a proxy for variables that cannot be

directly measured or included in the study such as leadership quality, employee motivation, job

satisfaction, teamwork, goal clarity, communication, organizational structure, managerial

competence, internal and external political support, or reward structure.

Following the previous applications of the Meier and O’Toole model (e.g., Poister, Pasha

and Edwards 2013), this study employs a time lag of three years between current and past

performance: crime rates from 2010 are used to define past performance, whereas data from

2014 are used to define current performance. The current performance year follows the survey

year (2013), allowing us to see the impact of the recommended practices in the following year.

The UCR breaks down crime in two broad categories: violent and property crime. Violent crime

represents an aggregate of sub-categories including murder, rape, aggravated assault, and

robbery, whereas property crime represents an aggregate of crimes such as burglary, larceny and

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theft, motor vehicle theft, and arson2. The results for the two broad categories (violent and

property crime) are presented and discussed in detail (see table 5), while a summary table

showing the impact of performance management and related best practices on the eight crime

sub-categories is provided in table 6.

The research model stands as follows:

Ot = β0 + β1*Performance Management + β2*Employee Consultation + β3*Performance

Reporting + β4*Employee Discretion + β5*Income per Capita + β6*Percentage

Minority + β7*Officers per capita + β8*Population Density + β9*Ot-1+ ε0

Here, Ot represents current performance and Ot-1 represents past performance.

Limitations

This study uses a cross-sectional analysis and neglects the trend of crime rates over time.

Not having data on the extent of time these management practices were established reduces the

internal validity of this study as well as the confidence in establishing a causal relationship

between management practices and crime rates. An extended use of management practices

embeds them in the organization as employees gain experience with their implementation.

Response bias is another possible source of weakness in the study, as the agencies which use

performance management might be more inclined to respond to the survey. Police chiefs may

have biased perceptions concerning their own ability to use best practices in their organizations.

In some cases, police chiefs might not even be the right people to ask certain questions. For

example, a police chief may have a high opinion of her own ability to provide discretion to

officers or disseminating performance reports to citizens.

2 See the UCR website http://www.ucrdatatool.gov/offenses.cfm for official definitions of these crime categories.

Accessed on March 17 2016.

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This study focuses on only one aspect of police performance: crime rates. Although these

are important indicators of police performance (Coleman 2008; Moore and Braga 2003), they are

only a part of a bigger picture of policing work which includes fairness, equity, and just use of

authority. As an example, strategies such as mass arrests might help decrease crime rates but also

result in discrimination against vulnerable communities (Eterno and Silverman 2010).

The external validity of these results depends on the authenticity of the UCR statistics.

Crime figures are self-reported by the police agencies in the UCR database and are prone to data

manipulation and misreporting of crime categories (Boivin and Cordeau 2011; Targonski 2011).

UCR figures for rape are especially problematic, whereas marginalized communities may not

report crimes committed against them due to distrust of police (Yung 2014). Trivial crimes such

as larceny and theft may also go unreported, while police officers might be tempted to change

crime sub-categories (e.g. converting robberies to larceny-thefts) to reduce their intensity (Eterno

and Silverman 2010). Data for crime categories such as murder, motor vehicle theft, and arson,

however, are more reliable as they are almost always reported and difficult to manipulate due to

the presence of insurance and hospital records.

Nevertheless, UCR are the most comprehensive, reliable, and widely used indicators to

measure police performance (Miles-Doan 1998; Moore and Braga 2003). Previous studies

comparing UCR statistics against other sources such as victimization rates, health statistics,

mortality rates, and citizen perception surveys did not find major discrepancies within these

datasets (Lynch and Jarvis 2008; Serpas and Morley 2008). The importance of the UCR database

is also accentuated due to an absence of alternate sources and a general acceptance within law

enforcement agencies.

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RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

This study employs EFA, allowing the survey items to align in an unspecified number of

factors based on Eigenvalues above 1. The results were extracted based on principal component

analysis (PCA) and Oblimin with Kaiser Normalization method of rotation (rotation converged

in seven iterations). Survey items followed the four theorized factors of performance

management, officer consultation, performance reporting to citizens, and officer discretion. The

test-statistics for the EFA and the pattern matrix are provided below in tables 1 and 2

respectively (see Appendix 2 for the scree plot for the EFA):

[Table 1]

[Table 2]

The results in tables 1 and 2 suggest a strong loading on the four factors. These factors

explain 68% of the total variance whereas the determinant of the correlation matrix is 0.042

(non-zero value is considered a strong fit). Similarly, the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin Measure of

Sampling Adequacy is 0.745, above the cut-off of 0.600. The Chi-Square value for Bartlett's Test

of Sphericity is high and significant at the 0.001 level, rejecting the null hypothesis that the

correlation matrix is an identity matrix. Three of the four components have Cronbach’s alpha

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values above 0.70, while the value of the fourth component is low but acceptable for EFA

analysis, especially when only two items loaded on this component with loadings as high as

0.761 and 0.864. The lowest factor loading in the model is 0.679. The descriptive statistics and

correlations for the variables are provided in tables 3 and 4.

[Table 3]

[Table 4]

Interestingly enough, none of the management practices are found to be significantly

correlated with crime rates (with the exception of employee discretion and 2010 property

crimes). This highlights the limited impact of management practices on crime. Only weak

correlations are observed among the management practices. Control variables such as economy

(income per capita), population diversity (percent non-white), and resources availability (officers

per capita), however, are strongly correlated with crime rates. As expected, table 4 suggests a

high correlation between current and past performance for violent and property crimes, and

might raise concerns for autocorrelation and multicollinearity. However, the VIF statistics and

Durban-Watson test shown in tables 5 and 6 do not indicate these issues.

[Table 5]

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The results in table 5 show a beneficial and significant impact of performance

management for violent and property crimes after controlling for past performance. This impact,

however, is not significant in the reduced models 1, 2, 5, and 6 excluding past performance.

These results attest to the limitations of management systems in helping with organizational

outcomes such as crimes reduction. Police agencies only have so much control over these

outcomes, as crime rates are impacted by a host of socio-economic factors not under police

control such as male-to-female ratio, legalized abortions, or even childhood exposure to lead

(Donohue and Levitt 2001; Edlund et al. 2007; Reyes 2007). It is only after controlling for a

wide range of factors through past performance that internal management practice emerges as

significant and beneficial for crime rates.

One factor score increase in performance management is significantly associated with a

decrease of up to 16.960 violent crimes per 100,000 population and 108.100 property crimes per

100,000 population (see models 4 and 8). These results provide support to Hypothesis 1,

suggesting performance management as an effective tool to increase organizational performance

after controlling for other factors. In addition to validating earlier empirical studies on the impact

of performance management (e.g. Poister, Pasha and Edwards 2013), these results endorse the

impact of performance management in a highly complex environment of policing. Performance

management is an established concept in police agencies that is gaining prominence, with the

rise and spread of systems such as NYPD's CompStat to other agencies in U.S. and abroad

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(Bratton and Malinowski 2008; Willis, Mastrofski and Weisburd 2007). These results suggest

that the interest of police agencies in performance management systems is not without reason.

The practice of employee consultation in the target-setting process for individuals and

units, however, is found to have a harmful impact on organizational performance, in

contradiction to the assertion made in Hypothesis 2. One factor score increase in employee

consultation is found to increase crimes by up to 18.020 violent crimes per 100,000 population

and 89.440 property crimes per 100,000 (see models 4 and 8). The results are indeed curious as

they belie theoretical expectations assuming an increase in goal acceptance and employee

motivation as a result of the consultation process (Miner 2005; Oldham and Hackman 2010).

These findings, on the other hand, support Nielsen’s (2013) argument that weak centralized

target-setting dilutes accountability and leads to goal ambiguity. Officer participation in the goal-

setting process is also likely to influence the process toward setting relatively easier-to-reach

targets, resulting in smaller gains in performance.

The results in table 5 fail to provide support for Hypothesis 3, as public performance

reporting is not found to be significantly associated with violent or property crimes. This is an

unexpected finding, since public performance reports supposedly increase visibility and

competition among police agencies and put pressure on these agencies to improve performance

(Moore 2003). Combined with the positive impact of performance management on performance

shown in models 4 and 8, these results suggest a stronger implication of internal performance

feedback to organizational leadership instead of external performance reporting to citizens.

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Citizens might not have the technical resources to decipher crime reports, or even lack an interest

in performance information unless they feel that their personal safety is at risk.

Citizen pressure on police agencies to reduce crime might be uneven and not connected

to actual crime figures and reports (Kogan, Lavertu and Peskowitz 2016), but instead are in

response to preconceived ideas about the occupants of a particular area or publicized media

stories (Ferraro 1995; Pain 2001). Indeed, citizen perceptions of safety and security are not so

much a function of crime figures but are instead a complex product of other factors such as

personal experiences, memories, reputation, and media stories (Koskela 1997; Koskela and Pain

2000). Police agencies, as a result, are likely to focus on other activities such as increasing

personnel visibility, installing street lights, and involving the community to reduce citizen

pressure mostly by increasing their sense of security instead of making efforts to reduce crime

(Pain et al. 2006; Roh and Oliver 2005).

The practice of providing discretion to employees is found to help reduce violent and

property crime in models 1, 2, 5, and 6, but fails to have a significant impact in models 3, 4, 7,

and 8 after taking past performance into account. This suggests a weak impact of employee

discretion, which fades away after we control for other factors through past performance. These

results do not support Hypothesis 4. Percentage of non-White inhabitants and the number of

police officers per 100,000 population are significant in the incomplete models 2 and 6 but lose

their significance in the model that includes past performance. Income per capita is associated

with a decline in crime.

23

Table 6 provides a summary of the impact of the performance management and

associated best practices on police performance in the eight representative crime sub-categories.

Control variables and past performance are included in the model but not shown in the table for

brevity purposes.

[Table 6]

Performance management is found to significantly reduce crime in 6 out of the 8 sub-

categories. The impact of performance management on organized crimes such as robbery and

motor vehicle theft is understandable as these incidents are almost always reported and it is

difficult to manipulate data due to their non-trivial nature and insurance claims. Police agencies

may employ geo-spatial mapping systems such as CompStat to identify the hotspots for such

crimes and increase deployment to limit their occurrences. Similarly, trivial crimes such as

larceny and theft may be controlled through strategies such as increasing police patrol and

visibility and/or the broken windows policy (arresting individuals for misdemeanor offenses such

as disorderly conduct). Performance management does not impact unorganized and pattern less

crimes such as murder or rape. These crimes are highly sporadic and mostly committed by

people known by the victim, and often go unreported (Yung 2014; Felson and Paré 2005). It is

extremely difficult for police to strategize against these type of crimes.

Employee consultation in the target-setting process is found to significantly increase the

rates of aggravated assault and motor vehicle theft. It seems that the officers influence the target-

24

setting process of relatively controllable crimes such as aggravated assault and motor vehicle

theft by keeping their performance targets modest, hence decreasing performance levels.

It is important to note that the counterproductive impact of employee consultation on

crime rates is by no means to suggest that this is a bad practice. Employee empowerment,

including consultation and discretion, may not have the desired impact on crime reduction, but it

may positively impact other important attributes such as developing teamwork and camaraderie,

decreasing stress among officers, or increasing job satisfaction and employee retention (Menon

2001). Similarly, reporting performance to citizens may not have a significant impact on crime

reduction but might help a police department demonstrate that it is answerable to its citizens.

CONCLUSION

The findings reported in this study provide support to the effectiveness of performance

management systems in improving organizational performance. These systems were found to

reduce crime across the various crime categories, even after controlling for related best practices

such as consulting employees in the target-setting process, reporting performance to citizens, and

allowing officers discretion. The general move of police agencies across the U.S. and abroad

toward the adoption of performance management systems is thus validated through these results.

This study adds to the growing literature on performance management finding these systems to

be effective in different contexts such as education (Hvidman and Andersen 2013; Nielsen

2013), transportation (Poister, Pasha and Edwards 2013), and healthcare (Poister et al. 2017).

Performance management systems, indeed, serve as tools to improve organizational

performance by setting goals, measuring progress toward those goals, analyzing performance

25

information, and taking action to improve organizational performance (Moynihan 2008). While

we consider the success of these systems in improving performance, their potential harmful

impacts such as data manipulation and teaching for the test should not be ignored (Radin 2006;

Loveday 2006; Eterno, Verma and Silverman 2016).

The null findings for public performance reporting and officer discretion should

encourage police leadership to rethink the impact of these practices on organizational

performance. The findings for employee discretion on police performance contributes to the

discretion versus accountability debate in the police literature. To what extent is it appropriate to

restrict officer discretion, especially if such a restriction would not impact overall police

performance? Similarly, the negative impact of consulting with officers in the target-setting

process raises the question as to what extent these consultations are appropriate and whether it is

a good practice to negotiate targets with employees.

Overall, these results highlight the importance of best practice evaluation in different

contexts, as some supposedly beneficial practices may lose their effectiveness (or even be

harmful) in certain contexts. Separating the universally effective practices from context-specific

ones will help improve organizational performance and build generalizable theories of

management (Lurey and Raisinghani 2001; Overman and Boyd 1994). In this respect, the

practices of involving employees in the target-setting process, reporting organizational

performance to citizens, and allowing officers discretion are found be ineffective or

counterproductive in police work, whereas performance management emerges as a successful

practice. More studies are needed to test these and other (performance) management best

practices in different contexts.

26

Future Directions

Future studies should employ longitudinal analyses to better ascertain the impact of

management practices over time. This study includes management practices as perceived by

police chiefs, while perceptions from lower-tier officers should also be gathered to provide a

more holistic picture of their implementation. Important management attributes such as

leadership and motivation should also be studied. Future studies should also include other

important aspects of organizational performance such as of equity, fairness, and just use of

authority. The difficulty in quantifying these attributes and a lack of nationwide statistics is a

major hurdle in including them in studies like this. In this regard, Epp, Maynard-Moody and

Haider-Markel (2014)’s discretionary traffic stops by race is a rare example of a successful

quantification of these complex performance dimensions. Similarly, surveying marginalized

populations to gather their sense of security and perceptions toward the police would also be a

helpful initiative. These and other such indicators should be emulated, expanded, and included in

nationwide datasets like the UCR to enhance future performance management research.

27

Tables:

Table 1: Test statistics for the EFA.

Test item Results

Cumulative % of variance explained by the 4 factors 68%

Determinant of the correlation matrix .042

Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin Measure of Sampling Adequacy .754

Bartlett's Test of Sphericity Approx. Chi-Square 1042.037 df 55 Sig. .000

28

Table 2: Pattern matrix of survey items including factor categories for the EFA.

Factor Categories Survey items Component

1 2 3 4

Eigen Value 3.59 1.46 1.32 1.10

Cronbach’s Alpha .80 .87 .70 .52

Performance

Management

- Our agency developed strategy through a

systematic planning process after analyzing the

needs, interests, challenges, opportunities, and

expectations of various external stakeholders.

.756 .037 -.088 .072

- We conducted a situational analysis examining

the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and

threats to identify the strategic issues facing our

agency.

.755 -.003 -.063 -.011

- We have established strategic goals and used

them to drive decisions and actions throughout the

agency. .782 -.114 .061 .041

- We have regularly utilized performance

information to revise our officer deployment plans. .680 .023 .028 -.059

- We have regularly utilized performance

information to develop strategic plans or help

inform strategy more generally. .679 .131 .135 -.044

Employee

Consultation

- We have regularly consulted with police officers

within the ranks before specifying performance

targets for our department and units. .000 .932 .023 -.016

- We have regularly consulted with officers within

the ranks before specifying performance targets for

individual officers or teams. .010 .930 -.025 .039

Performance

Reporting

- We have regularly published our unit and

department performance reports to the citizens. -.021 .052 .877 .027

- We have made our performance reports available

on our website (Please provide the URL for the

latest report, if applicable). .024 -.052 .866 -.006

Employee

Discretion

- We have given our officers considerable

discretion and autonomy in making operation-level

decisions to achieve performance targets. .077 .085 .044 .761

- Management does not interfere in day to day

decisions made by the officers “on the ground.” -.061 -.056 -.020 .864

29

Table 3: Descriptive statistics of the independent variables.

N Minimum Maximum Mean Std. Deviation

Performance Management 329 -4.488 2.130 .012 .978

Employee Consultation 329 -3.590 2.042 .005 .988

Performance Reporting to

Citizens 329 -2.309 1.975 .004 1.003

Employee Discretion 329 -4.310 2.106 .012 .978

Income per Capita 362 9194.000 81290.000 22275.199 8094.901

Percentage Minority 362 1.800 96.200 20.020 16.243

Population 354 6165.000 287559.000 44535.777 45380.713

Officers per Capita 354 31.932 665.354 241.962 88.741

Population Density 354 115.658 20104.319 2506.800 2103.916

Murder 2014 341 .000 50.281 3.619 6.406

Murder 2010 350 .000 39.223 3.416 5.528

Rapes 2014 341 .000 231.558 30.780 34.049

Rapes 2010 350 .000 149.010 32.444 24.219

Robbery 2014 341 .000 604.248 74.247 86.556

Robbery 2010 350 .000 651.089 89.981 106.388

Aggravated Assault 2014 341 .000 1225.269 211.783 204.278

Aggravated Assault 2010 350 .000 1331.624 238.304 228.185

Burglary 2014 340 8.701 2934.589 543.098 384.167

Burglary 2010 350 31.905 3894.990 724.275 534.019

Larceny/Theft 2014 340 163.290 12340.503 2284.700 1374.115

Larceny/Theft 2010 350 58.492 8079.386 2484.621 1322.216

Motor Vehicle Theft 2010 350 .000 1423.576 194.965 181.983

Motor Vehicle Theft 2014 340 .000 1093.693 179.037 167.523

Arson 2014 341 .000 103.581 14.070 16.884

Arson 2010 350 .000 133.273 16.986 17.644

Violent Crimes 2014 341 .000 1659.277 326.944 283.691

Violent Crimes 2010 350 .000 1989.191 364.145 317.733

Property Crimes 2014 338 278.198 14609.916 3014.331 1748.748

Property Crimes 2010 350 159.524 12021.436 3403.861 1805.564

Note: Crimes rates indicate the number of reported crime incidents per 100,000 population.

30

Table 4: Correlation table.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

1) Violent

Crimes 2014 1

2) Violent

Crimes 2010 .89* 1

3) Property

Crimes 2014 .68* .72* 1

4) Property

Crimes 2010 .71* .69* .87* 1

5) Performance

Management .00 .01 .04 -.00 1

6) Employee

Consultation .07 .03 .07 .07 .34* 1

7) Performance

Reporting -.00 -.03 -.03 -.04 .29* .16* 1

8) Employee

Discretion -.06 -.05 -.10 -.12* .07 .15* .10 1

9) Income per

Capita -.41* -.39* -.38* -.31* -.02 -.06 .07 .04 1

10) Percentage

Non-White .50* .54* .38* .36* .06 -.00 .04 -.01 -.31* 1

11) Officers per

Capita .44* .45* .50* .50* .05 .13* .02 -.02 -.09 .29* 1

12) Population

Density -.02 .02 -.10 -.09 .01 -.07 .00 -.03 .10 .29* -.11* 1

*. Correlation is significant at the .05 level (2-tailed). Crime rates indicate the number of reported crime

incidents per 100,000 population.

31

Table 5: OLS regression analysis of the impact of recommended practices on violent crimes.

Violent Crimes Property Crimes

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8)

Performance

Management

-7.798 -18.070 -15.750** -16.960** -37.270 -82.670 -107.100** -108.100**

(9.948) (12.310) (6.906) (8.232) (59.570) (72.020) (43.320) (4.860)

Employee

Consultation

24.730 13.710 19.640* 18.020* 177.100* 101.800* 92.930** 89.440**

(19.770) (1.810) (1.060) (9.113) (92.710) (56.710) (36.260) (36.39)

Performance

Reporting

-.345 7.827 11.490 13.070 -63.640 -44.170 6.158 -2.954

(14.520) (8.805) (9.350) (9.319) (114.300) (9.220) (49.620) (56.410)

Employee

Discretion

-21.400* -15.380* -9.576 -9.599 -236.20** -198.900** -66.410 -71.060

(11.360) (7.634) (7.289) (6.836) (97.020) (86.000) (49.640) (49.520)

Income per

Capita

-.011*** -.003*** -.045** .006

(.002) (.001) (.017) (.010)

Percent non-

White

5.348*** .402 2.280*** 4.595

(1.388) (.772) (6.414) (3.094)

Officers per

Capita

1.019*** .110 8.159*** 1.100

(.247) (.114) (2.139) (1.076)

Population

Density

-.000 -.000 -.000 -.000

(.000) (.000) (.000) (.000)

Past

Performance

.798*** .741*** .844*** .809***

(.031) (.057) (.050) (.058)

Observations 308 303 300 300 305 300 300 300

R-squared .011 .423 .780 .789 .024 .348 .756 .761

Durban-

Watson

2.032 2.121 1.972 1.938

Note: Crimes rates indicate the number of reported crime incidents per 100,000 population. Unstandardized

coefficients. The highest VIF score is 1.871. Robust standard errors clustered by 38 states in parentheses. * p<.05,

** p<.01, and *** p<.001.

32

Table 6: Summary of OLS regression analysis of the impact of recommended practices on the eight crime sub-

categories.

Murder Rape Robbery Aggravated

Assault Burglary

Larceny/

Theft Motor

Vehicle Theft Arson

Performance

Management -.140 -1.413 -5.578*** -1.07* -21.70** -76.09** -7.957** -1.774**

(.204) (1.270) (1.753) (6.121) (8.697) (36.95) (3.475) (.861)

Employee

Consultation .0245 1.656 .864 15.94** 2.448 8.96*** 4.808 .641

(.319) (2.245) (1.609) (7.205) (8.958) (29.17) (3.500) (.703)

Performance

Reporting .375 -.002 3.700* 9.585 6.890 3.343 -9.073 1.524

(.282) (1.528) (1.845) (8.169) (1.75) (42.51) (5.597) (.944)

Employee

Discretion -.260 -1.599 -.025 -6.885 -6.385 -59.66 -1.612 -2.055**

(.361) (1.717) (2.188) (5.243) (12.93) (4.86) (5.520) (.944)

Observations 300 300 300 300 299 299 299 300

R-squared .347 .293 .862 .709 .742 .748 .699 .331

Durban-Watson 2.108 2.083 1.996 2.125 2.031 2.037 1.775 1.983

Note: Control variables including income per capita, percentage minority, population, employee per capita,

population density, and past performance not shown for brevity. Crimes rates indicate the number of reported

crime incidents per 100,000 population. The highest VIF score is 1.819. Robust standard errors based on 38

states in parentheses. * p<.05, ** p<.01, *** p<.001

33

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Appendix:

Appendix 1: Independent sample t-test and group statistics between responders and non-responders.

Responded N Mean Sig. t

Population Yes 414 45097.96 .33 -.27

No 586 46018.33

Population Density Yes 414 2579.06 .04 -2.68*

No 586 2983.20

Violent Crimes Yes 414 337.15 .95 -.85

No 586 353.81

Property Crime Yes 414 3357.33 .43 .85

No 586 3257.99

Total Crimes Yes 414 3694.48 .40 .63

No 586 3611.80

41

Appendix 2: Scree plot of the EFA.