Performance measurement in public administration: Selected theory and experience from Slovakia

Public administration significantly changes during last years. One of main reforms is switch from administration to management, based also on implementation of private management tools in the public sector. The impact and outcomes of such approaches are not only positive, especially in specific conditions of Central and Eastern European countries. Because of this such approaches shall be introduced carefuly, and on case by case basis. As the part of public administration reform Slovakia introduced the experiment to measure performance of state administration offices in four dimensions: professional quality of performance (the quality of administrative actions), client satisfaction, employee satisfaction, efficiency of performance - of delivery of products. Only last three objectives were met by the experiment, and it was stopped in 2003. In spite of this, this experiment may serve as important lesson for future similar attempts in any of countries of our region.

Keywords: government, quality and effectiveness, public administration, customer satisfaction, New Public Management, employee satisfaction, district and regional offices, cost-centres