Performance Measures & Benchmarks

It seemed almost fitting that my last week as an intern started out with a trip to Mesa for a meeting with staff from the City of Mesa’s Management, Performance, and Accountability office. The meeting was scheduled in order to learn the steps Mesa took to implement performance measures and benchmarks. Casa Grande has been working on its performance measurement systems but has run into difficulty in having a successful program with meaningful measures. I had been to Mesa and talked to these folks before but this time I brought with me an entourage consisting of our Deputy City Manager, Senior Management Analyst, and another Management Analyst from the city manager’s office.

Mesa has a well thought out performance measurement system that rivals many others. I was really glad that my Deputy City Manager actually wanted to come and made it a point to make time in his schedule to come out with. I say this because what is really unique about Mesa’s performance measures are that it is driven by the City Manager, Chris Brady. I learned that he is a very data driven manager and unlike other initiatives pushed by a city manager, Mesa’s performance measures continue to work closely with its city manager. Every program manager meets with the city manager to review their program, performance measures, and benchmark.

It’s difficult enough for a person to be a room filled with all of the city’s executive managers but Chris Brady goes a step forward and challenges everyone to truly evaluate and be critical on the progress their program is doing. He’s not looking to put anyone on the spot but get his employees, particularly his management staff, to be constantly analyzing and understand what their program or department is doing. Mesa has not perfected performance measures by any means but has made great strides in making them a city wide function that is part of the management and budgeting of the city’s services.