使用不重要的数字:绩效指标的潜功能如何解释其成功

Using numbers that do not count:how the latent functions of performance indicators explain their success

绩效指标正遭受严厉的批评,被指责缺乏准确性,鼓励玩游戏,而最终却无法提高绩效。然而,尽管这些指标的缺陷已被充分证明,但实际管理中使用绩效指标的情况仍比比皆是。本文探究的是,尽管这些绩效指标已被证明存在弱点和缺陷,但在哪些条件下绩效指标可以改善绩效结果。本文的研究案例是欧洲银行体系的压力测试,这是用于风险监管的一个备受瞩目的绩效指标。通过采访比利时各银行的风险经理以及欧洲央行(European Central Bank)、欧洲银行管理局(the European Banking Authority)和比利时国家银行(the National Bank of Belgium)的员工,我们发现,计算压力测试的过程本身就改善了绩效结果。它是通过培养银行自我调节的能力来改善绩效,这与福柯(Foucault)的治理理念相符。因此,从业人员和学者不仅要关注如何使用绩效结果,而且要研究如何设计计算绩效指标的过程,以提高潜在的绩效结果。

Performance indicators have had to endure severe criticism.They are said to lack accuracy,encourage gaming and ultimately fail to improve performance.Yet,despite their well-documented weaknesses,performance indicators abound in governance.This article asks under which conditions performance indicators can improve performance outcomes,despite these proven weaknesses and dysfunctions.Our case study is the stress test of the European banking system,a high-profile performance indicator used for risk regulation.Based on interviews with risk managers in Belgian banks as well as staff at the European Central Bank,the European Banking Authority and the National Bank of Belgium,we find that the process of calculating the stress test improves performance outcomes in itself.It does so by fostering banks’capacity to self-regulate,tying into Foucault’s notion of governmentality.As such,practitioners and academics should not only pay attention to how performance results can be used,but also examine how the process of calculating the performance indicator might be designed to improve performance outcomes latently.