Performance measurement in the public sector: United Arab Emirates’ (UAE) state of the art

Abstract

There is an interest in the literature and among practitioners in the idea that public sector organizations should be managed for performance, but there is no clear agreement as to how this might be done. It is also unclear how the idea of performance can be measured. This article focuses on the critical question of what public sector managers know about performance measurement (PM), and how they perceive its potential for improving the performance of their organizations. The findings show that the overall public performance of the UAE local governments is excellent which is contributed by both financial and nonfinancial performance. Specifically, the purpose of the study is to review the performance management within the UAE public sector to assess the state of the art, and determine the present level of knowledge of PM among public managers. Finally, we suggest recommendations for managers and provide conclusions and research directions.

Keywords

• management
• measurement
• performance
• public organization
• uae