Performance in the Big Society

UK Prime Minister David Cameron yesterday announced his vision for the development of a 'Big Society' in Britain involving voluntary groups taking responsibility for delivery of public and community services such as libraries and community facilities. He said it is his mission to create a generation of volunteers.

Encouraging people to take more responsibility for change and to engage in issues affecting their local community has to be applauded. However, leaving aside the practical issues of funding and managing such initiatives, there are also some important performance issues at stake.

In terms of the Effectus Research framework, Cameron is proposing that UK society adopts a 'High Purpose' performance orientation in which performance goals are defined in terms of social and community benefit rather than profit goals or policy targets (as became the norm under the former Labour government). People are being asked to come forward and do things because they care, rather than because they will gain financially or politically.

The key question is whether this vision is reliant on altruism or whether an effective performance system - including strategy, objectives, incentives, penalties and measures, support structures and resources - will also be put in place to help make the vision a reality. As it is, the vision is vulnerable to accusations of being a cost cutting (high combat) exercise in disguise. Doubters also express concern about the scope of initiatives that could be included in the 'big society': for example, most people would probably prefer schools to be ran on 'high reliability' performance principles, with a certain level of central control and expertise, rather than left to voluntary initiative.

The future of this initiative may tell us a lot about how feasible a purpose-based performance model is in the delivery of public services, which may be profoundly important in defining an alternative to the market-based system which is increasingly discredited. Effectus will be closely involved in researching those organisations and initiatives forming the 'Big Society' to capture the lessons learned.