With its comprehensive scope and easy-to-read format, this compendium belongs in every company and academic institution concerned with business and industrial viability. Featuring scores of contributions covering the most advanced methods for the measurement and improvement of quality and productivity, no other reference can compete. Throughout 100 chapters, front-runners in the quality movement reveal the evolving theory and specific practices of world-class organizations. Spanning a wide variety of industries and business sectors, this handbook includes insightful discussions on quality and productivity in manufacturing, service industries, profit centers, administration, nonprofit and government institutions, health care and education. Topics include— Benchmarking The best way to implement an activity-based cost-management system Ten rules for building a measurement system Process simplification through cycle-time reduction Strategies for measuring and improving white-collar productivity Sharing the productivity payoff—gain sharing primer

Dealing with such productivity improvement programmes as action learning, quality circles, inter-firm comparisons and business clinics, this book also offers information on the most important areas in which productivity can be improved and on techniques field-tested in developing countries.

A productive society is dependent upon high-performing government. This third edition of The Public Performance and Productivity Handbook includes chapters from leading scholars, consultants, and practitioners to explore all of the core elements of improvement. Completely revised and focused on best practice, the handbook comprehensively explores managing for high performance, measurement and analysis, costs and finances, human resources, and cutting-edge organizational tools. Its coverage of new and systematic management approaches and well-defined measurement systems provides guidance for organizations of all sizes to improve productivity and performance. The contributors discuss such topics as accountability, organizational effectiveness after budget cuts, the complementary roles of human capital and “big data,” and how to teach performance management in the classroom and in public organizations. The handbook is accompanied by an online companion volume providing examples of performance measurement and improvement manuals across a wide variety of public organizations. The Public Performance and Productivity Handbook, Third Edition, is required reading for all public administration practitioners, as well as for students and scholars interested in the state of the public performance and productivity field.

This new book explains the Productivity Measurement and Enhancement system (ProMES) and how it meets the criteria for an optimal measurement and feedback system. It summarizes all the research that has been done on productivity, mentioning other measurement systems, and gives detailed information on how to implement this one in organizations. This book will be of interest to behavioral science researchers and professionals who wish to learn more about the practical methods of measuring and improving organizational productivity.

The question of how to measure and improve productivity in services has been a recurrent topic in political debates and in academic studies for several decades. The concept of productivity, which was developed initially for industrial and agricultural economies poses few difficulties when applied to standardized products. The advent of the service economy contributed to call into question, if not the relevance of this concept, at least its definition and measurement methods. This book takes stock of the issues met by productivity in services on theoretical, methodological and operational levels. The authors examine various definitions of productivity and the main methods of its measurement. A survey of recent conceptual and methodological debates on the notion of productivity is also presented. A more operational and strategic perspective is then adopted in order to identify and analyze the main levers, factors and determinants for improving productivity and, more generally, the actual strategies adopted for this purpose in firms and organisations. Providing a deep understanding of the specific and underestimated performance processes within service industries, this book will be of great interest to those involved in industrial economics, management science and public administration.