Bob Behn gets it. Sure, he sees what most people see at any PerformanceStat session -data and analysis, meetings with questions. Behn, however, sees more. He sees the feedback and the follow-up; the focus on purpose plus the delegation of discretion; the necessity of adaptation combined with a commitment to results. Most significantly, Behn sees the leadership. At CompStat meetings, most visitors never see any leadership. But Behn gets it: PerformanceStat is all about the leadership. -William J. Bratton, Police Commissioner, New York City
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Driving change is hard. Bob Behn's The PerformanceStat Potential demonstrates that achieving important public purposes requires leadership commitment, a set of critical operational components, and a new way of working. These are hard to pull off, and even dangerous for a public executive. Through a series of cases of PerformanceStat efforts, Behn teaches deep and enduring leadership lessons about what it takes to Reach the New Order of Things and why it's worth the risk. -Mary Bryna Sanger, Deputy Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs, The New School
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This is an excellent and ambitious book. It digs deeply into understanding how dedicated efforts at performance measurement can dramatically improve service quality in public agencies. At a superficial level, it's a matter of getting the metrics right and tracking them in real time. But at a deeper level, these numbers need to be monitored by managers who know and care about achieving results and who can lead others in their organizations in the same direction. -Eugene Bardach, Professor of Public Policy, Goldman School of Public Policy, University of California-Berkeley
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In The PerformanceStat Potential, Bob Behn sees with great insight and clarity the historic changes under way in self-governance. He contrasts the old ways of leadership that were ideological, hierarchical, and bureaucratic with new models that are fundamentally entrepreneurial, operationally collaborative, and relentlessly performance driven. As command-and-control gives way to effective collaboration, Behn heralds the rise of open, transparent, real-time, and real fast governance. -Martin O'Malley, Governor of Maryland