Tools for Decision Making

A Practical Guide for Local Government

David N. Ammons, Dale J. Roenigk

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• eBook ISBN: 9781000417081
• Edition: 3
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This book guides readers to the mastery of a wide array of practical analytic techniques useful to local governments. Written in an easy-to-read style with an emphasis on providing practical assistance to students, local government practitioners, and others interested in local government performance, this updated third edition features analytic methods selected for their relevance to everyday problems encountered in city and county governments.

The authors outline a variety of practical techniques including the simplest that the fields of management, public administration, policy analysis, and industrial engineering have to offer. Each analytic technique is introduced in the context of a fictitious case presented over a few pages at the beginning of that technique's chapter. Contents include demand analysis, work distribution analysis, process flow-charting, inflation adjustments, annualizing capital costs, staffing analysis, identifying full costs of a program or service, present value analysis, life-cycle costing, lease/buy analysis, cost-effectiveness analysis, benchmarking analysis, and more.

This updated third edition features a dramatic expansion of Excel-based applications, plus templates and exercises accompanying many of the chapters and available online. New chapters prepare readers to:

• use statistical tests to identify significant differences in performance averages;

• construct Pareto charts;

• develop cause-and-effect diagrams;

• prepare control charts;

• detect possible discrimination in hiring and appointment practices; and

• present analytic evidence more effectively.

This book is an essential resource for students and instructors of public administration courses on analysis, methods, evaluation, productivity improvement, and service delivery.

Online resources for this book, including Excel templates, are available at

https://toolsfordecisionmaking.sog.unc.edu

Part I Introduction

Too many local government issues are debated and decided without the benefit of systematic analysis. The choices made in such instances often suffer from the absence of insights that careful analysis might have provided. Sometimes analysis is overlooked because officials fail to realize that helpful analysis relevant to the issue at hand could be performed. And sometimes managers mistakenly believe that all analytic techniques are so sophisticated that they are difficult to learn and apply. Without highly trained analysts on board, they assume that the analytic task is beyond their staff’s capability.

In many cases their assumption is incorrect. Most local government staffs have managers, department heads, management analysts, administrative assistants, budget analysts, and others who, with just a little instruction, can quickly become capable of performing good analysis on a wide range of important issues and management problems.

This volume describes a variety of practical analytic techniques that are directly applicable to local government problems. Each is presented in the context of a fictitious scenario in a hypothetical community. The techniques are easy to learn and can be mastered quickly.

Learning how to perform analysis is important, but simply understanding the mechanics of a particular technique is rarely sufficient to ensure a useful result. Other factors are important, too. That is why each analytic technique is presented in a scenario, where an analyst can confront practical considerations beyond the numerical calculations. The scenarios allow the techniques to be seen in action. Furthermore, tables and figures display the products of analysis as they might be displayed to local government decision makers. For analysis to be effective in a local government setting, mastery of suitable techniques must be accompanied by:

• knowledge of when to apply a given analytic technique
• skill in presenting analytic information
• awareness of the political environment in which decisions are made
• sensitivity to the concerns of public employees and decision makers
• a realistic perception of the place of analysis in a government setting

When appropriate techniques are chosen carefully, applied properly, and presented effectively, well-reasoned analysis can play a role—sometimes a very important role—in local government decision making.

1 The role of analysis in local government

Too often, important decisions in local government are made without the benefit of careful analysis. Conclusions are drawn and choices are made in the absence of systematic assessments of alternatives and probable consequences, and often even without an assessment of service needs.

Decision making in local government sometimes involves matters as crucial to a community’s well-being as the development of long-term strategies for economic development or as seemingly mundane as choosing among competing bids in a purchasing decision. Whether crucial or mundane, a local government decision is much more than simply the logical product of careful analysis. Good analysis does not automatically influence decisions; in fact, the recommendations in carefully prepared analytic reports often are rejected in favor of other choices.

Few, if any, local government officials—elected or appointed—are willing to let the numbers derived from analysts’ calculations make their decisions for them. Each brings to office a point of view, an inclination to judge problems and programs from a perspective developed over a lifetime, and perhaps a vision of where the community is or should be going. Most have advisers whose judgment is particularly influential. And then there is politics—the struggle to influence the use of resources and the distribution of public benefits, the quest for control.

Personal views and politics play powerful roles in local government decision making, as they should. Democratic principles require nothing less. Too often, however, the perceived dominance of personal and political factors is used as an alibi to excuse the absence of analysis in the decision-making process.

There is room in local government decision making for carefully conceived, accurately reported analysis—not as a pat decision rule (i.e., decision making by formula) but simply as one of several influences. Frequently, the findings of a careful study will bolster the confidence of persons already inclined to favor a position supported by that research or spur to action persons already interested in an issue but undecided on a stance. Systematic analysis occasionally will reverse a person’s prior misconceptions—but not always.

The analytically supported “right” answer is not always the one chosen, and that may discourage an analyst or a manager who has devoted time and effort to the task. A few might even be tempted never to devote so much analytic effort to a problem again. But only the most naïve of analysts and analytically oriented managers would believe the fruits of their labor will sway every decision. For that matter, the same could be said about an operative whose stock-in-trade is political influence rather than systematic analysis. Few of the latter would abandon their efforts because of an occasional setback; why should the former?

Analytic heritage

Many of the tools for decision making described in this book are drawn from management science, industrial engineering, and, to a lesser degree, policy analysis. The first two fields, more than the third, focus on operational details. They offer an array of techniques less tied to statistics or to models requiring advanced training. Nevertheless, all three fields contribute in some manner to a variety of analytic techniques—even to some of the simplest and most practical.

Systematic analysis of operational details is most aptly traced to industrial engineering and management science. Frederick Taylor, considered the father of industrial engineering, was a prominent figure not only in the history of that field but also in the development of public administration. Taylor contributed much to management thought, including advocacy of methods study, time study, standardization of tools, and the use of task systems featuring bonuses for exceeding performance standards. His work influenced public as well as private management. Taylor’s notions of “scientific management” and...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Endorsement
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• List of boxes
• List of figures
• List of tables
• List of worksheets
• Preface
• Part I Introduction
• Part II The basics
• Part III Analyzing a unit’s capacity to meet the demand for service
• Part IV What does it cost?
• Part V Process improvement
• Part VI Other analytic opportunities and techniques
• Part VII Presenting analytic evidence
• Part VIII Wrap up
• Appendix A. Distribution of chi-square
• Appendix B. Distribution of t
• Appendix C. Future value interest factors
• Appendix D. Sum of annuity factor (SAF)
• Appendix E. The normal distribution and table of z-score probabilities
• Appendix F. Excel’s data analysis ToolPak: Installation, use, and example
• Index