Challenges and Benefits of Performance Management
Performance management requires an investment - particularly in the early stages when data-sensitive systems may need to be developed and enhanced. However, over time, performance management yields significant cost-benefits. States that do not implement performance management principles may incur much greater costs for substantially fewer benefits to the people their programs are intended to service.
Performance management provides an intuitively straightforward tool-a “scoreboard” approach – for the Single State Agencies to address long-term issues in substance abuse treatment programs across the State, including:
* Barriers that stand between need for care and the delivery of services;
* High treatment dropout rates; and
* Insufficient capacity to demonstrate improvements in outcomes.
Instituting performance management across a Statewide treatment system takes time and an investment of dollars and personnel across all levels of the substances abuse treatment system. In addition to costs associated with additional technology, planning, and other staff labor, this management approach also requires expenditure of political capital and the capacity to leverage both resources and partnerships. Despite these challenges, performance management yields both immediate and long-term benefits.
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