Collaborative Performance Management for Public Health: A Practical Guide

Performance management can be an uncomfortable topic within the discipline of public health. Written by leaders in public health performance management and quality improvement, this book carefully explains what public health performance management is – and makes a strong case for why it is needed to tackle successfully the long-standing health issues plaguing communities and states. Notably, the book eschews the need to invest in technology or to learn a new performance management vocabulary. Rather the authors advocate for more thoughtful use of the resources already available in the organization, relying on public health leadership working in conjunction with well trained staff to manage their own organizational performance. To be broadly accepted within public health, performance management concepts and models have to be framed and populated with public health examples, and this book offers a wealth of practical insights and case studies that may be immediately applied to public health organizations, from assessing an organization’s needs, introducing a performance management system to the organization, developing an agency’s goals and targets, to implementation of sound performance management systems and plans. Collaborative Performance Management for Public Health is required reading for all public health leaders and employees concerned with maximizing the health impact of scarce resources.

Amanda E. McCarty is an Assistant Professor in Health Services Administration at West Virginia University Institute of Technology. Previously, she served as the Director of Performance Management and Systems Development at the West Virginia’s Bureau for Public Health. As a consultant for the Public Health Foundation, McCarty has provided training and technical assistance for state, local and tribal health departments in the areas of performance management systems development, workforce development, quality improvement, and the development of evaluation plans and logic models since 2013.

Sonja M. Armbruster is on the faculty of Wichita State University’s Public Health Sciences program, and recently served as Director of the Center for Public Health Initiatives at Wichita State University’s Community Engagement Institute. She previously served as adjunct faculty for the University of Kansas Master of Public Health program. As a consultant for the Public Health Foundation she provides training and technical assistance for state, local and tribal health departments in the areas of performance management systems development, workforce development, quality improvement since 2011.

John W. Moran is a Senior Quality Advisor to the Public Health Foundation and an Adjunct Professor in the Arizona State University College of Health Solutions’ School for the Science of Health Care Delivery. He has more than 30 years of expertise in developing quality improvement tools and training programs, implementing and evaluating quality improvement programs, and writing books and articles on quality improvement methods. His past appointments include Senior Fellow at the University of Minnesota, School of Public Health in the Division of Health Policy and Management; President of the Advisory Board of Choose To Be Healthy Coalition of the Healthy Maine Partnership for York County, Maine; faculty member of the CDC/IHI Antibiotic Stewardship project; PHAB’s Evaluation and Quality Improvement Committee; and more than 20 years as an Adjunct Professor in the Graduate and Undergraduate School of Engineering at the University of Lowell.