Measuring Project Procurement Management Performance in the Public Sector

Project performance has traditionally been measured with respect to cost and time, and widely accepted tools such as C/SCSC (Cost/Schedule Control Systems Criteria), have been designed to monitor a project's progress and performance in these two areas. The success of government sponsored projects cannot, however, be measured by these two criteria alone. This is particularly true for projects where a large portion of the project work is contracted to the private sector. In these cases, the project procurement function performed by the contracting authority plays a determining role in achieving the project's objectives, at least from a government perspective. This paper provides a solution to effective Project Procurement Management (PPM) performance measurement in the public sector. It also discusses the difficulties that one must face in attempting to measure PPM using standard performance measurement tools; these difficulties serve to illustrate both the differences between PPM and non-PPM procurement activities on one hand, and the "soft" nature of government activities as compared to the private sector, on the other. The challenge is then to balance the requirements for financial accountability (efficiency and effectiveness), the esoteric values that PPM must uphold (Equity, Prudence, Probity, Fairness, etc.) and the project's specific objectives. Although the proposed approach was primarily designed for a specific public sector organization in Canada, it is hoped that the paper will help stimulate further discussions on the subject in the much wider context of procurement in a project environment. The opinions expressed in this paper are the authors' alone and do not necessarily reflect the positions or policies of the