Council Performance Management

 

West Lothian Council has developed an innovative and comprehensive framework (the West Lothian Assessment Model) against which it can assess performance and improvement. This framework is supported by a performance management system which monitors performance indicators, initiatives and risks across all of the council’s service units.

 

The Report on Progress against the Corporate Plan 2007-11 (Nov 2008) is a summation of how the performance indicators and initiatives in the performance management system support the priorities and aims of the Corporate Plan.

 

The Publication of Standards of Performance Reports are required of the council under the Local Government Act 1992 and show council service performance across a number of ‘statutory’ indicators, collected by all Scottish authorities. For comparison purposes the current West Lothian Council indicators are shown against the council’s performance in the previous year and the Scottish average.

Downloadable documents

Frequently Asked Questions

Click a question to see the answer.

Do Council policies include targets?

Council policies may not include targets as they often describe an approach we are taking in order to achieve an effect. There will however be a performance measure or measures which show how well we are achieving the desired effect and the targets will be reviewed each year

Does the Council check that action plans are followed through?

Our performance management system will contain all the initiatives, performance indicators and risks that make up all the ‘action plans’ of the service units. Progress against these ‘action plans’ is reported and monitored monthly so that progress is ensured.

How are Council policies made?

Every year the Council becomes aware of a range of issues that require new policies and strategies to be produced so as to meet new challenges and improve performance. The Council takes on board the requirements of the Scottish Executive, public concerns, and developments in service delivery in identifying areas of work. Policies follow procedures to make sure that aims are established, that views are taken on board, that changes to services are identified, that specific actions are decided upon and that measures of the success of the policy are produced.

How does the Council know that services are improving?

The West Lothian Assessment Model framework has a section on ‘results’ which looks in detail at how each service is progressing in delivering customer satisfaction, staff engagement, the effect of the service on the environment and social aspects of West Lothian and finally how efficient and how effective the service is at delivering its goals. The information contained in this section is monitored monthly and reviewed annually.