How are housing associations going to navigate their way using performance measurement through the unstable environment following the financial crisis of 2008?

Abstract

The third sector will play a major role in the reform of public services within the UK under the flagship rhetoric of the Big Society. There is a lacuna of research into third sector performance in comparison to the public and private sector, which renders this study relevant and timely. This three-paper PhD thesis makes an original contribution to knowledge in the field of performance management within UK third sector housing associations using a longitudinal, multiple case study analysis. The first contribution to knowledge is the development of a theoretical performance management model from a single case study analysis which encompasses trust, culture, and capability using empirical evidence to support the skeletal framework of change within a historically highly regulated third sector lifeworld. The second contribution to knowledge is a comparative study of performance measurement and management within housing associations and SMEs. The study revealed that both sectors were subject to institutional behaviours regarding their motivation for monitoring performance. These behaviours included coercive isomorphism, normative isomorphism and mimetic isomorphism. The study also revealed that the existing lifeworld was being steered towards a more commercial lifeworld via a process of colonisation from legal, power and financial steering media. This new environment will require clear and firm leadership. The third contribution to knowledge is the multiple case study analysis of leadership and performance within housing associations. The study revealed that contrary to previous research, this
particular part of the third sector does not suffer a leadership deficit, nor is it in an embryonic state. The study yielded rich empirical data which revealed multiple leadership types including servant leadership, transactional leadership and transformational leadership. The latter leadership type has led to innovative growth within housing associations. The study also recognised the tension of a social business which needs to remain sustainable within private sector disciplines whilst staying true to its values and mitigating against mission drift. The final contribution to knowledge is the extension of the skeletal Habermasian framework; this has included institutional theory which has been applied to public sector reform. The new framework unifies the earlier work by Broadbent et al. (1991, 2001) and uses empirical richness to construct a more practical model suitable for the context of social housing.

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