A critical analysis of strategic performance measurement in supporting estate decisions in NHS Scotland

National Strategic Performance Measurement Systems (SPMSs) for Estates Management (EM) are becoming a more common tool among governmental agencies and the enforcement of their adoption to the different operational (regional or municipal) units. In theory, governments assume that Senior Estate Managers will use the information provided by the performance measures for strategic decision-making over the life cycle of the facilities; however, there is little evidence that in practice this is happening. To address a gap in the literature this study seeks to understand current practice in the use of strategic performance measures set nationally for Estate Management strategic decision-making at Senior Estate Managerial level. The research looks at the healthcare sector, taking the case study of NHS Scotland. Based on sixteen semi-structured interviews with Senior Estate Managers across different Scottish NHS Boards, the study found that the implementation of SPMSs has a symbolic power rather than instrumental. The lack of integration between Clinical Services and Estate Management and issues related to the design reduces the potential of SPMSs to be an effective instrumental tool.