A performance appraisal for politicians?
 

Alright, the idea here is to keep this thread from being yet another conservative/liberal/other party line shouting match.

Given the popularity of performance appraisals for employees throughout many corporations I thought this might be an interesting topic in light of the fact that Congress has voted themselves a pay raise for the fifth consecutive year. I'm not criticizing this fact, just laying out the context for my question.

Are there measurable criteria that our nation's politicians should be held accountable for when they are up for "review" so to speak? I recognize that they get a "performance review" each election, but that has little to do with pay raises.

I'm sure there will be some thoughts towards economic indicators and the like but, and this is just my opinion, I'm thinking along the lines of performance that they have a direct impact on.

Things like pieces of legislation considered, record of showing up for votes, perhaps some measures of how they're representing their own state's interests?

Here are a couple of areas that I think should be measured (the specific tools to measure these results not withstanding):

Effect on balancing the budget

Ensuring that our military is properly equipped, trained, staffed

Measure of how "reachable" a representative is by the people they should be representing

Number of times they do not vote compared with times they do (abstentions not counting against them, of course)

Anyone else care to offer some scorecard measures?

Interesting idea. It would be cool to see them explain why they did not me their goals for the year like many of us have to.

Performace appraisal is an independent media and community engagement with the political process. Now there's a massive disconnect between politics and society. Are you thinking of an appraisal system run by a "council of twelve", a "chairman of the board"; perhaps a corporate managerial system where the speaker of the house forbids a junior senator to speak at a weekend rally against toxic waste in their district until they've filled in all their TPS reports.

That kind of thing would only widen the gulf. Performace appraisal should be left to the people and we have a responsibility to hold our politicians accountable.

I fear a formal corporate style appraisal system would be commenced, corrupted and coopted by one party and then the other - just another cheap and sleazy chance to smear the opposition.

- How much pork they produce (reps with farms excluded)

The appraisal process could not be run by "senior" political hacks it would have to be independently run (something akin to a Congressional Budget Office).

As far as "Performace appraisal is an independent media and community engagement with the political process. " the media selectively chooses to report activities of our representatives based on what will generate the most ratings, so that's not viable, and community monitoring is virtually non existent unless the representative in question steps on some toes and people start digging.

Let's just assume that the system would be independently run (whether CBO style or something else) and focus on the measures that you see as important indicators of whether your elected representative is doing his/her job effectively.

Hi,

Thanks very much for this comment. It help me to think about my ideals.

We also find them more same at: humanresources.hrvinet.com/performance-appraisal-procedure/
Tks again and pls keep posting.

Performance appraisals already happen on two fronts:

One: the press.

Two: the Electorate decides whether or not to give the politician another term in office (i.e. the next election).

both of these are extremely biased, particularly the electorate.

Here is what pisses me off: A member of Congress gets tenure and receives pension benefits after serving only five years. So, a Senator who is a complete jackass, doesn't listen to his constituency, etc. - even if the electorate throws him out on a rail after a term, we the people still pay him money for his disservice from the time he is 62 until the day he dies. So, to that end, your performance appraisal is inadequate because turds still get paid.