After carefully considering alternatives, ICMA has decided to discontinue the ICMA Insights™ comparative performance management and analytics platform. The platform is no longer available for new participants or re-enrollments. Current participants will continue to have access to the platform until their current subscriptions expire.

In 2013 the ICMA Board approved pursuing a partnership to offer an affordable, top-quality performance management software solution for members in order to expand the use of performance management in local government; to create a national comparative database of performance metrics to help identify best practices and accelerate adoption; and to help cities and counties more efficiently enter data, analyze their own data, and compare data across jurisdictions, filtering for relevance (population size, etc.).

Together with technology partner SAS, ICMA launched ICMA Insights in 2014, but adoption rates have been low. ICMA will focus its efforts instead on advancing the practice of local government performance management as one of the key pillars of professionalism—providing training and other resources to assist local governments in their performance management initiatives.

“We’re obviously disappointed that ICMA Insights was not a sustainable initiative,” said ICMA Executive Director Robert J. O’Neill Jr. “ICMA will continue to work on building consensus around the key metrics local governments should collect so that cities and counties can compare with one another, share successful practices, and continuously improve public service delivery and internal efficiencies. We will also continue to advocate for the leading practice of creating benchmarking consortia.”

ICMA offers a wide array of resources to assist local governments in their performance management programs and activities, and we invite you to take advantage of them:

• Browse the Performance Management topic page to see documents, articles, questions and answers, and other features.
• Access a collection of Top Resources to see practical tips and case studies to inform your local government performance management initiatives.
• Check out the Performance Management and Analytics blog to hear from managers and others with ideas, perspectives, and advice to share. Subscribe to the blog and you’ll receive updates delivered to your email inbox.
• Search the Online Store by topic for digital publications.
• Apply to the Certificates in Performance Management program, which recognizes jurisdictions committed to collecting, using, and sharing performance information.
• Learn how to join forces with your peer jurisdictions to form a comparative performance consortium to benchmark with others.
• Read more in this issue of Public Management magazine devoted to the topic.

For information on how this decision may impact your jurisdiction if you are a participant, contact performanceanalytics@icma.org.