Personal Dashboards: A Cutting Edge Faculty Performance Evaluation System

Abstract

Northwest Missouri State University, a two-time winner of the Missouri Quality Award and two-time finalist for the Malcolm Baldridge National Quality Award, has a long history of quality in higher education. Dr. Dean Hubbard, university President for the last 20 years, has pioneered the quality movement in higher education. Northwest’s Seven-Step Planning Process has become a benchmark process that many other institutions have mimicked through the years. Quality is truly the guiding force for our institution. Many years ago, President Hubbard and his staff brainstormed the most important indicators of quality at the institutional level. These indicators are continuously monitored and revised through a data management device that became known as the University’s “Dashboard” system, not dissimilar in concept to the dashboard of indicators one can find in any automobile or aircraft. We have taken this institutional approach of driving and managing quality, and applied it to individual faculty performance measurement. We have developed a series of job performance indicators designed to help faculty continuously improve their own performance, and to help administers monitor, track and reward high-achievers, and motivate those in need of assistance.