Understanding Gaps Between Objective and Subjective Performance Measures: Accreditation of Public Service Organizations and Citizen Satisfaction
研究了韩国育儿市场中政府认证（客观绩效）与家长满意度（主观评价）之间的关系，发现认证与满意度的正向关联在家长不知情或服务提供者为非营利组织时减弱，揭示了两种绩效指标不一致的原因。
Governments use various performance measures to ensure that public services delivered by private-sector providers are safe and meet citizens’ particular needs. These measures can include awarding accreditation and assessing citizen satisfaction. However, few studies have investigated how objective performance measures relate to citizens’ subjective evaluations of providers from the perspective of service users. To fill this gap in the literature, this study closely explores a particular case of the Korean childcare market in which governments administer a large number of private-sector providers that play a dominant role in delivering public services. Our findings indicate the positive accreditation–satisfaction link is weakened when parents may not be aware of a provider's accreditation status or when their selected service provider is nonprofit, as opposed to for-profit. Overall, this study suggests that it is important to understand why there is some degree of incongruence between objective and subjective measures and how these two different performance indicators converge in the data. Special attention should be given to bridging the gap by closely reviewing institutional pressure on service providers and a symbolic impression of accreditation.