ABSTRACT

The Production
Model of
Performance and its
application on the
Traffic Police System
of Islamabad
Public Personnel
Management

FINAL TERM PAPER

By: Hamza Ahmed Ali BPA-16
 1

Islamabad is the capital of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and the 9 th largest city in the country.

Built as a planned city, Islamabad replaced Karachi the capital of Pakistan in 1960s and is

regarded for its notable greenery, security and relatively high living standards ( Shirley,2006).

Established in 28th of January 2006, Islamabad Traffic Police system was established with a

persona of being an eminent role model for the other provinces. According to World Health

Organization report back in 2012, Islamabad has been distinguished as one of the most

formidable cities with respect to road accidents. Pakistan was ranked 48 th worldwide and an even

more staggering as 1st in Asia for most deaths occurred by road accidents ( Zia, 2014). Now there

are many factors involved in this insolent trend of road accidents in Islamabad and overall, of

Pakistan. The traffic situation of Pakistan is galvanizing every day, this notably goes to the fact

that population increase in Pakistan and increase in the use of motor transportation has a major

impact, in addition to the weak and uncared law in order and law in order institutions. According

to WHO in a report published back in 2018, Pakistan lacks national vehicle standards, formal

certification for pre-hospital providers, has partially designed standards for the safety of the

pedestrians, incompetent non license drivers, no testing carried out in case of a fatal crash and

has no restraints on children seated at the front. Following the events of the last 15 years, almost

15,000 road accidents have been recorded and on accounts, the negligence and the incompetence

of the traffic police always comes in the account for such figures. Many other significant factors

involving road accidents include unsatisfactory automobile conditions, lack of proper road

marking, negligence caused by use of mobile phones, awful road conditions and over-speeding.
 2

These factors have a vase effect on the pedestrians as well as in the case of 2010, about 350

fatalities were reported in Islamabad, and astonishing about 55% were pedestrians. Efforts are

continuously being made in order to cope with this distress and has managed to incorporate

multiple techniques and strategies to manage this menace of road accidents and bring down the

number of deaths caused by accidents (Khoso, 2011). It is worth mentioning here, the cause of this

system failure does reflect the population menace, since due to the increase in population, it is

much more difficult now to regulate proper traffic control and mitigate negligence. Some of the

strategies devised by the Islamabad Traffic police includes the introduction of the E-challan

system and the ban on “double-Sawari” including compulsion on helmets. Speed cameras are

also an influential approach which is injecting positive fear in the minds of people to avoid speed

cameras by maintaining low and suitable speed. Our objective is to take a deeper look into the

steps taken by the Islamabad traffic police and their outcomes and outputs. We would be using

the performance model for production and would take a close look on accessing the impact and

effect of the programs inaugurated by the Islamabad Traffic police. We would also loom forward

towards accessing the problems and loopholes that would be appreciated in policy making and

implementation. Since we are using the performance production model for this paper, we would

be analyzing all the 15 elements involved in this model one by one separately (Aziz, 2014).

Let’s start with an overview, Socio-economic conditions of a region or a place is the focal point

of policy implementation whereas in our case, Islamabad appears to be the city with most life

ending accidents demanding a reaction from the concerned institutions. Our next element in the

list is the “needs” which suggests needs of the people living in a locality. In this case, the people

have a need to have safe roads and have a secure environment. The requirements of the people
 3

need to be served by the respected authorities in order to benefit them. The next step involves

taking the needs of the people and making them into attainable goals and objectives and hence

shape the policy structure in order to fulfill the needs of the people. The next step involves a

connection or a pathway which serves through some relevance which makes these goals and

objective relevant to the needs of the people. This connection between needs and objectives

makes the objectives relevant to the needs of the general public. In our case it's the need for

people to have safer roads because of socio-economic situations. These needs are then translated

to policy objectives by public officials because they have a relevance to the needs of the

residents of Islamabad. Now we turn towards the part two of the performance model which is

related to efficient output. This involves generating various inputs which are generally in a form

of finance. Here we have in a form of increase in band-form highways, advent of speed cameras

and other various policies and restrictions we’ve mentioned above. Mainly the purpose of these

inputs in to generate a positive impact which would be in a form of some suitable and admirable

output. e.g. All the policies including the e-challan and the over speeding policies generate a

response from the people which serves as an output. Furthermore, the output and its magnitude

are measured in terms of economy of scale which correlates both the input and output relative to

expenditure. In case of Islamabad, economy can be measure as the net expenditure on the inputs

as aforementioned over the impact it brings as a whole on the future facts and figures. These

ratios play a part in identifying the level of efficiency. The cost effectiveness is a subject to

inputs and their outcomes like e.g., the result of adding new personnel and adding new and

improved regulation infrastructure was a lesser number of traffic violations. Efficiency is a

matter of generating maximum output with respect to minimum input. Whether the needs are

fulfilled or not as an aftermath of the outcomes suggest the utility and sustainability of the
 4

outcomes. I.e. If the number of deaths and the road accidents does not reduce after the

application of all the actions then this suggest elsewise that the outcomes are not sustainable and

does not serve as beneficiary hence reducing the utility and sustainability. This ratio of outcome

to output serves as the effectiveness. The output in our case is fewer traffic violations and the

outcome is fewer fatal accidents in Islamabad. The next step in our performance production

model is the Immediate outcome which is pretty much self-explanatory. The Final outcome is the

major and decisive element as it declares whether a policy program has been successful in order

to reach a respectable result. In our case, fewer number of accidents after the policy

implementation would be the case. However, the context has a major effect on the ultimate

output of policy implementation. Unfortunately, if the policy program is being implemented and

there occurs a change in the political tenure in the country, the undertaking government would

rather prefer their own agendas and might undo the outcome or positive influence of the policy

program which would affect the outcome (Kaufman, 2005).

After a general overview, we will now discuss our performance model in detail. The Socio-

economic situation in Islamabad is undoubtedly well managed. In Islamabad, we have first ever

planned capital in the world. It is very well organized and managed by the federal government.

Even with all the effort attested to Islamabad, we are writing this regarding the number of

accidents in the city. National Transport Research Centre Pakistan report the number of deaths

due to road accident has increase in the last decade, significantly in the last 7 years. The report

suggests during the last seven years there have been an increase of 137 people killed in road

accident in Islamabad while another 200 seriously injured. Now this arises a question that why is

there such a high number of accidents which have occurred in Islamabad over the last one
 5

decade? One major concern could be the fact that there are about 31 entry points is Islamabad yet

not all of them are being controlled by the traffic. One other major concern is the fact that

majority of the accidents take place in the Kashmir highway and Islamabad Express which are

the two main expressways in Islamabad. The media has made its role prominent and hence we

have had multiple advertisement regarding the issue of road accidents in Islamabad however, no

proper action has been conducted by the governing authorities. Socio-economic conditions of a

region or a place is the focal point of policy implementation whereas in our case, Islamabad

appears to be the city with most life ending accidents demanding a reaction from the concerned

institutions. Moving on to our next element the “needs” which suggests needs of the people

living in a locality. In this case, the people have a need to have safe roads and have a secure

environment. The requirements of the people need to be served by the respected authorities in

order to benefit them. Islamabad is mainly a cultured and educated city with a contrast of public

and private enterprises and is the hub of Pakistan’s public sector and contains the parliament

house. Hence this city needs to be administrated properly and the institutions must rise up to the

needs of this city. The next step involves taking the needs of the people and making them into

attainable goals and objectives and hence shape the policy structure in order to fulfill the needs

of the people. In policies program which have been designed specifically for the Islamabad

traffic issue, the main problem, previously has been subject to parallel demands of the

institutions and priorities which were given more preference. However, this resulted into increase

in the number of accidents on road and with time due to the increase in traffic with no significant

development towards roads and mediums, this approach has been a sheer negligence on the part

of institutions. Immediate account in creating ambitions regarding the need of people is the

demand of performance model. This demands for setting objectives in order to get desired result
 6

and facilitating the needs of the people. Next step involves a connection or a pathway which

serves through some relevance which makes these goals and objective relevant to the needs of

the people. This connection between needs and objectives makes the objectives relevant to the

needs of the general public. In our case it's the need for people to have safer roads because of

socio-economic situations, involving various accounts for improving the current system in order

to get the required results. These needs are then translated to policy objectives by public officials

because they have a relevance to the needs of the residents of Islamabad. Now we turn towards

the part two of the performance model which is related to efficient output. This involves

generating various inputs which are generally in a form of finance. Here we have in a form of

increase in band-form highways, advent of speed cameras and other various policies and

restrictions we’ve mentioned above. Mainly the purpose of these inputs in to generate a positive

impact which would be in a form of some suitable and admirable output, as all the policies

including the e-challan and the over speeding policies generate a response from the people which

serves as an output, hence this would serve as an asset to improve the system and attain the

desired results. Furthermore, the output and its magnitude are measured in terms of economy of

scale which correlates both the input and output relative to expenditure. In case of Islamabad,

economy can be measure as the net expenditure on the inputs as aforementioned over the impact

it brings as a whole on the future facts and figures. These ratios play a part in identifying the

level of efficiency. Efficiency is the must resolve of every policy program because we want to

yield maximum outcome at the expense of least input, adding infrastructure and providing

necessary equipment to curtail the traffic issue, the input would be least and optimum. The cost

effectiveness is a subject to inputs and their outcomes like the result of adding new personnel and

adding new and improved regulation infrastructure should result in a lesser number of traffic
 7

violations. Efficiency is a matter of generating maximum output with respect to minimum input.

Whether the needs are fulfilled or not as an aftermath of the outcomes suggest the utility and

sustainability of the outcomes. If the number of deaths and the road accidents does not reduce

after the application of all the actions then this suggest elsewise that the outcomes are not

sustainable and does not serve as beneficiary hence reducing the utility and sustainability. This

ratio of outcome to output serves as the effectiveness. The output in our case is fewer traffic

violations and the outcome is fewer fatal accidents in Islamabad. The next step in our

performance production model is the Immediate outcome which is pretty much self-explanatory.

The Final outcome is the major and decisive element as it declares whether a policy program has

been successful in order to reach a respectable result. In our case, fewer number of accidents

after the policy implementation would be the case. However, the context has a major effect on

the ultimate output of policy implementation. Unfortunately, as we have mentioned previously,

all the projects are servant to sheer commitment and subject to time investment, outcome results

in time as changes occur with time and only after suitable period of time, we could see the

visible result of policy program provided no significant x-factors. Yet if the policy program is

being implemented and there occurs a change in the political tenure in the country, the

undertaking government would rather prefer their own agendas and might undo the outcome or

positive influence of the policy program which would affect the outcome. Such has been the case

of Pakistan in the previous few decades. Many policy initiates which have been implemented by

the previously governments were considered unnecessary by the next, hence change in the

political agendas subsided the long-term effect and outcome of a policy program. In the case of

Islamabad various strategies such as increasing the input and adding more personnel have been

overlooked and subsequent introduction of cameras and increasing the number of road breakers
 8

have been instrumental in the initial stages. However various initial inputs were not drawn out

properly. The overall output could never be monitored if we draw theoretical motives without

proper practical demonstration and exercise. In many strategies, reducing the number of inputs

has drawn to a less effective conclusion and less demanding result. The practical application is

one thing and theoretical design is another, outcome draws to both planning and implementing

which is unfortunate in the case of Islamabad. Many inputs haven’t been added and as a result

we have no real reduction in the accidents taking place on the National Highway and Kashmir

Highway.

After proper application of the performance production model and analyzing the significant

points, we can now conclude our paper. The application and the design of the performance

production model is a bit complicated and perplexing. The fact that this model is a bit too

shallow to make room for inter organizational support and has a whole performance model

paradox which is totally profane and unclear because of its inability to adapt to various variations

of ideal management types. Another issue is its idealistic approach which serves as hindrance as

in many cases the scenario is not idealistic and requires different increments. But on the contrary,

still it is worth many regards due to its significance in highlighting many important factors such

as innovation, efficiency, efficacy, effectiveness and effect which provide a complete framework

for high grade performance.

 9

Bibliography:

 Shirley, P., & Moughtin, J. C. (2006). Urban Design: Green Dimensions. Routledge.

 Zia, Y., Sabir, M., & Saeed, I. U. (2014). Pedestrian injuries and fatalities by patterns in

reported road traffic crashes-Islamabad. J Pak Med Assoc, 64(10), 1162-5.

 Aziz, L., & Khan, A. M. (2014). A Comparative Study Evaluating Performance of Old

Traffic Police (OTP) & New Traffic Police (NTP) in Twin Cities (Rawalpindi &

Islamabad). South Asian Studies, 29(1), 171.

 Khoso, A. K., Ekman, D. S., & Bhatti, J. A. (2011). Comparison of highway crash

reporting in Pakistan with the World Health Organization injury surveillance

guidelines. Traffic injury prevention, 12(3), 279-282.

 Kaufman, A., & Englander, E. (2005). A team production model of corporate

governance. Academy of Management Perspectives, 19(3), 9-22.