Berättelser om resultat : Myndigheters utformning av resultatredovisning utifrån ett narrativt perspektiv

Sammanfattning: Bakground: Performance management has, for a long time, been a part of the public administration in Sweden. Arguments such as more transparency and efficiency has guided the implementation of this model, particularly at the beginning of the 21st century. One particular part of the performance management-model is the production of annual performance reports from government agencies. The framework stipulating the rules for producing such reports is broadly defined and vague with the purpose to promote local adaption for each agency. The theory of organizational translation stipulates that no idea can move from one context to another without adapting in some way to the new context.  Aim: With guidance from translation theory this master thesis aims to explore why government agencies’ annual reports differ from one another and why performance is disclosed in different ways. Both translation theory and boundary objects-theory where used to explore the difference in producing annual reports.  Method: This thesis uses semi-structured interviews with public officials in four different agencies and annual reports for 2019 from the same agencies to gather empirical material for the study. The empirical material where analyzed by using a narrative analysis to break down the annual reports as stories told by the government agencies.  Conclusion: This study shows how result as a concept has been institutionalized in the writing of annual reports but been given different meaning in comparison between the selected agencies. Further, the study identified two examples of how result as a concept can be re-contextualized to a local context of particular agencies. This study also found that key actors in the production of annual reports, the process managers, act as institutional translators for the organizations, as in translating the institutional requirements and expectations. Finally, the concept of results also can be given different meanings between public organization as well as within such organizations.