Compstat Paradigm: Management Accountability in Policing, Business and the Public Sector

• NCJ Number: 214229
• Author(s): Vincent E. Henry
• Date Published: 2003
• Length: 366 pages
• Sale Source: Looseleaf Law Publications, Inc
• Publication Format: Book (Softbound)
• Publication Type: Program/Project Description
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

This book explains how "Compstat" as a management concept has been instrumental in enabling the New York Police Department (NYPD) to change in ways that significantly reduced crime and disorder in the city.

Abstract

Compstat is a management process through which the NYPD identifies problems, devises problem-solving strategies, and then measures the results of the problem-solving activities. Although the implementation of Compstat involves meetings between the department's executives and managers and the use of computer-based and other technology systems, these are only elements of a much larger management system that encompasses New York City's entire municipal government. The key strategy of Compstat is to decentralize the organization's management structure by increasing the authority, responsibilities, and accountability of frontline officers and mid-level managers. In reflecting the concepts of community policing and its problem-oriented focus, the officers on the street and their immediate supervisors work with community leaders and residents to identify their public safety concerns, analyze crime problems specific to each precinct, and develop proactive strategies for addressing them, followed by assessments of the effectiveness of the strategies. Compstat's tools--i.e. meetings, technology systems, data-collection and analysis, etc.--are means to serve the ends of this basic paradigm of proactive, accountable grassroots action. The chapter topics of this book include a review of the history of community policing and problem-solving in the NYPD, organizing a police department to focus on performance, how to achieve change in a police organization to facilitate crime control strategies, and the application of Compstat in security management. A chapter also discusses communication, information, accountability and results in the Compstat process. The concluding chapter summarizes the basic principles and precepts of the Compstat paradigm. A 260-item bibliography/references and a subject index