Everyone knows what metrics are and everyone will be quick to tell you why they are important and how they will help your business. In most cases this is true and with many organizations, these are indeed used correctly and can be very helpful in determining what is going on at a company. While this can be a great tool, what most firms have found is that these metrics are debated. There are times when employees and managers can disagree on what is important or what should be measured and with all of this going on, how do you decide what should be enough?
The first step in this process is to consider what is really going on? Is it really important? In other words, what does a company need to measure or does it simply suffer from measure creep? Many organizations find it hard to answer this question for fear of losing everything they have worked so hard to gain. One way to approach this situation is to use what some others call a feedback loop, here’s how it works. Take a look at what you have recently finished in a business area. What did it take to get there? Perhaps there will be some significant things you want to change and maybe you don’t need to be measuring them at all. If you find as you go through the process you find more needs are right then somewhere along the way you may want to cross the goal off the list before moving onto something else.
With countless other things to measure, how do you know which is the right thing to do? Is it easy to train employees in how to even figure out what needs to be measured or would the process be more effective if it was just a case of just getting the things you do see into a system? Doing all of this can be very time consuming if done properly. The answer to this dilemma may be easier than you realize, one of the most effective solutions is to treat people as beings. Whether you are asking employees to develop a metric or you are just asking them to make decisions on their goal, frame it in terms that include company, department, process, and humanistic. It may be hard to come up with 2 page brochures but it amazes me how the discussion can be made worthwhile when everyone has this same idea in mind.
What all of this is trying to accomplish is being able to go back and look at a report early in the game. In this case, just right after we come out of the process and not too soon later. This allows you to see all the things that have already been started. What’s great about seeking feedback from other people is that you may not realize all of the things this person is trying to take work off of themselves. A great tool that many companies and organizations use to gather feedback from employees is 360 degree evaluations. Under this type of evaluating system, managers and employees have the opportunity to ” candidly” give their honest appraisal of who they are as a person or what they think. 360 degree evaluations are great because they are able to provide both negative and positive results. Of course you have to consider the results that are capable to getting what they were hoping for. These results can help in justifying whether there is anything to be done in order to improve certain areas. This is also a great tool when trying to provide career and personal advancement for pent view.
Taking these actions will ensure you are right on track. A good technique is to ask questions such as: ‘If we areOUGHTto improve in ITopresponse time execution? Go ahead and rate your company right now on how effective our company is in this area. Now go back have someone confirm or deny any area you feel needs improvement. With this information you will see where time, energy, and budget should be spent or leaning later on.
Once you have collected all this good information, don’t waste them on developing fancy metrics that will be less than useful. The best thing to do is use them or they will all be abuse. Take these suggestions and utilize them and you’ll be on your way to measuring mission critical goals!
