Metrics_ How to Improve Key Business Results - Martin Klubeck [115]
The point is simple. While data, measures, and information about how well each worker performs in given situations is usable, it's not truth. I've already shared this, so I won't belabor it. But understand that you can't avoid the job of the supervisor, manager, or leader by looking at data. No more than a baseball team's manager can look solely at statistics to set his lineup. You have to know your players. You have to talk to them, work with them, and put each in a position to be successful.
I use sports analogies a lot. Not because I like sports (although I do), but because sports provide a great example of how a business can be run, how an organization can function. Table 11-3 shows a comparison of a sports team to a corporate team. You can choose if you identify it better with a professional, college, or high school sports team—just as you can choose to look at the company as either a large, medium, or small (mom and pop) organization.
The analogy truly has no bounds. You can take it as far as you like. You can apply it to any aspect of your business. Sports teams—college and professional both—are great examples of how work teams function.
If your work team were a sports team, how successful would they be?
When a sports manager looks at statistics for individuals and the team, she uses these to improve each. Her intent is to find ways to make the team as successful as possible. She can use the data as a starting point for conversations about the player's performance. And if she finds the player not performing up to the needs of the position, she will most likely try to develop the player's talents. The team has already invested money in the player. But in the end, if she can't get the player to perform at the needed levels, she may let him go and have to recruit new players. (I even like that fact that players are recruited and drafted—not “hired.”)
A good manager will do the same with performance measures. He won't use the measures to manipulate the workers into changing behaviors. He will use the information to work with the employee to improve her abilities, developing her as best he can. If, like the sports manager, he fails, he may have to let her go and hire new workers.
Remember, if the workforce is your organization's greatest asset, then the manager's job is to develop those assets to their highest potential. Sports teams know the greatest assets—and they are paid accordingly.
The manager's job is to develop the workforce to their highest potential.
Process Health Measures
You may want to measure the cost of everything. You may want to know how much each person is paid per hour (even if salaried) so you can determine how much laughter in the halls is costing the company. You may want to be able to show how much it costs the company for the annual picnic. Or the costs of equipment, facilities, and furniture. These measures are not the ones you need.
Process health measures are about the process, not the people. How much does it cost to perform a given process in the way it's done today? It's all about process improvement. If you can find ways to improve a process, one of the measures of success may be less cost to the customer, organization, or society.
So, how much does the process cost? How much does it cost for each of the steps? Feel free to include the hourly rate of the employees but remember why you're measuring it—to improve.
Most process-improvement methods are very good at measuring the right things. Besides cost, you'll find most want you to also measure how long it takes to perform a task or process step. How long does your customer have to wait for the service? How long does it take for you to perform the service?
One example, Lean Six Sigma (a process-improvement methodology) is based on flow and defect removal. Flow is all about how the process moves from point A to Z. Do you incur backlogs, stockpiles of inventory,