• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

Recap

Triangulation is a principle foundation for a strong metric program. Triangulation has many benefits. The more triangulation used, the stronger the benefits. But the saying “all things in moderation” is also true with triangulation. You can overdo anything. You'll need to find the happy medium for you. Let's look at some of the following benefits:

Higher levels of confidence in the accuracy of the measures used to form the metric

Higher levels of confidence in the methods used to collect, analyze, and report the measures

A broader perspective of the answer—increasing the likelihood of an accurate interpretation of the metric

Satisfaction in knowing that you are “hearing the voice of all your customers”

A more robust metric (if you lose a measure, data source, or analysis tool you will have other measures to fall back on)

Confidence that you are “seeing” the big picture as well as you can

It is important to use triangulation in more than one aspect of the measurement collection and analysis, including the following:

Multiple sources of data

Multiple collection methods

Multiple analysis methods (across measures and the willingness to apply different analytics to the same measures)

Multiple areas (like Delivery, Usage, and Customer Satisfaction) or categories

With all of this diversity it is important to stay focused. Collecting data from different quadrants in the Answer Key would not fit the principle of triangulation. If you dilute your answers by mixing the core viewpoint, you will run the risk of becoming lost in the data. If you lose focus and collect data from disparate parts of the Answer Key, it is probable that you are trying to answer multiple questions with only one answer. While meta-metrics use other metrics as part of their input, they must still stay within the context defined by the root question.

A solid metric can lead you in time to metrics in other areas of the Answer Key, but only after you've done your due diligence in answering the questions at hand.

Conclusion

The concept of triangulation is not unique to the development of metrics and has been proven to be an effective guiding principle for using data.

Triangulation is a major principle in creating a viable metric program. It offers many benefits in return for the effort it takes to collect and analyze more data, from more sources, in multiple ways. Using triangulation on the Product/Service Health quadrant of the Answer Key garners you a robust set of measures to build your metric.

By concentrating on using a blend of sources, measures, and methods you end up with a comprehensive metric. You will have to still assess the metric for completeness to the question, but triangulation helps you get there with much less fuss and frustration.

Figure 7-3. The Product/Service Health quadrant

A quick review of the Product/Service Health quadrant (Figure 7-3) demonstrates this, as follows:

Product/Service Health Delivery Availability

Speed

Accuracy

Usage Unique users

Repeat customers

Referrals

Customer Satisfaction Annual surveys

Trouble resolution feedback

Interviews

You can have more than three components for any of these. For example, you could include “reliability” in Delivery or “frequency of use” under Usage. Many times, the measures themselves dictate different methods of collection and analysis. Surveys are inherently different than interviews. While trouble resolution feedback is normally in the form of a survey, the types of questions asked are drastically different from the general survey administered annually.

Each piece of information (Delivery, Usage, and Customer Satisfaction) has a different collection/analysis methodology, but within each set you can further vary the tools, processes, and methods of collection/analysis.

When you combine the focus of the Answer Key with the comprehensiveness of triangulation, you will find yourself ready to promote a practical metric program