Do Your KPIs Pass the Ultimate Test?

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are a vital part of any management team's toolkit.

Get them right and KPIs can help you to lead your team to victory and success. Get them wrong and they suck up time and resources and frustrate all of those that are involved with the activity.

I was working with a team the other week and they had come up with about twenty different KPIs they could use for their function and they were getting stuck as to how to proceed.

I asked them to test their measures against the ultimate test:

"Can you use the KPIs to make management decisions?"

Great KPIs can help you make swift decisions that affect the outcomes for your business.

Effective metrics allow you to keep the standards you need in your business in place.

Well thought through measures guide and support your thinking, making you more effective and efficient as a manager.

The team I worked with applied this simple test and eliminated pointless metrics, enhanced others and prioritised just a few.

Develop your own effective suite
of Key Performance Indicators

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If you reflected on your own KPI suite today, would all of your measures pass this test?

Giles

About the author Giles Johnston is a Chartered Engineer who specialises in helping businesses to grow and improve through better business processes. Giles is also the author of Business Process Re-Engineering and creator of the 'Making It Happen' continuous improvement toolkit.

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