I have been working with performance measures for over 20 years, and in that time I have witnessed minimal progress in the right direction. Deriving measures is often viewed as an afterthought. They are regarded as something we fill into a box to say we have achieved a goal. However, I firmly believe that performance…

Continue Reading

By David Parmenter Cascading measures down an organization was probably the most damaging process used in the balanced scorecard approach. There are four reasons why it does not and will never work: The answer lies with the critical success factors Having first ascertained the organization’s CSFs it is thus best to start the balanced scorecard from the…

Continue Reading

By David Parmenter Here are three ways that can help you transform your business. Performance measures communicate what needs to be done and help staff understand what is required. They enable leaders to give the general direction and let the staff make the daily decisions to ensure progress is made appropriately. This shift to training and…

Continue Reading

From my research over the past 30 years I have come to the conclusion that there are four types of performance measures, and thus it is a myth to consider all measures as KPIs. These four measures are in two groups: result indicators and performance indicators. I use the term result indicators to reflect the fact that…

Continue Reading

By David Parmenter Unintended behaviour – the dark side of measures Measurement initiatives are often cobbled together without the knowledge of the organisation’s critical success factors and without an understanding of the behavioural consequences of a measure. Every performance measure has a dark side, a negative consequence, like the dark side of the moon.  The…

Continue Reading

By David Parmenter This information has been extracted from David Parmenter’s Key Performance Indicators (4th Edition) which is the highest rated KPI book on Amazon. First lets define what a KPI is Well, a Key Performance Indicator (KPI) is an indicator that focuses on the aspects of organizational performance that are the most critical for the current and…

Continue Reading

By David Parmenter I have organised these answers into three sections Getting Started  What is a KPI, a CSF and BSC? Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are those indicators that focus on the aspects of organisational performance that are the most critical for the current and future success of the organisation. KPIs have seven characteristics, which…

Continue Reading

A Key Performance Indicator (KPI) “focuses on the aspects of organisational performance that are the most critical for the current and future success of the organisation.”   KPIs have 7 characteristics that make them unique and limit the number to no more than 10 for the whole organization: So, the Board of Directors get a different measure,…

Continue Reading

“Show me a company with over 20 KPIs and I will show you lack of focus, lack of alignment and under achievement.” For years organisations that have measured and reported what they thought were KPIs have not had the focus, adaptability, innovation and profitability that they were seeking. KPIs themselves were mislabelled and misused. Some…

Continue Reading