Ultimate Performance: Measuring Human Resources at Work

A Common Mistake

When generating and using metrics, there are many mistakes that can be made. One of the most common is to mistake Performance Metrics for Diagnostic Measures. According to Dave Trimble, Performance Metrics “are high-level measures of what you are doing; that is, they assess your overall performance in the areas you are measuring,” whereas Diagnostic Metrics “are measures that ascertain why a process is not performing up to expectations. They tend to be internally focused and are usually associated with internal process steps and inputs received from suppliers.” (Trimble 1996) To understand why we are not performing up to expectations is to not understand how we are performing. That is, Diagnostic Metrics are internal, whereas Performance Metrics are external. However, the only way to generate accurate Diagnostic Metrics is to have accurate Performance Metrics. In the world of metrics we have to move from the outside in (this is a lesson similar to the one obtained from the field of baseball).

In remedying this mistake, four leading questions are asked (Trimble 1996):

1. Do the metrics make sense?

2. How do they compare with your existing metrics?

3. Do they form a complete set (that is, have you adequately covered the areas of time, quality, cost, and customer satisfaction)?

4. Do they reinforce the desired behavior?

Trimble’s questions will aid us in our quest to understand metrics in a variety of industries with the further goal of understanding what makes a good metric. These ...