How to tell if you're using the right process metrics

In practice, we often observe process indicators that are not related to actual process execution. In addition, process improvement measures are often faced with resistance due to acceptance of the measured process indicator. Too bad because Process improvements can significantly help you achieve your business goals and ensure long-term competitiveness.

In order to approach the topic of process indicators, you should first think about what make up good process indicators. We have a few tips to help you define good process metrics:

How can I recognize good process indicators?

Often ridiculed as a trivial criterion in theory, but highly relevant in practice: measurability. First and foremost, key figures should be measurable. This means, among other things, that the underlying data must be of meaningful quality. If process improvement measures are based on poorly measured process indicators, these often have acceptance problems. Only measurable key figures can be used for systematic control.

Conversely, this does not mean that just because something is measurable (there is a data basis), it serves as a good indicator. Instead, every key figure should also have a relevancy for your company and its management. An indicator of the relevance of a key figure is a stringent relationship between corporate strategy, process goal and process key figure. Our tip: Focus on a few key figures that focus on the critical success factors, instead of collecting many indicators that are of little significance.

For a meaningful key figure, it is particularly important that it comparable and reproducible is. Only this reproducibility allows conclusions to be drawn about the effectiveness and impact of controlling measures over time. In addition, the reproducibility of a process indicator increases traceability and thus its acceptance. Because of their easy comparability, numerical values are the most suitable.

A seemingly trivial requirement is that key figures should be as simple as possible. Die simplicity However, it is essential for managing processes. Key figures that are too complex obscure the reasons why the value of the process key figure has changed. The opposite of simple process indicators are therefore complex indicators. The simplicity of a process key figure usually decreases as the number of influences, so-called “drivers”, that change it.

The aim of a key figure is often not simply to measure an issue. Instead, if the key figure deviates from a target state, action should be taken to regulate. In order to be able to intervene as effectively and without delay in the event of a deviation, a key figure should, if possible, be in Closely related to time with their influencing factors. In practice, it is therefore often advisable to measure “earlier in the process chain” than late (cf. in e-commerce: “Monthly website visitors” vs. “Monthly volume of invoices issued”).

For entrepreneurial and business-wise management of processes using their key figures, the Measurement effort For the collection of a process key figure, not the benefit exceed from their evaluation.

Final appeal

Nobody wants a jungle of key figures that prevent interpretability. Record key figures. Key figures whose measurement contributes to real corporate management are essential. If measuring a key figure costs more effort than it is useful, discard it. If you steer a company from the reactive defensive, it becomes difficult to seize entrepreneurial opportunities. Therefore, record key figures where “it is still possible”!