I used to think that performance measurement was about the techniques of selecting, collecting, analysing, presenting, and interpreting data to inform decision making. It’s true that technique is an important part of the process, but I’ve been excited to learn that performance measurement is mostly about the people.

If we want to help people, like our colleagues and leaders, to understand why performance measurement needs to be done better, we need to engage them in the right kind of dialogue.

Subscriber Sue asks: "My biggest challenge is that senior management doesn't want their strategy to be results focused or necessarily strategic - instead they focus on a plethora of new projects. How do you convince leadership of the importance of having a results-oriented strategy and making it measurable?"

Measure Up subscriber Ben is a performance professional in a large private sector company, with this question: "How do we embed measurement in an organisation without creating red tape?"

People agree they should measure performance. But they just don't get around to doing it. They say they don't have time, don't have money, don't have support, have too much else to do. If things are going to change, we need a different approach to engaging people to measure what matters.

There are three reasons why people will give time to things. Apply these reasons to measurement, and more people will give time to measuring, too. (more…)

Big hairy audacious goals are scary. So are stretch targets. So scary that most of the time we avoid them or ignore them. What we don't realise is, that by avoiding them because we can't guarantee we will meet them, we end up guaranteeing a fate worse than failure.

Are you shouldering all the burden of trying to get your organisation or company to take on better performance measurement practices? Stop the struggling today, and kick off a KPI Community of Practice to share the load and the learning.

There are still managers around who think that the way to make performance improve is to hit people over the head with KPIs or performance measures. We know they're doing far more harm than good, but what can we do to stop them?

Just because you think performance measurement is the duck's guts, the best thing since sliced bread, the answer to your company's woes, doesn't mean you can expect everyone else to see it the same way.