I had a long talk last week with a guy we will call Joe. He works for a company who has undertaken a large data conversion project. Mid way through that project the sponsors became very concerned about the project’s status. Reports indicate the project is on track, but for some reason uncertainty prevails. They
In his book The Personal MBA: Master the Art of Business, the author Josh Kaufman recommends isolating two to five critical indicators, or what he calls Key Performance Indicators (KPI). These numbers should measure throughput and of a given system. The goal in identifying and following these critical numbers is to improve the system under investigation. At
When discovering and resolving issues two attributes are absolutely necessary. These are a calm head and an experimental mindset. Uncertainty is inevitable. The sooner this is accepted, the better you will become at solving problems. Having numbers that expose issues are of little use unless the system under investigation is improved. A strong increase in
