The Power of Metrics

Its in the air, New Year inundates us with a string of resolutions aimed at improvising the status quo. Like any theory of goal setting would profess, achieving a goal is impossible sans objective and quantifiable criteria to measure it – or what is christened in more formal terms as the ‘metrics’ to identify the gorge between the objective and the outcome.

The art and science of designing metrics is akin to wedlock between the outcome we are expecting and the actions we desire to reinforce in order to expand the boundaries of future objectives. This brings us to the classic trade-off between quality and quantity or what we refer to in the language of metrics as the ‘efficiency’ and the ‘effectiveness’. This implies that there are two separate angles offering different views of ostensibly similar outcomes, the difference lying in the behavior that these encourage. For example, the capabilities of the professors in American Universities are measured hugely by the feedback scores the students give them on parameters like punctuality, covering the scope of syllabus, resolving their doubts etc. Arguably, the professor who is less stringent on the students, handholding and spoon feeding to the extent of a handicap might get away with a better score as compared to a professor who drives her students very hard via setting and expecting challenging standards of performance from them. The behavior of the professor is thus actuated by the metric that measures her performance.

At the risk of gross generalization, I offer to categorize the efficiency metrics as the short-term approach to building high performance as opposed to the effectiveness metrics as the long-term sustainable approach. In an organization, probably the sales team would be measured by an efficiency metrics like number of orders booked while the research and development team would be measured by an effectiveness metrics like the novelty of ideas generated. Unfortunately, the balance is amiss in both approaches. In the absence of a propensity toward quality the performance of the sales team would be similar to fleecing the potential of the individuals because they are considered dispensable. In the same vein, effectiveness without efficiency would result in individuals with no sense of urgency and hence eventual demise.

Having established the importance of metrics brings us to the most important facet of the whole game – the vocabulary of the language of metrics. Wittgenstein once said “Think of the tools in a tool-box: there is hammer, pliers, screwdriver, a rule, a glue-pot, glue, nails and screws. The functions of words are as diverse as the functions of these objects”. Structuring the vocabulary in a way that encourages and reinforces the required behavior is the essence of designing metrics.

This impetus provided by powerful metrics can fortunately be extrapolated to our lives. But the onus of setting these metrics, unlike in organizations, rests on our shoulders, multiplying the complexity of the job manifolds. The basic reaction toward setting goals for self is of pure ‘quantity’ – so we want to lose x pounds in one month, read y books every fortnight, stay z hours in office, reach w salary bracket in one year and so on. Unfortunately this is an unsustainable short term approach to deceptive improvement. Putting on the effectiveness metrics glasses for a sustainable long term view we would rather build our stamina x times, comprehend and apply what we read in y situations, balance work and life z times more than before and reach w satisfaction level with the content of the work we do. A slight tug and the whole view of the kaleidoscope becomes more beautiful.

The back of my college sweatshirt sported the words ‘journey is the reward’, but a tryst with the corporate world and cogitating on the experience brings home the realization that it would be almost impossible to walk on the chosen track without the quintessential milestones – as they say if we do not know where we are going we have to be very lucky to get there.