Measure What Matters: Using Metrics to Drive the Right Behaviors
Metrics drive behavior. The question is “does the metric drive the right behavior?” This is an important question because either the absence of a metric or an incorrect metric can drive unintended behaviors. Getting metrics right is important to an improvement process. My presentation at FABTECH titled Lean Alignment & Metrics will focus on several techniques to help companies determine what metrics to use and then how to bring the metrics to life. One technique is to use the “input-transformation-output” model. Let’s illustrate with a couple of examples:
- # Materials Shortages:
- Inputs – open WOs and planned WOs that have material shortages (from manufacturing information system)
- Transformation – sum of open WOs with shortages plus sum of planned WOs with shortages
- Outputs – total number of shortages
- Supplier Satisfaction:
- Inputs – supplier satisfaction survey/feedback instrument responses
- Transformation – average of individual respondent scores
- Outputs – average score and trend line
