Key Performance Indicators
(KPIs) and Balanced Scorecards are ways of managing performance. They are
particularly challenging in areas that are hard to quantify and articulate. A
lot of my work for money involved taking technical concepts, trying to wrap my
head around them, then trying to make them easier for others to wrap their head
around. Understanding is incredibly hard to quantify. Trust even more so. It
takes years to build, and can be broken in an instant. Particularly if you are
looking for reasons or data points to not trust someone. Everyone is holey.
Everyone is flawed. A bigger flaw is looking for holes in other people. To look
for reasons to distrust. The problem with KPIs is the list gets long fast. So
if a task (maintain trust) is “worth 2%” of a year’s assessment, the
quantifying or checklist becomes a spurious form of false confidence. Easier is
to have a list of things you won’t do. Even better is to have an incredibly
short list (three key things), and to trust people. Trusting doesn’t mean being
a sucker. You can build buffers, checks and balances. But it does mean
accepting that not everything can be controlled or quantified. It does mean
building systems that aren’t designed to cut people off like gangrenous limbs.
