Improving the performance of your business month on month and year on year is vital, is critical and demonstrates strong leadership.

Metrics and results matter. And there is a whole load of material about OKRs (Objectives and key results) and ensuring that individuals, teams, divisions and change programmes fully understand their OKRs and the commitments they have made (or others have made on their behalf)

The OKRs are set, and then month on month, there is a need to demonstrate that progress is being made and performance is going in the right direction – is satisfaction and NPS increasing, are Costs going in the right direction, do you have the proper conversion and renewal ratios.

Tracking progress towards these results can lead to assessing how things are getting done – who is working on them – the consistency to the script – if assummed time lines of something that needs to happen is being completed on time.

This is all great and much needed – and when the results start going in the right direction there is a warm glow and a sense of achievement but more often than not gaps start to appear between the budgeted performance, the actual performance and the reforecast performance – external factors get in the way – assumptions around levers and drivers may have been too optimistic and ultimately what it’s going to take to change the stat has been under estimated.

If you want your results to change something in the broader system needs to change .. are you clear on exactly what needs to change to change the result .. are you clear on the extent of change needed to see the increase in performance and are you clear on what it’s really going to take to get that extent of change.

It’s often going to take changes to the way things are done, it’s often going to take changes to how things are done and it can often mean it’s going to take changes to the core infrastructure, tech and data in your business to get the step change in results.

Focusing on the result and tracking progress isn’t where you need to focus – focus on what needs to change and the progress being made in making that change is what will lead to the change in performance.

You need to be able to see the change – you need to have that traceability to cause and effect, to change and effect. You need to see that the people, process, data and tech is changing and that the changes are coming together to contribute to the changing results.

You need to be aware of the delivery dates of the changes in people, process and data but also what it’s going to take to deploy and adopt the changes to see the changes in performance .. if the changes needed to get the step change in performance are significant don’t expect immediate up tick in results .. if you are looking for single digit improvements in results then it could just be a case of small operational change rather than major transformational change.

People often say focus on the outcome rather than the output and I get that but for me it’s about focusing on the change you need to drive to get the new outputs that will lead to the better outcomes.

Take a look at the information you are discussing does it clearly and forensically show :-

1. What aspects of your business need to change to improve performance

2. Is it just continuing doing what you do best but focusing on a key aspect of the market

3. Is it improving process aspects of what you do across the value chain of your business

4. Is it better analysis of the data you have

5. Is it ripping out core tech and replacing it with something new

Once you’ve mapped out what neeeds to change people, data, process and tech .. start tracking the progress of the changes being made in these areas and know that as the changes are made performance will improve.

If you are just circling around the “effect” looking at numbers month on month and not looking at the narrative of change underpinning the numbers then you are missing a trick .. the numbers are the results it’s how the results will change that you have to focus on ..