Measuring Change: The Role of Metrics in Organizational Success

So we are, in fact, a data-driven society. We are able to say something works or something doesn't work because we measure, and the metrics really do help you prove that something is what you wanted it to be, or they point to an area where you need to learn from what's not working and make it better. So they provide that evidence of progress, they help you track adoption rates, behavior shifts, and alignment with strategic goals, which you set out to do in the beginning, but now, again, we're always looking to see that we are doing exactly what we said or close enough to what we said we were going to do, and the only way to show that is, again, through these metrics.

They support your transparency, they help with the accountability, and they let everybody else who's not necessarily right in the change management process with you see what you're doing and feel that sense of investment that you've been cultivating. We talked a lot about how important stakeholder buy-in is. Transparency helps ensure that the connections you're cultivating remain strong.

So when we are using metrics, what we're doing is this. Let's use an example to show what we're talking about here. Let's say we've got a human resources department that wants to implement a process improvement.

They've got a high turnover rate, high absenteeism, people are finding better jobs or not showing up for work, and obviously, this is not working for HR, and so they are looking to decrease the turnover rates, and the way they have chosen to decrease those turnover rates is to go to a hybrid work environment. So their desired outcome, their objective, will be that fewer employees leave the organization because of scheduling problems. So they focus specifically on this change, specifically on the scheduling problems, not on the absenteeism.

So I point that out because that's important to note that in many cases, what you're trying to do is keep your focus narrow in order to fix one thing at a time. So the action steps they set out are here. They're going to conduct a study to see whether a hybrid work environment would help to decrease those turnover rates, survey the people who would actually be using this hybrid work environment, and develop potential core hours that they could float for all of those people who might potentially be using these hybrid work hours.

So once they've got that fundamental piece in place, they've got an idea for what to do, they've surveyed folks, they have a good idea of how they can start this change, then they need to figure out how they're going to measure it. So they're going to look at two things. The KPI, which stands for Key Performance Indicator, gives us a picture of what should happen in a measurable way.

So, for example, 25% fewer people will leave in the next fiscal year. And so in order to measure that KPI, we're going to say, all right, we need to see what the decrease is in the people who are leaving, and then we need to be able to check once a quarter for any decreases. So the KPI is the measurement, the metric is the decision about what we're going to measure.

A little bit of a closer look at that KPI, since we're throwing that term around a lot. Again, it is the measurable value. So, it tells us how effective we are in this change? We mean the team, or the person, or the individual.

It helps us track our progress. So it could be customer satisfaction numbers, it could be budget efficiency percentages, dollar amounts, or program outcomes. What did we change? How many people did we get into a program or lose from a program? Those are all examples of what a KPI is.

Ultimately, they help you guide your decision-making and identify areas for improvement. So, as we are working through this example that we've got here, this HR department that's trying to decrease the amount of turnover, we've identified the KPI as how many people are leaving. The metric is measured once every quarter.

And we're looking at the measurement of changes in data and percentages. We want the numbers of people and the percentages, and how they compare from quarter to quarter. Understanding what that data tells us is going to help us see that what seemed like a good idea is actually working the way we thought it would.

And that's the thing about change: a lot of times, something briefs really well, sounds great on paper. Is it really going to work the way we thought it did? The metrics tell the story. So how do we do that? How do we actually come up with those metrics? How do we decide what the different measurements that will tell the story are? The first thing we do, as we have done with so many other steps in this change management process, is to clarify our objective.

What does success look like? What do we want to have happen? We identify our stakeholders and our impact areas. So again, the stakeholders are the folks like the employees, the leadership, customers, partners, anybody who is invested in some way, whether because they're an end user or they've got some other interest in what the change is going to be. And then we consider the processes, the behaviors, and the systems that may change.

To do that, you're going to be using those 12 organizational types to determine what type of change you're looking at. And then you're going to be looking for further support in this analysis by using one of your change management models, either the COTR 8-step or the Step Up, Step Back. Then we're finally at the point where we say, okay, what metrics am I going to be using? What metrics are going to help me tell the story and whether it's working or not? And these are going to be three dimensions that we're choosing from.

Either the leading indicators, meaning signs of progress. Have we completed training? Do we have communication? Have we reached the people we want to reach? Or it could be lagging indicators. Not so great, but we need to know about them as well.

Long-term impact, meaning productivity may not be going up or down. Retention, that's in our example that we've just been using. Retention hasn't been great, no matter what we did.

Or customer satisfaction. And finally, behavioral indicators are key. Evidence that we have changed mindsets.

Evidence that we have shifted habits into the pattern that we were hoping to shift to. So what kind of feedback quality are we getting? What kind of collaboration levels are we getting? Behavioral indicators in that example we were using before about high turnover would be that people are staying. That we've managed to come up with hours and a hybrid work schedule that works for enough people that they choose to stay rather than find a job that's got a better culture, a better schedule for them.

More on change management metrics, on identifying those change management metrics. We would want you to use a mix of data. It would be a mix of quantitative and qualitative, meaning hard data, what it is that you can actually measure, those KPIs, percentages, dollar amounts, hours, numbers of people, that's all hard data.

But you don't want to forget about the value of anecdotal evidence. The stories that you hear from people about what's working and what's not working are valuable, too. You can't measure it.

You can't measure it when someone says, I feel a certain way. But you can listen, and you can certainly start measuring it if you have enough people who are feeling a certain way, whether it's good or not so good. And that is not always what we think about when we're talking about data, but it is equally valuable information to collect because together that qualitative and quantitative data will tell you what you need to know about the success of your change and the change you're implementing.

You want to always remember to align those metrics with organizational strategy. So your broader goals, again, that mission, the delivery, the performance improvement, cultural transformation, connecting the mission, the change mission to the organizational mission and vision. All of those are pieces of the puzzle, and the metrics have to be able to measure those pieces of the puzzle.

Otherwise, they're just numbers. They're just data and stories sort of hanging out there, not really telling you what you need to know. Do remember to set baselines and targets.

Set your benchmarks. It's really what we're talking about. Those benchmarks tell you where you started, so that you can always look back to where you started to see whether you're going in a direction you want to go or not.

And then monitor, report, and adjust. We learn from mistakes. We learn from what we thought was going to work and maybe did work, but not the way we thought it was going to, or what didn't work.

So be ready to review those metrics. Be ready to share the insights with your team, be transparent, and be ready to refine your change approach based on what your data reveals.