Evolving Metrics

Instead of asking, "What are the right metrics?", we should be asking, "What are the current ways we can measure what we are looking for today?" Those are drastically different.There are no right metrics. There are no wrong metrics. There are only better and worse ways of helping us quantify (and understand) success. The reason is that outcomes don’t indicate the same reality forever. Measuring what we did 50 years ago will not tell us the same story now, even if the exact same numbers are being recorded.Acquiring a second family car 75 years ago was a good measurement of middle class success. 20 years ago it was not a good measurement of the middle class. And in 20 years, it may be an indication of poverty or ignorance or something totally different. Why? Because the reality around the thing being measured totally changed in that time. An outcome yesterday told a story; the same outcome today tells a different story.The two car measurement is not wrong, but it’s not accurate anymore. What is a better measurement of middle class success today? That’s a question requiring cultural awareness and economic insights, among other things. In other words, it requires education, discernment, and a fundamental belief that the measurement you come up with didn’t work yesterday and may not work tomorrow.A better measurement today is what we’re after. More important than that, even, is the process you come up with to generate time-sensitive, evolving metrics.The best way to do that is to begin from the end and work backwards. What change, outcome, impact do you want to see today? Then, what factors must be measured to help you quantify that outcome today?Not tomorrow.Today.