Measurement Design Is an Opportunity to Learn

Abstract

Measurement is a critical aspect of leadership. If you don’t have an accurate picture of where you’ve been and how things are working, it’s difficult to know how to improve. A primary benefit of measurement systems is their generation of data that support analysis and learning. However, measurement is often practiced “the same old way,” instead of being seen as an important system of leadership that requires continuous improvement to remain vital. I will summarize three articles leading up to this one to position the importance of measurement, following with a discussion of measurement in the context of leadership and provide examples of some recognized models. Finally, I present the notion that measurement design is an ongoing process, rather than a one-time event. By continuously improving measurements, an organization creates the opportunity to learn more and more about what works and what needs to be improved upon to respond to changing conditions. Hence it follows that measurement presents an important opportunity to learn how better to meet customer needs in providing engineering services.