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HOW IT'S DONE: GRAPHING

In my company we use the most common and most easily accessible method of displaying performance progress that social science affords:  the simple line graph in which the performance variable being measured is plotted on the vertical axis and units of time are plotted on the horizontal.  For example, if you wanted to record the weekly change in output of a given assembly line, you would set up a simple line graph showing the weekly periods on the horizontal axis and the number of units completed on the vertical axis.  You could just as easily plot a "management" variable like R&D; expense, or sales calls, or reports delivered.

Number of Units Completed
Baseline period Goal line period



It's a simple enough concept, but it's important to call attention to a couple of often ignored features of this type of graphing.

First, notice that, on the vertical axis, we're measuring the performance variable - in this case, a line's output - in terms that are strictly quantifiable.  We're not tracking "output" or "efficiency" or "productivity," but "units completed."  Secondly, the same general observation goes for the horizontal axis: we're not tracking some vague "sense" of improvement "over time," but the units that come rolling off the line in question at the end of each week.  Specificity is everything in keeping good records, and that's why the weeks are designated along the bottom border of the graph.

You've also got to keep specificity in mind when you're choosing the variables to measure.  A major error made by managers in recording and tracking performance is that they choose the wrong variables to track - variables that, in terms of the P.R.I.C.E. terminology, are just not Pinpointed enough to make sense to the people who are tracking them.  To help you avoid this problem, we suggest that, in deciding on which performance variable you want to measure, ask yourself three questions:

1. Is the measurement going to be relatively easy to get, and not result in a lot of extra work for someone?  There's no point in setting up a Recording system to improve the efficiency of your operation if the system itself cannot be efficiently run.  Look for variables that are immediately accessible, easy to identify, and clearly quantifiable.

2. Will your people readily understand the measurement and the graph that pictures it?  If not, they're not going to be responsive to the data, and the whole purpose of the scorekeeping will be lost.  Since you're aiming for changes in human behavior, look for small, discrete Behaviors that can directly and obviously affect your performance picture.

3. Can the variable be controlled?  That is, can you improve it by human, rather than simply mechanical, modification?  Again, since Behavior is the key, you don't want to post data on your machinery's compression ratios or on depreciation curves.  Focus on those things that your people are saying and doing, and that can be changed for the better.  There's nothing more frustrating than getting negative feedback on a condition over which you have no control.

Once you've chosen the performance variable - whether it's a "blue collar" variable like units completed or a "manager's" variable like sales calls - you should establish a baseline.  You do this by collecting relevant data for a brief period of time, averaging that data, and then plotting this baseline average on the left end of your graph.  This baseline then becomes the standard against which change in performance is measured:  it's like par in golf, or what I referred to as that hypothetical "Point A" on the journey from poor to good performance.

Remember when I talked about my 1975 season with the Vikings, when Jerry Burns, John Michaels, and I established the objectives the team would need to accomplish if we were going to win?  We began that exercise in Pinpointing by determining in the record books what playoff teams had averaged over the years in terms of various variables; by doing that, we were establishing the baseline that we knew we needed in our own performance.

Or take the example I graphed above, where we were plotting the number of units completed per week.  Let's take the first four weeks of the horizontal time line as the baseline period, and assign hypothetical numbers to the "units completed."  Say four hundred units came off the line in the week ending April 7, then in the next three weeks four hundred and twenty units, three hundred and fifty units, and four hundred and ten units.  Those four figures are identified by the four points plotted on the graph in Figure 3.  The baseline average is the average of those four figures, and it's represented on the graph by the horizontal dotted line.  What this graph now tells a worker or manager is that at the beginning of the scorekeeping period, "par" was established as three hundred and ninety-five.

From there it's easy.  At the end of each week, you simply plot on the graph that point indicating units completed for that week, and connect them over time with a solid line, as I've done here for the first four (baseline) points.  The resulting graph will give immediate, visible feedback to the people involved on how they're doing, week to week.  Which is the point of the system.

But there's one other feature of graphing that is important to get in.  I've said that the Recording element of the P.R.I.C.E. system is a way of showing people how they're progressing from Point A to Point B.  Point A is the baseline we've just set up.  Point B is the goal, or objective, you want to get to, which I talked about in the last chapter.  In the companies we work with, after we've determined a realistic, Pinpointed objective with regard to a given variable, we draw that objective in on the relevant graph as the "goal line" that everybody should be working for.  If it's been determined that six hundred units a week is a reasonable objective, for example, we would draw that in on our graph as shown as the "Goal line period".

Once you've drawn the goal line in, you have the required Point A - Point B "journey" pretty well mapped out.  All you have to do is fill in the intermediate points on that journey week by week, to keep yourself and your people aware of how you're all doing.  In the chapter on Evaluation, I'm going to give some detail about how to "interpret" the developing map, so that it becomes not just a snapshot of what you are, but a real motivational tool.  Here I just want to mention two fundamental points about using Recording and graphs:

First, in order to be effective, a graph like the one given as an example here has to be publicly posted so that the people whose performance is in effect creating the data know what that data is.  Remember, the whole point of this element of our systems is to give people scores on their work, so they can change and improve.  If you're graphing a very specific performance variable of one person, of course it makes sense to give him or her the results privately.  But in today's industrial and corporate environment, you're not going to be doing that very often, since everything is so interconnected.  Most of the time you'll be tracking data that has been generated by an entire working team:  every member of that team should have access to that data.

Secondly, they should have access to it as soon as possible after it is collected, and as frequently as possible over time.  Ideally this means every week, and in some cases - where a performance variable is very critical to the overall operation and delay in improvement would cause major losses - it means every day.  Scorekeeping is a useless exercise unless it follows immediately upon performance - which is why the quarterly report approach to industrial motivation is just not acceptable.  If you want to hike the unit figure up to six hundred or cut down on the number of days lost to accidents, let your people know now that they're doing wrong and doing right.  Waiting for the "Big Picture" in areas like these is like waiting until your boxer is on the canvas before telling him to keep his guard up.

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