Creating KPIs - The Practice of Cloud System Administration - page 388

Chapter 19. Creating KPIs
The only man I know who behaves sensibly is my tailor; he takes my measure-
ments anew each time he sees me. The rest go on with their old measurements
and expect me to fit them.
—George Bernard Shaw
Astartupdecidesthatwebsitespeedisimportanttothesuccessofitsbusiness.Management
decides that page load time will be the key performance indicator (KPI) that determines
employee pay raises at the end of the year. Soon services that shared machines are given
dedicated resources to avoid any possibility of interprocess interference. Only the fastest
machines are purchased. Many features are delayed as time is dedicated to code optimiza-
tion. By the end of the year, the KPI measurements confirm the web pages have extremely
fast load times. The goal has been reached. Sadly, the company has no money for raises be-
cause it has spent its way out of business.
Measurement affects behavior. People change their behavior when they know they are
being measured. People tend to find the shortest path to meeting a goal. This creates unin-
tended side effects.
In this chapter we talk about smart ways to set goals and create KPIs. Managers need to
set goals that drive desired behavior to achieve desired results while minimizing the unin-
tended consequences. Done correctly, this enables us to manage operations in a way that is
more efficient, is fairer, and produces better results.
Setting KPIs is quite possibly the most important thing that a manager does. It is often
said that a manager has two responsibilities: setting priorities and providing the resources to
get those priorities done. Setting KPIs is an important way to verify that those priorities are
being met.
The effectiveness of the KPI itself must be evaluated by making measurements before
and after introducing it and then observing the differences. This changes management from
a loose set of guesses into a set of scientific methods. We measure the quality of our system,
set or change policies, and then measure again to see their effect. This is more difficult than
it sounds.