The Industrial Society reports that financial considerations are the most widely used measures of a company's performance, but in the results of a new survey also announces that 24% of businesses now use broader measures of gauging performance. The real news from the survey is that there appears little consistancy in the way that British firms measure performance either at organisational or individual level.
Chief Executive of The Industrial Society, Will Hutton, said, "A growing number of companies are declaring independence from using only financial measures of perfomance. Such a narrow approach has often proved counterproductive beyond the very short run. More and more companies will use broad based performance models like EFQM"
Some telling statistics come from the survey of 380 UK businesses and organisations:
1.Commonly used broader performance measures include
a.Customer satisfaction (69%)
b.Profitability (67%)
c.Employee attitudes/satisfaction (66%)
d.Complaints/returns (75%)
e.Customer surveys (71%)
f.Employee turnover and absence rates
2.Only 51% of respondents measured whether staff understood and support the organisation mission statement.
3.Performance of individuals through agreed performance plans with line managers was used by 91% of respondents
4.Nearly two-fifths had no means of measuring ‘team’ performance
5.Just over a third (35%) of respondents see performance management as the responsibility of the HR manager/director, although 25% employ a dedicated manager
6.A quarter (25%) do not measure their HR function in any way
7.Over a fifth (21%) do not use any guidelines for performance measurement
8. A small number (2%) do not use any form of performance measurement
