Potentials of Key Performance Indicators

Introduction

Key Performance Indicators (KPI) is a management tool, which is widely used in companies, organizations and other types of project teams. KPI’s are used to achieve a common goal and help the ever development of an organization. KPI are a set of measurements, which mainly purpose is to reflect upon and keep track of the progress towards a set of requirements. This way the project team can make sure that their work is focused towards the goals set [[1 Center for Lean]].

The purpose of KPI’s

KPI’s works as a management mechanism, which can evolve around many aspects of an organization or project team. By using KPI’s the project manager can keep track of the quality of the different workflows regarding a project e.g. [1]:

• Quality of workflows and deliverables
• Customer/client satisfaction
• Efficiency & effectiveness
• Costs
• Time- and scheduling compliance
• General employee well-being

Using KPI’s inside a project organization can potentially have multiple purposes in order to optimize and reach certain goals. KPI’s can help a project team by realizing and improving many different workflows. If used optimally KPI’s can be a tool to achieve e.g. [1]:

• Transparency of the project for stakeholders and the team organization.
• Increased production and productivity in services.
• A clear and mutual set of expectations for the workflow and expected output.
• An individual understanding of the organization and its general work.
• Increased motivation for stakeholders and employees working towards a common goal.
• A possibility for benchmarking and sharing of experiences with other similar companies or projects.
• Feedback on the general process and workflows regarding the progress of the project.