Key performance indicators (KPI)

Tareq al-Suwaidan defines a key performance indicator (KPI) as 'the minimum acceptable level of a goal in a given field': instead of disputing the evaluation of an aspirational target, the two sides agree on a figure that must not be undershot — for example a company aiming at five hundred thousand dollars of profit sets its KPI at not falling below three hundred thousand ^{1 2}.

An indicator is set for every independent unit (SBU) and even for the support units, at two levels: indicators for the coming year and indicators for the whole plan period, and they rise as performance improves ^{3 4}. Their number per unit is between three and ten at most, because beyond ten the goals remain important but stop being 'critical' ⁵. An indicator may be financial, or a measure of quality, time, speed of service, number of products or branches; his example from banks and hotels is that a customer never waits more than two minutes ^{6 7}.

He states the rule 'what you cannot measure you cannot manage': social and faith goals can only be managed by turning them into numbers — instead of 'raising loyalty to the homeland' one writes 'distribute a hundred thousand leaflets, run twenty courses, present five programmes'; and a plan flowering with 'improve' and 'develop' without figures is to him unserious ^{8 9}. A good indicator meets two criteria — difficult yet possible — and it is not imposed on a unit but negotiated with its leadership until it settles on 'difficult' rather than 'impossible' ^{10 11}. His working example: the strategic plan of al-Resalah channel was written on this model in a single day, nine to nine, by the nominal-group method, and its summary as a single sheet hung in every office is better than seven volumes nobody applies ^{12 13}.