I'm not against high level organisational KPI's, but I do believe these can often be one step removed from the teams and squads actually delivering the projects each and every day. Often KPI's are intended to drive an organisation to achieve high level results, meet certain objectives over a designated time period and often the individuals within teams have little direct input or control over the specific metric defined as "success".

The trick to getting individuals and teams 'bought in' on the success of a project and organisational success is to have them set their own realistic and measurable success metrics that have meaning to them in relation to the piece of work they are involved with, but also align to the high level organisational KPI's.

Importance of Success Metrics

Success metrics are an important factor when you are involved in delivering something for an organisation. Measuring components of a project will help teams understand the ongoing performance, understand when something isn't right or flag when you need to pivot or adjust your approach. Its important that the teams feel connected to the success of work they are involved with.

Teams and individuals feel far more connected and interested in the quality and performance of what they are delivering when they feel they have had a say in what they believe success looks like.

• Involve all of the team when deciding key metrics
• Fewer metrics provide greater insight
• Shared and highly visible metrics provide higher transparency and collaboration
• Simplified dashboards and metrics drive greater interest 
• Bite off small chunks and iterate
• Love your chosen success metrics and look at them often
• Maintain visibility of past, present and future team metrics
• Fine tune your measurement process as the strategy or situation changes

Essentially, the 'measurement' of a project is the easy part, but the more interesting component teams face when defining their success metrics is measuring the 'right things' that have meaning and define actual success whilst learning to ignore and not get lost in other interesting data that does not contribute to team success. 

Building a Culture of Interest in Output

They key to ongoing success is to build an internal culture where teams are connected and show an ongoing interest with work they produce and its success in the market (or wherever the project will make a difference). When teams feel connected and genuinely interested with their outputs, you will find a far more positive team culture (and better project outputs) compared to people just turning up, churning work out and going home each day. 

Connected, collaborative and engaged people are far happier and more productive than those stuck in a rut that is Groundhog Day.

Celebrate Success Often

People are proud of the work they produce and their involvement in something that their organisation is delivering, especially when something they have built or have been involved in is a success and has a positive impact on a client, product consumer or its intended audience. 

Part of a team defining and measuring success metrics for a project, is celebrating the successes when they come. Make sure you stop as a team to celebrate when it is deserved and meets the definition of success according to the team. It's important for teams to feel the love and be acknowledged when 'success' is actually achieved.

As one of the greatest leaders once said - "It is better to lead from behind and to put others in front, especially when you celebrate victory when nice things occur. You take the front line when there is danger. Then people will appreciate your leadership." Nelson Mandela

Organisational Success

In essence having more success driven teams and people within a business, that are actually connected with what they deliver within an organisation the more likely the company is to succeed and achieve the higher level organisational KPI's.