KPI, KPI's, management information, dashboards, Call center management, real time stats, real time statistics, RTS, correlating KPI's, Graphic management information, graphical management information

1. The problem with KPI’s
First is of course the wording. Key Performance Indicators
suggest that there are Performance Indicators and Key
Performance Indicators. This is rarely true; every indicator
appears to be key indicator, which makes no sense.
Some people say: ‘it doesn’t matter how you call them,
you know what we mean’. Well…it does matter to me
because it’s nonsense calling every indicator Key. Same
for calling every employee ‘manager’.
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2. The problem with KPI’s
Secondly I find that many organizations over-use KPI’s and
spend to much time ‘staring in the rear mirror’ while lacking
a proper dashboard to steer day-to-day operations.
I am sure many LEAN specialists will agree.
And since we all love to mystify our work; let’s call your
dashboard RKPI’s; Real time Key Performance Indicators
And I will be the RKPI-Manager then, the RKPIM 🙂
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3. Get a dashboard first
Enough with the fun now, KPI’s can be really useful if designed wisely.
In this super short presentation I will indicate what a good dashboard should
do for you. The first ‘best practice’ tells you: “less is more”.
In order to fly and land a plane, a pilot needs six gauges. We, humans are
not really able to steer on more that six indicators in real time. These six
gauges would be RKPI’s, the rest of meters and stuff would be PI’s;
performance indicators that are not real time, though relevant sometimes and
key sometimes.
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4. Less is more
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5. ACTION!
What you can learn from the picture of a submarine on
the previous page is that below every gauge there is a
handle or wheel. So, if you aren’t able to act upon a
RKPI, you can do without, it doesn’t belong on your
dashboard.
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6. Near real timeAs every nerd will happily
tell you, real time doesn’t
exist, but you’ll get the
idea. Make sure your
dashboard is close to real
time. Since it has to be
actionable, you don’t want
it to be late. It’s that
simple.
If your RKPI comes in
after an hour, it isn’t a
thing you need on your
dashboard.
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7. Correlating RKPIs
If you have strongly correlating RKPI’s try to stick with the most
important one or if you know your business logic, the first one
that steers all others.
But…use your brain; the age of Miss America clearly correlates
with Murders by steam, hot vapors and hot objects….
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tylervigen.com

8. Graphics please!
We, human beings, are
not very good with
numbers and we are
really horrible with
statistics. That’s us, can’t
change that. But we are
reasonably OK with
seeing patterns and
differences in graphs and
charts. So if you can
dump a number in favor
of a chart or graph, do so.
If that graph is a real time
moving graph, you have
little more to wish for on
your dashboard
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9. An example of a really
good RKPIs in a call
center
If you would like to see a series of good visualizations of what
is going on in a call center with 7 streams if incoming traffic,
click here. It’s dynamic, there is a lot of useful real time
information packed in really easy to use graphical overviews.
If this is your dashboard, you have a head start on many,
many other organizations.
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10. Need more?
• paul.harts@visionpartners.ae
• +971 55 45 28 480
• or add visionpartners.ae to your Skype contacts
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