In my previous post on this topic, I explained my basic premise that there are major differences between Strategy Execution software and the broader category of Performance Management software and why I believe that only Strategy Execution software really helps an organization become more performance-focused.
In the next handful of posts, I'll be highlighting specific software capabilities that I believe are key to supporting this sort of transformation. I hope these will help you if you're looking at software now, or if you're trying to determine if your current solution will get you where you want to go.
In this post, I'll talk about specific software features you should look for if you want to instill accountability in your organization - one very critical step toward building a performance-oriented culture.
Ensuring that leaders and employees are accountable for business results is not primarily a technology issue. However, both the Strategy Execution methodology and related software must be designed to help nurture and facilitate personal and organizational accountability for real change to occur.
Here are some characteristics to look for:
- Every object in the software has a person's name next to it. Every measure, initiative, objective, task, and comment in the software has the name of one person (and in some cases, a few people). This helps support a culture of accountability where it is clear who owns what and how they are progressing.
- The system “understands” reporting relationships. The best motivator of accountability can often be the boss/employee relationship. The system should track reporting relationships and allow managers at all levels to see not only strategic results, but also how individuals are performing against their strategic and personal goals, plus how these individuals are performing on important projects or tasks for which they are accountable.
- The software provides audit trails. At a high level, “performance audit trails” containing historical records of commentary and explanations of performance are always visible on measures and initiatives. At the most granular level, the system should provide complete records of changes made to measures, goals, initiatives, comments, and status reports, to ensure that nobody can surreptitiously change performance history or previously made commitments.
As a rule, the category of Performance Management software called Business Intelligence (BI) systems are not designed to enforce accountability. Functionality in this area is typically limited to a text field, which captures an owner’s name, but nothing more.
Beware of “tacked on” pseudo features here, like simple text boxes to capture the name of “owners.” If the system doesn’t understand reporting relationships and have a central repository of owners, lots of other important functions won’t be possible.
In Part 3 I'll point out software features that help drive action.
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