Re: Measuring Productivity

Subject: Re: Measuring Productivity
From: Chet Ensign <Chet_Ensign%LDS -at- NOTES -dot- WORLDCOM -dot- COM>
Date: Wed, 23 Aug 1995 19:34:27 EDT

What a coincidence. I am reading a paper titled "Measuring the Strategic Value
of Information Technology Investments" by Kurt Conrad, formerly of Boeing. It
tackles the very issue of productivity measures. On the issue of counting pages
or lines of code, this quote jumped out at me:

Traditionally, productivity is measured by dividing output by some input.
But what
input? The Taylor model defined productivity in terms of physical inputs
and outputs,
but this started to lose appropriateness in the 1930's as quality -- not
quantity -- became
a significant measure of value. ... Without a replacement metric, however,
American
productivity appeared to fall as white collar workers became an increasing
portion of
the labor force.

What's interesting is that trying to stick to the old methods of measurement
distorts management's ability to see what's going on inside development
projects. Kurt writes:

Dollars are one of the few concepts that all parties seem to understand.
Project
justifications regularly rely on calculated cost savings... As there are few
or no
accepted methods of calculating cost impacts, some very creative calculations
are applied. Development, implementation, and maintenance costs are
underestimated. Training and support costs are shifted to end-user
organizations.

I've seen this sort of thing happen. How about you?

When he gets to section three, "Performance-Based Concepts of Value" he starts
to address new measures of productivity. "The only useful measure of IT value
is the performance of the organization." And shortly after that, he says
something that hints at why too many managers would like to hang on to the
piece-work measures of output. "The shift in focus from costs and savings to
results raises the stakes for all parties. IM customers must be able to
articulate their missions and goals..." In other words, managers will have to
define the results that are needed, instead of point fingers at staff and say
"They aren't working fast enough."

This doesn't mean, and Kurt by no means says, that measures aren't possible.
However, the systems of measurement that give a true picture of what's going on
are those that shift the focus from the "buckets of money" model that measures
how much a *department* costs, to a process model that measures how much it
costs to achieve a result.

Neat stuff.

/chet

Chet Ensign
Director of Electronic Documentation
Logical Design Solutions
571 Central Avenue http://www.lds.com
Murray Hill, NJ 07974 censign -at- lds -dot- com [email]
908-771-9221 [Phone] 908-771-0430 [FAX]


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