Measuring Project Goals and Improvement

[dbulak]

project goals

I don't know if this belongs here, but the situation is " a goal was established at .25 and at year end the goal was at .35--obviously it was not met. A new goal is established at the new year of .30." My question is "how does this show improvement?" Can this be done year after year? What would an auditor have to say? Need all the thoughts you can.

 

[Marc]

What are .25 and .35?

 

[dbulak]

What are .25 and .35?

These are percentages for orders shipped.

 

[Claes Gefvenberg]

My question is "how does this show improvement?" Can this be done year after year? What would an auditor have to say? Need all the thoughts you can.

With the information provided, the short answer is that it does not... What were the corresponding results?

The goal was first set to .25, then raised to .35 which was obviously too high as it was not met and then adjusted to a hopefully more realistic .30. Ok, one can sometimes aim a bit too high, so that seems reasonable.

If the results showed an upgoing trend I would call it progress, otherwise not...

/Claes

 

[Al Dyer]

Orders shipped on-time?

If so, why not a goal 100% with continual improvement over time? Most customers I have dealt with have a pre-set goal of 100% on-time delivery. Was there a certain mindset or methodology in coming up with .25/.30/.35 etc...

Al...

 

[RoxaneB]

With the information provided, the short answer is that it does not... What were the corresponding results?

The goal was first set to .25, then raised to .35 which was obviously too high as it was not met and then adjusted to a hopefully more realistic .30. Ok, one can sometimes aim a bit too high, so that seems reasonable.

If the results showed an upgoing trend I would call it progress, otherwise not...

/Claes

I agree....the goal might be 0.25, then raised to 0.35, only to have 0.3 as deemed more realistic.

I would ask what are they now? If the original goal was 0.25, were they 0.15 before?

I would also look at their planning process. Okay...they want to get to 0.25/0.35/0.30/whatever...how? How will they get from their current performance level to their goal?

Have they established some reasons why their current performance is the way it is?

Have they assessed the resource needs to get from their current performance to their goal?

Is improvement in this area necessary?

We have a wonderful "nature of doing business" called billets between cobbles. In other words, how much good stuff gets through before we have to scrap some? The higher the number, the better. But in our industry, cobbles are normal after certain activities are performed.

So we analyzed ALL cobbles...looked at products they were happening for, where in the line, which crews were on, equipment, etc....and we've focused on what we feel are the main heavy hitters. We will still have cobbles, but we have set realistic goals to fix the main problems.

 

[dbulak]

My mistake

I am sorry that I did not write the situation of the cicumstances correctly. Let me re-phrase it and ask the same question. The goal was set at .25% and at the year end the results showed that orders shipped was actually .35%. The goal was re-set to .30% for the new year. What do you think of this?

 

[RoxaneB]

I am sorry that I did not write the situation of the cicumstances correctly. Let me re-phrase it and ask the same question. The goal was set at .25% and at the year end the results showed that orders shipped was actually .35%. The goal was re-set to .30% for the new year. What do you think of this?

It is difficult to comment on the new goal and the fact that is below was actually achieved in the previous year, without knowing the organization's through processes.

There could be other factors unknown to us that factored into management's decision to allow this goal.

Going back to my billets between cobbles (bbc) example, if we have a projected year sales forecast that involves us doing more product changes than we are used to, an improvement in our bbc number while more than likely be more difficult to achieve. This knowledge will factor into our thought process when we set our goals for the following year.

 

[Chessie]

Goal vs. Continual Improvement

I am sorry that I did not write the situation of the cicumstances correctly. Let me re-phrase it and ask the same question. The goal was set at .25% and at the year end the results showed that orders shipped was actually .35%. The goal was re-set to .30% for the new year. What do you think of this?

With only the results from one year (.35%) it's not possible to see if there was improvement. If the previous year was .40% and the year before that was .45% then improvement has taken place (assuming low is good, as in errors). Goals are necessary but really have no bearing when looking back at whether improvement has actually happened. If the new .30% goal is achieved in the new year then looking back that will show improvement even though the goal is less stringent than the previous year's goal.