Measurement plays an important role in focusing people on particular aspects of the business. In many organizations, the things that are measured are considered important while the things not measured are considered unimportant. Developing appropriate measures, making better use of existing measures, and improving measurement systems can lead to improvement throughout the organization. Many companies try to utilize measures that are not accurate or of unknown accuracy. Inaccurate measures lead people astray resulting in tampering, ignoring problems, etc. A study of the quality of measurement often indicates that the accuracy of many of the measures do not support the importance that managers placed on them each month. When more accurate measures are developed, everyone begins to treat the measures with more respect, and fewer changes to plans have to be made each month.
