Strategic Planning and KPIs

By Karla Organist, IDM Senior Project Manager and Chief Contrarian

I recently jotted down a line I read somewhere that really stood out to me: “Data can be technically correct, but strategically meaningless.”

It made me consider some of our recent strategic planning projects, where KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) were a major focus for our clients. The desire for clear KPIs is entirely understandable. We live in a data-driven world, and boards, investors, and communities demand proof of progress.

But here’s a note of caution: having an over-focus on KPIs during a planning process could mean the critical phase of strategy development is marginalized. Strategic planning is not the act of picking a target metric; it is the rigorous, often messy work of diagnosing your community or organization’s unique challenges and needs, identifying strengths to leverage, and making hard choices about what you are going to do about it. When organizations skip this structural work to jump straight to KPIs, they end up with technically precise measurements attached to empty plans.

Don’t get me wrong, we do encourage metrics and data - data that informs the process, quantifiable metrics that monitor progress along the way and measure success at the end - but a KPI can only tell you if you crossed the finish line, it cannot build the road that gets you there.

Successful strategic planning requires that the process of discovery and strategy development is elevated to a primary position. KPIs are incredibly valuable, but only as trailing indicators that validate whether your strategic plan implementation is actually working. Before a single metric is set, organizations must invest time in designing the specific initiatives and workflows that will drive change by addressing challenges and needs. By focusing intensely on the architecture of the strategic plan first, and treating data as a secondary navigation tool rather than the ultimate destination, communities and organizations can ensure they aren't just hitting arbitrary numbers, but are actually creating meaningful change.

One last point: meaningful change isn’t always a number, as Einstein is quoted as saying, “Not everything that counts can be counted and not everything than can be counted counts.”