Sustainable Success from KPIs Tools and Resources

...solve thorny business challenges in the time it takes to drink a cup of tea
The heartfelt success of your business depends on your rapid response to the right measures

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Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are measurable values that help your business track progress towards your strategic goals and objectives. They can be a critical tool for assessing performance across various aspects of your business, such as financial health, customer satisfaction, operational efficiency and employee engagement.
When you measure the right things, the results allow you to make well-judged decisions and will provide actionable insights. By consistently monitoring KPIs, you can identify trends, pinpoint areas for improvement and make informed decisions to stay on track. Whether it’s tracking sales growth, website traffic or employee turnover, KPIs help translate your abstract goals into tangible metrics, making them essential for maintaining focus and building sustainable success in your business.
But are you measuring the right things? Think about the KPIs you have in place in your business and ask yourself this one question:
How do I build sustainable success for my business by measuring what matters most to my business, my customers and my team?
STOP thinking your existing Key PERFORMANCE Indicators are good enough. It suggests you’re stuck in the old way of managing your performance.
START measuring what matters most to your customers and your team. Then take regular action to improve these human Key PREDICTIVE Indicators.
The one ‘BREAKTHROUGH QUESTION’ you must ask to help yourself…
How do I build sustainable success for my business by measuring what matters most to my business, my customers and my team?
Measuring the right things in your business is critical for sustainable business success, as it ensures alignment with strategic objectives and drives informed decision making. KPIs that are well defined and relevant provide actionable insights into performance, enabling you to identify areas of strength and opportunities for growth and improvement in your business.
If your business doesn’t measure the important metrics, you risk operating without a clear understanding of your business performance.
This can lead to crisis management, reactive and subjective decision making, inefficient working processes and systems, unhappy customers and a team that lacks focus and direction.
Without appropriate measures in place, identifying problems early becomes challenging, leaving your business vulnerable to financial instability or to being overtaken by the competition.
But what do you measure?
Now, with the technology at your fingertips, the measurement possibilities are endless…
…cash, revenue, key costs, capital value, team engagement, team absence, customer loyalty, productivity, product quality, delivery speed, stock turns, etc.
To ensure you maintain your business focus, you need to concentrate on just a handful of the right measures.
Financial KPIs to ensure your business is healthy – revenue, profits, cash, workflow – are typically easy to measure but, on their own, will not ensure sustainable success.
Using KPIs to measure what matters most to your customers and team, in addition to the financial metrics of your business, creates a holistic approach to performance management.
Customers drive your revenue, so tracking KPIs such as satisfaction scores, retention rates and feedback ensures their needs and expectations are being met, fostering loyalty and growth.
Similarly, team-focused KPIs – for example, engagement, productivity and churn – highlight the wellbeing and motivation of your team, directly impacting operational efficiency and customer experience.
When combined with the necessary financial measures, you will obtain for yourself a complete picture of your business’s health.
Measuring what matters most will enable you to align priorities, strengthen relationships and achieve sustainable success by focusing on the right things.
Don’t let your canary fall off its perch
“When the rescue party descended the mine, a canary in a cage was kept in front of them and it dropped off its perch when the danger point was reached, overcome by the poisonous atmosphere.” – Use for the canary, British Library Museum

Image: shutterstock - ismail19797 2492775175
The experience of early 20th-century miners points to how you can create a successful, sustainable business.
Their success hinged on a canary.
Canaries were taken down mines by coal miners because they were highly sensitive to toxic gases.
If the canary showed signs of distress or fell off its perch and died, it served as an early warning system, alerting miners to the presence of danger before it became life-threatening.
The miners had 6 minutes to survive – 13 at the most – as the breathing masks held only a limited amount of air. When the canary fell off its perch, the miners had to act fast.
Canaries measure what matters most. Miners used this measurement and turned it into an actionable response.
This story highlights the importance of early detection and preventative action – principles that are directly applicable to KPIs in business.
In your business, KPIs act as the canary in the coal mine, signalling potential problems or opportunities before they become critical.
For example, a sudden drop in customer satisfaction scores might indicate emerging issues in service quality, much like a canary reacting to toxic gases. Similarly, an increase in team turnover or declining cash flow could be early indicators of deeper operational or financial challenges. By tracking KPIs regularly, you can identify these warning signs early and take corrective actions to prevent larger issues from developing.
Just as the miners depended on the canary for survival, the sustainability of your business depends on tracking the right KPIs and using them to monitor the health of your business, the health of your customers and the health of your team.
Continental Airlines chose the right KPIs
“Most businesses fail because they want the right things but measure the wrong things, and they get the wrong results.” – Gordon Bethune, Continental Airlines

Image: shutterstock – Maxx-studio 1465389734
The story of Continental Airlines under the leadership of Gordon Bethune is a powerful example of how the strategic use of KPIs can transform a struggling business into one that is thriving.
Prior to 1994, Continental Airlines had filed for bankruptcy twice. Its customer satisfaction ratings were abysmal, team motivation and engagement were at an all-time low and the business was losing millions of dollars each month.
They were using KPIs that were overly complex and which were focused on cost reduction…
When Gordon Bethune became CEO in 1994, he implemented a bold turnaround strategy centred on clearly defined KPIs aligned with what mattered most to customers, employees and the business.
He ditched the old set of KPIs and then got every one of Continental’s 10,000 employees focused on 3 simple customer KPIs:
- Left/lost luggage
- Fewer complaints
- More on-time arrival
He kept the financial KPIs in place, but he simplified them so that they were focused on profitability and cost control to ensure the airline operated sustainably.
Bethune then focused his attention on KPIs that improved the customer experience and operational performance.
When tackling operational performance, he zeroed in on on-time arrivals which, at the time, were the subject of most customer complaints. Continental ranked last among major airlines in this metric.
Bethune introduced a simple but impactful KPI: the percentage of flights arriving on time.
He tied the success of this KPI to a financial incentive, offering bonuses to employees whenever the airline achieved a top-five ranking for on-time performance.
Then he moved to lost luggage, baggage handling and overall service quality. For his team, he established metrics to measure and reward collaboration and efficiency.
Because of the simplicity of his KPIs, everyone in the business understood the role they had to play when it came to working towards their achievement.
The results were staggering. In less than a year:
- Continental had moved from being ranked last to first in on-time performance among major US airlines
- Team engagement took off, as workers felt motivated and appreciated
- Customer satisfaction increased dramatically
- The airline made a profit in 1995 – its first annual profit in years
- Their stock price soared
Bethune’s focus on the right KPIs, those that aligned with the needs of customers, employees and shareholders, proved that clear metrics, combined with accountability and recognition, could drive cultural and operational transformation. Continental Airlines became a case study in business success, showing how KPIs can fuel a business’s survival from near extinction and how the right KPIs can deliver sustainable growth.
Team KPIs matter too...
“The future of work is human-centric. The companies that win in the marketplace will be those with the best employees.” – Stephan Meier, The Employee Advantage
To survive and thrive in the modern world, customer-focused KPIs are not enough. You need to measure what matters to your team.
Team-focused KPIs are vital because they directly influence motivation, engagement, satisfaction and productivity. A motivated team will deliver better and higher quality work, faster and more accurately, and will work harder for your customers – all critical factors for business success.
These KPIs measure factors such as individual performance, job satisfaction, training effectiveness and employee retention, providing valuable insights into how well employees are supported and how motivated they are to contribute to your business goals.
When your team have clear, measurable KPIs tailored to their roles, they have a greater sense of purpose and direction and a better understanding how their work impacts the broader success of your business.
This clarity fosters accountability and empowers your team to take ownership of their tasks.
Moreover, tracking team-focused KPIs highlights where further support or additional training is required, enabling your team to see opportunities for growth and development in your business.
Showing your team members a development plan and their career and growth opportunities in your business strengthens motivation and loyalty, ensuring they feel valued and engaged.
When you focus on your team, you create a positive work culture which, in turn, reduces team churn and attracts top talent. In essence, team-focused KPIs not only increase the knowledge and skills of your team, they help drive up the success of your business as well.
BUT – does team buy-in really influence business performance?
Whether you’re a UK or US business, Dr Alex Edmans’ hard research proves that a commitment to team culture improvements does drive financial results – and has done so since the time of Henry Ford.
Finding a handful of KPIs is difficult in the team space. Your business – every business – is unique. In addition, identifying just a handful of team KPIs from the complexity associated with individual motivation and the further complexities of team dynamics adds to the challenge.
What Edmans’ 30-minute video (less if you speed the video up!) shows is that a 300% – and up to 400% – better shareholder return is likely if you succeed at building a team-first culture.
To help you think further about specific actions, strategies and KPIs for developing a healthier team culture, read this article from FlexOS.
It provides a brilliant overview of these complexities. Have a look and see what resonates for you and your team and consider whether you and your team can work out a KPI or two that can work for you.
- How Managers Benefit from Having Strong Team Dynamics
- How the Different Personalities in Your Team Interact
- Know Which Stage Your Team are at in Team Development
- Strategies to Build Strong Team Dynamics
- Overcome the Unique Challenges of Building Strong Team Dynamics in Hybrid and Remote Teams
Get the buy-in of your team using Gallup or B Corp
I am sure we all agree that getting the buy-in of your team improves the performance of your business, but how do you measure – and build – team engagement?
One way is to seek out an overview KPI that demonstrates your focus on the team. Consider adopting a regular sounding board to check on your team’s views.
Two well-researched and proven ways to do this are the Gallup Q12 survey and the increasingly popular B Corp certification.
The Gallup Q12 survey is a widely recognised employee engagement assessment tool developed by Gallup, the global analytic and advisory firm. It consists of 12 carefully crafted questions designed to measure key elements of workplace engagement and performance. These questions are based on decades of research and aim to identify the factors that contribute to high-performing, engaged teams.
The Q12 focuses on areas critical to employee satisfaction and productivity, such as clarity of expectations, access to resources, recognition, development opportunities and alignment with the mission of your business.
The questions are straightforward and use a five-point Likert scale:
- Do I know what is expected of me at work?
- Do I have the materials and equipment I need to do my work correctly?
- At work, do I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day?
- In the last seven days, have I received recognition or praise for doing good work?
- Does my supervisor, or someone at work, seem to care about me as a person?
- Is there someone at work who encourages my development?
- At work, do my opinions seem to count?
- Does the mission or purpose of my company make me feel my job is important?
- Are my co-workers committed to doing quality work?
- Do I have a best friend at work?
- In the last six months, has someone at work talked to me about my progress?
- In the last year, have I had opportunities to learn and grow?
The Q12 can be used to assess engagement levels, identify strengths and weaknesses in your culture and help you to enhance your employee experience.
Research shows that higher scores on the Q12 correlate with improved outcomes, such as increased productivity, profitability, customer satisfaction and reduced turnover, making it a powerful tool for fostering a thriving team culture in your business.
From https://www.bcorporation.net/en-us:
The B Corp Certification is a prestigious designation awarded to businesses that meet high standards of social and environmental performance, accountability and transparency. Administered by the nonprofit organization B Lab, the certification is designed to recognise companies that balance profit with purpose, demonstrating a commitment to positively impacting their workers, communities and the environment.
To achieve B Corp Certification, a company must undergo a rigorous assessment process, the B Impact Assessment (BIA), which evaluates its impact across five key areas:
- Governance: Ethical practices, accountability and transparency in decision making.
- Workers: Fair treatment of employees, including wages, benefits, workplace safety and career development opportunities.
- Community: Contributions to local communities, supplier practices and diversity and inclusion efforts.
- Environment: Sustainability practices, carbon footprint reduction and resource conservation.
- Customers: Ethical treatment of customers and delivery of socially beneficial products or services.
A company must score at least 80 out of 200 possible points on the BIA to qualify and must agree to legal accountability by amending its governing documents (in most cases) to ensure decisions consider stakeholders beyond shareholders, including employees, customers and the environment.
B Corp Certification is recognised globally as a hallmark of responsible business. Certified B Corporations are part of a community of like-minded organisations committed to "using business as a force for good." This certification not only builds trust with consumers, investors and partners, but also helps attract talent aligned with the company’s values and purpose.
Keep it simple with a one-page plan
When you have worked out your handful of KPIs for your customers and your team, add them to your key business KPIs (these are just as important). You will want to get them all on one page – these will then form your ‘canary-like’ KPIs.
- 2 or 3 customer KPIs to keep your team focused on your customers every day – they are your paymaster general, after all
- 2 or 3 team KPIs that enable leaders and managers to focus on improving team togetherness, collaboration, motivation and engagement for the work they do every week
- 2 or 3 essential business KPIs – functional and financial – to ensure that the KPIs above build and grow a sustainable business every month
Here is how you create this one page of key PREDICTIVE indicators:
- Clarify the strategy and key objectives of your business. Make a short-term list of quarterly objectives and a longer-term list – a 1-, 3- or 5-year plan – with your team.
- Work out, with your people, your team and customer measures.
- Work out, with your people, the key functional and financial measures.
- Track your KPIs every month (at least) and make decisions and take action to improve them.
- Meet with your team to assess the results and make further adjustments to the decisions and actions if necessary.
The book and other resources
Learn why the most important activities that actually matter in your business are those that impact your customers.
One hundred years ago, the traditional accounting measures of costs, activities, efforts and inputs met the needs of that era's businesses. But today, these internal metrics are narrow in their focus and have become less meaningful in the knowledge economy, with little effect, in the long run, on an organisation's bottom line. Compelling and bold, Measure What Matters to Customers lays out an exciting, new road map for measuring customer value and successfully raising profits.
What people are saying about this book:
"We have known since the 1960s, when Xerox did extensive research, that employee satisfaction - customer satisfaction - profitability, yet the vast majority of companies measure only the latter. Why? Because we have a learning disability, that's why! In Measure What Matters to Customers, Ron Baker slaps us in the face with a generous dose of logic to help us correct our blind wandering through the labyrinth of lagging indicators like revenue and profitability, in favor of key predictive indicators that define success the same way our customers do. Hmmm, maybe we will get it this time?" - Ed Kless, Director, Partner Development and Recruitment, Sage Software
"Ron Baker has done it again this is the most helpful business book that I have read. In it, Ron continues his relentless focus on customer value, challenging the reader to rethink their definition of success. It provides both a solid theoretical foundation and proven practical steps that can be implemented in your business today to become a truly customer-focused organization. Lead your organization to the next level by measuring what matters to customers." - Brendon Harrex, Chairman, Ward Wilson Ltd., Invercargill, New Zealand
In an ever-shifting work landscape, leaders can no longer ignore their most overlooked stakeholders – employees.
In The Employee Advantage, behavioural economist Stephan Meier explains why organisations must value their employees as much as – if not more than – customers. Those that pivot toward an employee-centric model will be more profitable, innovative and appealing to top talent.
The good news? You don't need to start from scratch. The customer-centric tools that give you a competitive advantage can be repurposed to focus on employees.
What people are saying about this book:
"An engaging look at the complex relationships that connect pay, respect, culture, autonomy, purpose, and more to employee experience and company value. The Employee Advantage shows that employee experience remains a worthy bellwether for company success." - Amy C. Edmondson, Novartis Professor of Leadership, Harvard Business School, and author of The Right Kind of Wrong
"Move over, customer centricity. This book highlights that no company can afford to put employees second. With robust evidence and rich cases, Meier explains why leaders who fail to care about people do so at their own peril." - Adam Grant, #1 New York Times-bestselling author of Think Again
"Meier has provided insightful thinking and compelling evidence for the win-win value of putting employees first in business rather than behind customers and shareholders. Even more importantly, he's offered a roadmap for doing so effectively and efficiently. Serious leaders of all kinds should read this book and internalize its lessons." - Robert Cialdini, author of Influence
Another book mentioned in the Business Breakthrough report is The Balanced Scorecard, in which the authors argue for a balanced set of KPIs in your business.
The Balanced Scorecard translates a company's vision and strategy into a coherent set of performance measures. The four perspectives of the scorecard – financial measures, customer knowledge, internal business processes and learning and growth – offer a balance between short-term and long-term objectives, between outcomes desired and performance drivers of those outcomes and between hard objective measures and softer, more subjective measures.
If you are interested in diving further into Stephan Meier’s thoughts on how putting your team first helps your business thrive, then check out this video – it’s an episode of Business talk hosted by Deepak Bhatt.
In this enlightening discussion, Professor Meier explores the transformative impact of prioritising employees and how this approach can significantly enhance business success. Don't miss this opportunity to gain valuable insights from one of the leading voices in management and business strategy.
The discussion is 45 minutes long, but it’s well worth it, as Stephan explains so effectively the direct link between the performance of your business and the engagement and motivation of your team.
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