ABSTRACT
There is a systemic relationship between purpose (what we are here to do), measures (how we know how we are doing) and method (how we do it). In the example of the service center, command-and-control managers typically measure ‘service level’—calls answered in so many seconds and agent activity. These measures not only obscure the means for improvement, they create de facto purposes that get in the way of the real ones: ‘pick up the calls,’ and ‘make your activity targets.’ At a stroke both agents’ and managers’ ingenuity is focused on how to survive; how to avoid being paid attention to. In the broadest sense, the purpose becomes ‘make the plan.’ It is dysfunctional, but managers do not know it. Although these ideas appear to work at one level, they hide the better alternative.
