What Gets Measured Gets Done.

If you browse the internet you will notice that opinions diverge on this quote. Simply put, depending on the personality and time management style of the person, they might find this quote of value or not.

What Gets Measured Gets Done.

The origin of the disagreement in my opinion is the extent of time and tasks tracking used by companies to increase the productivity. And to be honest it does work, even-though the worker might not be happy about it.

Metrics and KPIs

for a company it is very important to have specific metrics or KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) to measure. Why? because that allows the founders to know how the company is evolving. Metrics can vary and depend on what the entrepreneur chooses them to be.
Metrics can be clicks, sales, visits, likes etc …

Measuring metrics is one thing, and setting quotas that need to be reached is something other completely, the later can sometimes be beneficial for an organisation, but can also be detrimental. It can cause employee burnout, and in some cases cause dishonest or less optimal behavior.

For example:
“staff at an outsourced Police control room were making 999 calls at quiet times in order to meet their target of answering 92% of calls within 10 seconds”.
“doctors [in the UK] were diverted from treating seriously ill patients to ones with minor problems in order to meet 4-hour waiting time targets” 

In general, measuring the progress helps you keep focused on the goal.
When gym goers keep a journal, they are reminded every-time of the objective to reach, hence more likely to stick to the track and reach the goal.
When a webmaster keeps track of the website, he gets to know what is performing better, hence can double down on it.
When an entrepreneur is measuring aspects of the interaction with the product, he can improve the product to have a better market share.