P5知识点讲解-业绩指标 (1)

P5知识点讲解-业绩指标 (1)

ACCA P5考试：PERFORMANCE INDICATORS

在讲解咱们的业绩指标之前，先讲解一下：什么叫“业绩”？

在牛津词典中，业绩performance是被定义为：

‘A task or operation seen in terms of how successfully it is performed’

Organisations differ greatly in which aspects of their behaviour and results constitute good performance. For example their aim could be to make profits, to increase the share price, to cure patients in a hospital, or to clear household rubbish. The concept of ‘performance’ is very relevant to both P3 and P5. P3 looks at how organisations can make decisions that improve their strategic performance and, of course, P5 is called ‘Advanced Performance Management’ and is focused on how organisations evaluate their performance.

The primary required tasks are often found in the organisation’s mission statement as it is there that the organisation’s purpose should be defined. These are called ‘primary required tasks’ because although the primary task of a profit-seeking business is to make profits, this rests on other subsidiary tasks such as good design, low cost per unit, quality, flexibility, successful marketing and so on. Many of these are non-financial achievements.

Some aspects of performance are ‘nice to have’ but others will be critical success factors. For example, the standard of an airline’s meals and entertainment systems will rank after punctuality, reliability and safety, all of which are likely to be critical to the airline’s success.

OBJECTIVES

Objectives are simply targets that an organisation sets out to achieve. They are elements of the mission that have been quantified and are the basis for deciding appropriate performance measures and indicators. There is little point measuring something if you do not know whether the result is satisfactory and cannot decide if performance needs to change. Organisations will create a hierarchy of objectives which will include corporate objectives which affect the organisation as a whole and unit objectives which will affect individual business units within the organisation. Even here objectives will be categorised as primary and secondary, for example an organisation might set itself a primary objective of growth in profits but will then need to develop strategies to ensure this primary objective is achieved. This is where secondary objectives are needed, for example to improve product quality or to make more efficient use of resources.

Objectives often follow the SMART rule. They should be:

Specific: there is little point in setting an objective for a company to improve its inventory. What does that mean? It could mean that stock-outs should be less frequent, or average stock holdings should be lower, or the inventory will be held in better conditions to reduce wastage.

Measurable: if you can’t measure something you will be at a loss as to how to control it. Some aspects of performance might be difficult to measure, but efforts must be made. Customer satisfaction is important to most businesses and indications could be obtained by arranging customer surveys, repeat business and so on.

Achievable/agreed/accepted: objectives are achieved by people and those people must accept and agree that the objectives are achievable and important.

Relevant: relevant to the organisation and the person to whom the objectives are given. It is important that people understand how achieving an objective will help organisational success. If this connection isn’t clear, employees will begin to feel that the objective is simply a cynical exercise of management power. The person to whom the objective is given must also feel that they can affect its achievement.

Time-limited: all objectives have to be achieved within a specified time period otherwise procrastination will rule.

CRITICAL SUCCESS FACTORS

A critical success factor (CSF) can be defined as:

‘An area where an organisation must perform well if it is to succeed.’

Alternatively, Johnson, Scholes & Whittington defined CSFs as:

'Those product features that are particularly valued by a group of customers, and, therefore, where the organisation must excel to outperform the competition.’

This definition is more complex than the first, but it is more useful because it makes the organisation look towards its customers (or users) and recognises that theiropinion of excellence is more important and reliable than internally generated opinions. If an organisation doesn’t deliver what its customers, clients, patients, citizens or students value, it is failing.

PERFORMANCE INDICATORS AND KEY PERFORMANCE INDICATORS

Performance indicators (or performance measures) are methods used to assess performance. For example:

In profit-seeking organisations:

• Profit

• Earnings per share

• Return on capital employed

In not-for-profit organisations:

• Exam grades (a school)

• Waiting times for hospital admission (a health service)

• Condition of roads (a local government highways department)