[Lawn Lad]

I'm curious to know what others have done in this regard.

1) Do you post performance goals for your crews/company?
2) Do you follow up and post their actual performance?
3) If yes, how often and in what format?
4) What numbers do you use?

I'm also curious about the key indicators that companies use to manage their operations. I look a Covey class a while back and the concept of having a 'dashboard' has stuck with me. I look a monthly P&L and so forth, but I think I can improve.

I'm trying to find the key numbers that drive the business. Is it the effective bill rate (or realization rate) equally revenue/payroll hours? Is it a under/over of man hours from estimate to actual?

I also know that numbers will be different for each part of the business. A "Sales" dashboard might show the number of leads generated to those converted, closing rate, dollars sold towards goal, etc.

I'm trying to think about a financial dashboard after reading the Opearting Cost Study from PLANET recently. Would I be better off monitoring the quick ratio and receivables turn over in addition to the P&L on a monthly basis or some other measure?

While I could create a dashboard for Finance, Marketing/Sales and Operations - I'm wondering - what are the key two, three or four numbers that really tell you how a business is operating. Something you can look at on a weekly basis?

From here obviously you have to have the system in place to provide the data and then it has to be sustainable.

At this point I'm brainstorming and interested to know what others might be using in their businesses.