intelligent measurement

Intelligent Measurement – what and how?

February 28, 2006 at 9:46 pm Leave a comment

Intelligent Measurement is about using innovative methodologies and technologies to measure things which are (a) important to measure, and (b) notoriously difficult – normally because of the intangibility of the subject and the subjectivity of measurers.

Don’t get me wrong. As a declared enemy of bureaucracy, I have an aversion to all forms of obsessive micro management and control freakery.

But I have seen many organisations blunder along in the dark as they attempt to improve their communications or embark on change management or environmental performance programmes.  If only they had some objective measurements at the start of the programme- their strategy would be informed by actualities, not anecdote. They could have measured outcomes, not output. They could have used the data to frame a sensible budget, and also measure which parts of the budget were wasted, and which returned the investment.

I have been to a number of conferences on PR measurement, notably Katie Paine’s “Measurement Summits”. The cry from the floor is “how can I obtain evidence to justify/keep my job/budget/team?” One solution is measurement. But what? And how?

Over the next months, I will be posting on this blog examples of good “Intelligent Measurement”. (please feel free to post any suggestions on the blog).

Richard

Entry filed under: General, PR evaluation.