It’s football season. In Nashville, Tennessee where I live that means the heart of SEC sports. This past weekend, I had the opportunity to attend the University of Tennessee game against South Carolina.
It was the kind of football game fans love. Tennessee had an early lead then in true suspense fashion fell behind until the last possible moment of the game. The Volunteers came from behind to beat the Gamecocks 23-21 with a winning field goal at the buzzer. The team’s fight song “Rocky Top” erupted as players flooded the field in jubilation.
A win is a win, right? Yes, but what made this win so special is it broke an 11-year losing streak against a ranked opponent. Congratulations!
It was an interesting day in SEC football. Other surprising upsets and records occurred. Auburn beat Texas A&M, Ole Miss beat LSU, Vandy beat Georgia, and Missouri beat Florida. What a day for anyone with bets on any of these outcomes!
As I watched ESPN wrap up shows, it made me think. Records were broken yesterday because these teams keep score of many aspects of their game. Yes the # of wins is always the top score but there is much more to it than that.
In your business world, what or how are you keeping score? It’s impossible to ever break a record if you aren’t driven by metrics in some way.
Most businesses track sales or revenue, those are a given. Want to be a real trend-setter? Consider these metrics:
- How many times are we failing? It means we are trying new possibly crazy ideas that will wow our customers and help us become a service leader?
- How many of our employees are actively involved in their communities? They become an extension of your brand and possibly its opportunity to give back in a unique way.
- Why do any of our employees choose to leave us? Is there an underlying retention need we need to address (by the way, money is rarely “the” reason employees leave you).
- What are our customers’ top three complaints in doing business with us? Fix just one of those and you will be amazed at the positive response (and likely increased business) from your customers.
- Same as #4 but apply it to our employees. Fix just one of these and you won’t be able to stop your employees’ loyalty and performance they give you.
And the list could go on and on. If every organization took even one of these metrics/questions seriously, what difference would it make in your organization? And here’s the cool thing. Your business is not limited by a sports season. You have the opportunity to break record 365 days per year. So, what’s stopping you? What record can your business break?
By the way, we want to hear from you. What interesting metric does your organization measure? Please inspire us with your success!