All objectives flow from customer’s needs.

A strong process for innovation should always be focused on meeting customer needs, even when those needs are not always clearly articulated or fully understood. Goals at the onset of a design project should be rooted in creating a product or service that really helps people. Such goals can become a powerful motivating force and rallying cry for project teams.

Tip #2: Base your metrics on your goals.

What you measure affects your outcome.

It’s often said that you get what you measure. Metrics can reinforce a healthy product development process. By aligning the metrics you’re using and tracking to the right goals, you can encourage constructive behavior.

Anchor your success metrics to your goals.

Set a concrete definition of success by using the business goals to define your ultimate success metrics. For example, if you are interested in simplifying the user experience you could choose a decrease in the volume of support calls as a success metric. If you are interested in creating a more compelling ecosystem of products, you could choose to measure how often customers purchase complementing products in the ecosystem. In either case, with knowledge of the desired outcome, you can use historical and competitive data to set concrete benchmarks for the team. If these success metrics are not explicitly stated at the outset of a project, it is often difficult to fully understand the market dynamics at play measure how well the team has met its objectives.

And, the activities will follow.

With goals and corresponding metrics in place, it becomes easier to plan activities and allocate resources that encourage the team in the right direction. For example if you are trying to develop an ecosystem of products, you may need to bring together different product development teams within the organization for a design vision session.

When goals and metrics are agreed on upfront, product teams will be able to manage the design process around a clear definition of success – avoiding lengthy negotiations and costly rework. A clear metrics framework will help designers know exactly which business goals to shoot for. This is the basis of the D³ Matrix. It sets the foundational goals for every project then informs the metrics and activities to meet those goals.

Related posts:

1. Five Key Strategies for Making Metrics
2. Design Council’s Lessons from America
3. Five Key Strategies for Managing Change
4. Design Strategies for Technology Adoption
5. Sustaining vs. Disruptive Innovations