Section Four STRATEGICALLY ORIENTED PERFORMANCE
MEASUREMENT SYSTEMS
The strategic importance of performance measurement systems
is indicated in the following quotation by Clinton Longenecker
and Dennis Gioia:
A shipping firm executive captured his personal
credo in the phrase: “You get what you
measure.” And we might add: “You measure
what you value.” If the organization values short-
term results, that is what it will measure and get.
If it values executive development, a different
emphasis emerges.^1Various approaches to performance measurement are
available to help assess the degree to which the behavior of
employees at all organizational levels contributes to the
implementation of strategies. Measures of performance are
necessary for the functioning of reward systems, which are
discussed in the next section. All methods of performance
measurement and evaluation are potentially useful means of
providing feedback on the degree to which behaviors are
congruent with organizational strategies. Likewise, they are all
potentially useful means, although to varying degrees, of
informing reward systems of the extent to which employees are