Check the score, I mean results, I mean metrics, or whatever

Metrics, figures, measureables..whatever you want to call them, there is a seemingly endless number of statistics. In the sports world alone there are thousands.

Take basketball, for example -  there are assists, rebounds, player minutes, turnovers and time of possession, just to name a few. These individual data points are so important that they scroll along the bottom of the screen and are printed in the next day’s newspaper.

Would looking at only a few of these stats indicate which team won or lost the game? Not necessarily. Was the team's goal to out rebound the other team? I'd say the goal was to win by making the most baskets to score the most points. However, out-rebounding the other team may very well have been a strategy to reach that goal.  So tracking those rebounds is great, but losing sight of the ultimate goal by getting lost in numbers that won’t necessarily guarantee you a win… not so great.

While this type of stat monitoring gives insight into where the team or individual players are strong or need to improve, if too much emphasis is placed on the stats alone, one could easily lose sight of the ultimate goal of the game – to win. As referenced in a recent Harvard Business Review blog post, "metrics are starting points for dialogue rather than conclusions."

So while there are endless amounts of stats, I try only to look at data that will make me change what I’m doing to win the game. Even better, I try to prioritize review of stats that will help me know what to change.  

There are 280 words in this post.  The word “the” is used 16 times.  There are 5 line breaks in this post.  The metric that matters most in this post: 1 point.