#DELIVER · LinkedIn post · English translation
Programme steering series (5/7): Reporting determines behaviour
You do not get the projects you want. You get the projects you ask people to report on.
Teams do not automatically optimise for the project objective. They optimise for what needs to look good in the next status report. Ask for ‘per cent complete’, and you get teams that deliver good percentages – not necessarily good results.
This is not a motivation problem. It is a steering problem: reporting is not neutral observation. It tells a team where to direct its energy.
Economists have known this pattern for decades as Goodhart’s Law: when a measure becomes a target, it loses its value as a measure.
For programme steering, this means that before asking how to report, you need to ask what behaviour the reporting should actually produce.
What does your project really report on at the moment – progress, or merely activity?
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