MEASURE INDIVIDUAL SUCCESS

It is important to measure individual success because it can tell you if you are effectively using your time and effort. Being productive at work doesn’t necessarily mean you are succeeding at your job. You need to be able to define what success means in order to work towards getting there. As Peter Drucker said, “You can’t manage what you can’t measure.” A greater understanding of what workplace success is can help you work towards achieving meaningful goals.

Set yourself personal KPIs

Good metrics are actionable and drive successful behaviour. If you work in marketing, you can measure success by tracking how your marketing results have varied over time. Keep track of your conversion rate every week or look at the changes in website traffic results. This can help you understand if you are succeeding in improving results, and also allows you to know early on if there are any negative trends.

Success does not happen overnight; it often takes many failures to get there. SEO is a good example of this, as it will take many months before you start seeing results. Once you do, you can start achieving profitable and consistent growth. When you measure your success at work, look at who you are becoming rather than your current circumstances.

It is easy to determine success based on proxies rather than actual outcomes. Secondary metrics, like the number of likes on your post, might be a proxy for marketing success but it may not translate to tangible business results. Processes such as posting five times a day may increase your follower count, but not necessarily. Instead, learn how you can best serve your customers and do what will help you succeed. Measure your success based on outcomes instead of what you are aiming to achieve.

One of the best outcomes of defining success is that measuring it will stir you to automatically change your behaviour to best improve your outcomes. Well defined success can make it clear what you need to do to achieve it. Work backwards from a specific metric to understand what elements have come together to enable you to make that target. Recognising how you identify success should help you yield more meaningful results and improve your performance at work.