At The KPI Institute, our mission is to pursue performance, in all its facets, and bring this knowledge to others who wish to improve both on an individual level and an organizational one. Outstanding employees that strive to lift their company to new heights, maximize its potential and strengthen its development, so that it becomes the best of the best, all the while harnessing this knowledge to better themselves as professionals – these are the people that inspire us.
Join us in our journey of interviewing some of the most extraordinary individuals that continue to make The KPI Institute a role-model for others to follow. In today’s edition, we will be featuring The KPI Institute’s Team of the Quarter for Utilities Performance Benchmarking project.
1.What was your role within the Utilities Performance Benchmarking kick-off team?
Alina Miertoiu
,, I was extensively involved in developing the content for the reports and applying the agreed-upon benchmarking methodology, but as a Project Manager, my role was also to coordinate the project team and to work with other departments, such as Graphic Design, Marketing or Sales.”
Andrea Minelli
,, My role was to support the development of all the Utilities Benchmarking reports, contributing and keeping track of the progress of all the research activities that assisted the enhancement of the report series. My involvement consisted in delineating certain sections of the utilities reports, processing a large pool of both financial and non-financial KPI data, to include in the reports, and design related graphs in order to clearly visualize the performance data that we were working with. Furthermore, we researched several companies’ reports that presented valuable performance data, relevant for our initiatives.”
Ana Lenchințan
,, My main responsibility consisted of drafting up a part of the reports presenting various types of performance metrics, besides the financial ones. Large amounts of KPI data were thereby processed, on the basis of which we designed associated graphs to help visualize the results of each metric. I also conducted research on the companies whose reports we analyzed in order to extract applicable data and defined over 100 key performance indicators.”
How did it feel to be nominated and selected as Team of the Quarter?
Alina Miertoiu
,, It is always nice to have your efforts recognized and appreciated. This is, on one side, a confirmation that you are doing the right thing, and, on the other side, an impulse to do even better next time. I think of it as a trigger to starting a constructive competition with yourself.”
Andrea Minelli
,, I reckon that when your efforts are recognized and aknowledged by your team members and at the organizational level, it gives you the support to continue being driven, focused and willing to do more and in a better way.”
Ana Lenchințan
,, Seeing that that your efforts materialize into a well-structured and informative publication, that you helped create a positive impact and your work in this direction is being recognized is one of the main benefits a workplace can offer. Thus, through the nomination and selection, I felt that my efforts are appreciated and that my contribution matters.”
What do you find to have been the most challenging part of the project?
Alina Miertoiu
,, As this project required working with considerable amounts of secondary data, making sure the data was relevant, accurate and clustered corectly, was essential for the deployment of the Utilities Performance Benchmarking Report Series, hence clustering and reviewing the accuracy of the data were the most challenging and time cosuming parts.”
Andrea Minelli
,, I had the chance of working with very supportive team members, where communication and support was constant throughout the duration of the project. For this initiative, I reckon the challenges were mainly technical, considering the fact that the nature of these tasks were very intricate and required attention and accuracy.”
Ana Lenchințan
,, The innovative character of this initiative, which prompted us to constantly adapt and redesign our work processes in order to obtain the best results.”
What would be the three main lessons learnt from this project?
Alina Miertoiu
,, Since this was the first large scale project I coordinated, I can say that there were a lot of lessons to learn for me, but if I were to name the main three I would say:
Make sure all team members are on the same page
Empower the people from your team to act
Ask for feedback often and recalibrate based on it ”
Andrea Minelli
,, Communication is vital – When communcation among members is constant and clear, it creates a sense of accountability and understanding that supports the achievement of the desired results.
Plan and update – When the tasks and expectations are decided upon as a group, since the very beginning of the project, each individual member will be able to focus on his/her duties and have control over the progress made towards the established shared goals.
Ask for and give feedback, be adaptable – Being able to keep an open mind but above all, have a positive attitude towards new ideas, opinions and initiatives proposed by those involved in the project is very important. Moreover, be flexible in case unexpected events that may interfere with your tasks appear out of nowhere. ”
Ana Lenchințan
,, Communication is essential– If information flows consistently, results will reach desired levels sooner and all team members will feel included and appreciated.
Plan every step carefully – If expectations and specifications are clear from the beginning, team members will focus adequately on their tasks and will be able to work with a high degree of independence towards reaching the common goal.
Stay malleable – Despite accurate planning, unforeseen events and changes will almost certainly occur, thus it is important to adapt to these developments as you go along, with a positive attitude, naturally, and the desired results will follow suit. ”
