I once heard a parable during a lecture about famed process expert W.E. Deming.
A bank's management was concerned that its tellers' cash drawer balances were often slightly off the expected counts. During spot checks, one drawer might be 25 cents over; another might be a few dollars short, and so on. Management thought this was symptomatic of sloppiness. To address the problem, they instituted a rule that all cash drawers had to be reconciled at the end of each day, and if there were a discrepancy, the teller would be disciplined.
After a few weeks, management asked for a report. Congratulations were given all around. Discrepancies had vanished entirely. Problem solved.
Eventually the real story surfaced. The tellers responded to the rule by creating a secret piggy-bank fund. If a drawer was over at the end of the day, the excess went into the fund. Deficits, likewise, drew from the fund. Thus, the books balanced perfectly at the end of each day. No other process changes occurred.
The lesson is that when you're trying to manage a process, you'll almost always see improvements in what you're measuring, but that does not mean that the root problem is solved. The number of tickets issued by these cameras will certainly go down, and police will use that number to justify more installations. In reality, drivers will start holding phones above their heads, wearing seatbelt-colored shirts, driving with the sunshade down, avoiding the routes with cameras, waving their arms around the cabin, and so on. The metric is number of tickets issued. Drivers and law enforcement will collaborate, conspire, and independently innovate for the exclusive goal of bringing that number down.
A bank's management was concerned that its tellers' cash drawer balances were often slightly off the expected counts. During spot checks, one drawer might be 25 cents over; another might be a few dollars short, and so on. Management thought this was symptomatic of sloppiness. To address the problem, they instituted a rule that all cash drawers had to be reconciled at the end of each day, and if there were a discrepancy, the teller would be disciplined.
After a few weeks, management asked for a report. Congratulations were given all around. Discrepancies had vanished entirely. Problem solved.
Eventually the real story surfaced. The tellers responded to the rule by creating a secret piggy-bank fund. If a drawer was over at the end of the day, the excess went into the fund. Deficits, likewise, drew from the fund. Thus, the books balanced perfectly at the end of each day. No other process changes occurred.
The lesson is that when you're trying to manage a process, you'll almost always see improvements in what you're measuring, but that does not mean that the root problem is solved. The number of tickets issued by these cameras will certainly go down, and police will use that number to justify more installations. In reality, drivers will start holding phones above their heads, wearing seatbelt-colored shirts, driving with the sunshade down, avoiding the routes with cameras, waving their arms around the cabin, and so on. The metric is number of tickets issued. Drivers and law enforcement will collaborate, conspire, and independently innovate for the exclusive goal of bringing that number down.