KPI Examples for Your Leadership Team

The key to assessing the health of your business…

CEOs need easy access to a few key performance indicators to monitor how healthy the business is at a given point in time.

It’s imperative to identify a handful of metrics that the CEO needs to see daily or weekly.

These metrics should tell a quick story and give insight into both external and internal trends. This blog provides KPI Examples for your leadership team.

Which KPIs belong on a CEO’s KPI dashboard?

Business leaders need to keep up-to-date in real time (or as close as possible) so that they can have the actionable insights needed to make adjustments to their priorities.

Here are some examples of KPIs that a CEO should be watching for their leadership team:
CEO/Owner

• “A” Players on the Leadership Team – the goal would be to have at least 75 percent of the Leadership Team be considered “A” players.
• Net Cash Flow %
• Return on Investment (or Assets) %
• Brand Promise Delivery
  • Net Promoter Score
  • Repeat Customers % (The goal is to have at least 95 percent of existing customers become repeat buyers)
• Leadership Team Development Plans – 100% complete
• Profitability
• EBITDA
• Market Share

Marketing Leader

• Leads Generated #/ month
• Cost per Lead
• Brand Awareness >percent
• Promotion Effectiveness / ROI +%
• Trade Show ROI +%
• New Customer Acquisition
• “A” Players on the Team – the goal would be to have at least 75 percent of the Team be considered “A” players
• Marketing Team Development Plans  – 100% complete

Sales Leader

• Sales Pipeline Value / Conversion %
• Leads Converted #/ month
• % of revenue goal
• Year over Year Revenue Growth (New & Existing Clients)
• Sales Efficiency Ratio $? /$1.00
• Market Share Growth + percent
• “A” Players on the Team – the goal would be to have at least 75 percent of the Team be considered “A” players
• Sales Team Development Plans  – 100% complete

Operations Leader

• Gross margin %
• “A” Players Retained %
• Internal Hires for Open Positions %
• Customer Visits per Quarter
• “A” Players on the Team – the goal would be to have at least 75 percent of the Team be considered “A” players
• Operations Team Development Plans  – 100% complete

Financial Leader

• Return on Invested Dollars – percent
• Accurate Budget Forecasts ± 2.5 percent
• Accounts Receivable Days < 30
• Cash in hand for operations
• Level of debt as % of total Assets
• Financial Literacy of Leadership Team 100 percent of team
• “A” Players on the Team – the goal would be to have at least 75 percent of the Team be considered “A” players
• Financial Team Development Plans – 100% complete

Human Resources Leader

• Regrettable Turnover < 1 percent (Regrettable Turnover is the percentage of people who leave the organisation but whom you did not want to lose?)
• Open Positions < 5 percent
• Absence time, Engagement level
• Management Efficiency Ratio $10.00/$1.00 (Management Efficiency Ratio is measured by how many contribution-margin dollars are generated for every dollar of the management team’s salary.)
• Employee Net Promoter Score (NPS)
• “A” Players on the Team – the goal would be to have at least 75 percent of the Team be considered “A” players
• HR Team Development Plans – 100% complete

Manufacturing Team Leader

• Gross / Contribution Margin 58 percent / 42 percent
• Labour Efficiency Ratio $?/$1.00 (Labour Efficiency Ratio is measured by how many gross-margin dollars are generated for every dollar of direct-labour salary.)
• Machine Utilisation Rate – %
• Days Lost Due to Injury – 0 days
• Quality / Bugs
• “A” Players on the Team – the goal would be to have at least 75 percent of the Team be considered “A” players
• Manufacturing Team Development Plans  – 100% complete

Legal Leader

• Corporate Legal Compliance – 100 percent
• Legal Budget Management ± 5 percent
• Litigation Win Rate – ? %
• Employee Policy Signatures/Communication – 100 percent
• “A” Players on the Team – the goal would be to have at least 75 percent of the Team be considered “A” players
• Legal Team Development Plans – 100% complete

Innovation Leader

• Products Developed on Time ± 1 week
• Products Developed on Budget ± 2.5 percent
• First Year New Product Market Share – 20 percent
• Accurate Product Market Forecasts ± 5 percent
• “A” Players on the Team – the goal would be to have at least 75 percent of the Team be considered “A” players
• Innovation Team Development Plans  – 100% complete

Purchasing/Supply Chain Leader

• Reduction in Cost of Goods Sold – 5 percent
• Days Lost Due to Product Shortage – 0
• Supplier Mistakes
• Supplier Quality Ratings +90 percent
• Material Quality Specifications – 100 percent
• “A” Players on the Team – the goal would be to have at least 75 percent of the Team be considered “A” players
• Purchasing/Supply Team Development Plans – 100% complete

I don’t think it is an accident that successful CEOs are watching KPIs that fall into one of the 4 categories:

• Customers – Do your customers love, appreciate, and refer you?
• Employees – Are your employees engaged, productive, delivering results, and excited about the future?
• Revenue – Do you have the right product/service offerings and marketing/sales strategies to support your current and future revenue goals?
• Processes – Do you have healthy operations and disciplines that you can scale for the future?

Thinking about your business, what Customer, Employee, Revenue, and Process KPIs are key for your company’s success?

Your list will be unique and based on your industry and specific goals. However, the ideal KPI dashboard for CEOs should include one or two metrics from each of the four key areas to ensure a balanced scorecard of your company’s success.

Keep in mind that there may be more than KPIs on your CEO dashboard.

You’ll also want to keep an eye on the key projects – or quarterly rocks in Rockefeller Habits – that help drive your numbers towards your strategic plan.

For example, if you are implementing a CRM to improve your sales KPIs, you’ll want to make sure that you keep track of that project on your dashboard as well.

This will ensure that you are not only looking at the key numbers, but you’re also looking at what you are doing to improve those numbers.

This will give the Executive and Management teams the performance dashboard that they need to keep the business performing at a high level.

I want to acknowledge 2 key sources for this blog:

• Rhythm Systems – 5 Reasons Why You Need KPI’s
• My fellow Scaling Up Coach, Dave Baney’s book – The 3×5 Coach: A Practical Guide to Coaching Your Team for Greater Results and Happier People

Take your business to the next level with a personalised report…

Take your business to the next level with a complete Business Action Plan in just 10 minutes or less… It’s a completely free tool.

You’ll receive a scorecard that’s been designed to show entrepreneurs, CEOs and Leadership Teams their blind spots and provide instant, actionable steps on how to improve.

Your Action Plan covers your Leadership Team, your People, your Strategy, your Customer, Execution, Cash and you as a CEO.

It’s proven to work and will provide key insights that you can action immediately. Take the survey and get your Action Plan instantly here.

Or, feel free to email us at jonathan@scaleupgrowth.co or call +61 (0) 408 748 980.

I hope you have enjoyed these insights. Have a great week and stay growth-focused!

Best Wishes,
Jonathan