Step 11 · Measure the Results

The implementation is not the finish line. Compare the result with the problem, baseline and success measures established at the beginning.

Full guide planned · 15 min read
Step 11 · Measure the Results

The short version

Did it actually make the operation better? Go back to the problem you wrote down in step one and answer against it. If the inventory problem was time and missed expirations, then the questions are whether checks take less time and whether fewer items are expired or missing — not whether the software works. Be equally willing to record that it created new work somewhere else, because that is the finding most likely to improve the next decision.

See it applied

Worked example — built from published USFA sources, not from a department's reported results

Worked Case Study: The NERIS Transition Through the Technology Adoption Roadmap

Every fire department reporting incident data had to move from NFIRS to NERIS on a national timetable. The destination was fixed; almost everything else was still a local decision. This works the twelve steps through that transition, using published U.S. Fire Administration material for the facts and clearly labelled examples for everything a department would do locally.

Read it

Go deeper

Questions to ask your vendor

  1. Did it save time?
  2. Did it reduce errors?
  3. Did it improve readiness?
  4. Did users adopt it?
  5. Did it reduce risk?
  6. Did it improve information quality?
  7. Did it create new work somewhere else?
  8. Did the actual cost match expectations?
  9. Are we using the capabilities we are paying for?

This is a reading list, not a guide

Everything above was published by someone else, and is here because it is the clearest treatment of the subject we could find and verify. The Hub’s own guide to this topic is still being written. If you know a better source than the ones listed, that is worth telling us before it is.

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