Performance Measure
A Performance Measure is a system measure of some designed system.
- Context:
- output: Performance Score.
- ...
- It can range from being a Historical Performance Measure that evaluates past performance to being a Predicted Performance Measure that forecasts future performance based on models and simulations.
- It can range from being a Qualitative Performance Measure, like user satisfaction surveys, to being a Quantitative Performance Measure (such as performance metrics).
- It can range from being a Domain-Specific Performance Measure to being a General Performance Measure.
- It can range from being a Operational Performance Measure to being a Strategic Performance Measure.
- It can range from being a Real-Time Performance Measure used for monitoring systems in operation, to being a Retrospective Performance Measure that assesses past performance after completion of a task or process.
- ...
- It can be used in performance benchmarking to compare systems or processes against a standard or competitor.
- It can identify areas of inefficiency or underperformance
- It can provide actionable insights for Performance Improvement.
- It can influence both operational decisions (like workload balancing) and long-term strategy (like system upgrades or redesigns).
- ...
- Example(s):
- a System Performance Metric, such as a computing system performance metric that tracks CPU usage or response time, and a business performance measure like profitability.
- an Algorithm Performance Metric that measures accuracy, precision, or runtime efficiency in a machine learning model.
- a Task Performance Measure, such as a classification performance measure (accuracy of predictions), or a ranking performance measure (precision in ranking tasks).
- an Organizational Performance Measure, such as KPIs related to sales growth, employee turnover, or customer satisfaction.
- ...
- Counter-Example(s):
- Anecdotal Feedback – Unstructured and subjective feedback that lacks measurable, systematic criteria for performance.
- Process Description – A narrative or step-by-step outline of a process, which explains how something works but does not provide any performance metrics or measurable outcomes.
- Task Checklist – A list of actions to be performed without evaluating how well the task is executed or the quality of its results.
- See: Performance Improvement, Benchmarking, System Optimization
References
2009
- (Wikipedia, 2009) ⇒ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performance_improvement#Performance_defined
- Performance is a measure of the results achieved. Performance efficiency is the ratio between effort expended and results achieved. The difference between current performance and the theoretical performance limit is the performance improvement zone.
Another way to think of performance improvement is to see it as improvement in four potential areas. First, is the resource INPUT requirements (e.g., reduced working capital, material, replacement/reorder time, and set-up requirements). Second, is the THROUGHPUT requirements, often viewed as process efficiency; this is measured in terms of time, waste, and resource utilization. Third, OUTPUT requirements, often viewed from a cost/price, quality, functionality perspective. Fourth, OUTCOME requirements, did it end up making a difference.
Performance is an abstract concept and must be represented by concrete, measurable phenomena or events to be measured. Baseball athlete performance is abstract covering many different types of activities. Batting average is a concrete measure of a particular performance attribute for a particular game role, batting, for the game of baseball.
Performance assumes an actor of some kind but the actor could be an individual person or a group of people acting in concert. The performance platform is the infrastructure or devices used in the performance act.
There are two main ways to improve performance: improving the measured attribute by using the performance platform more effectively, or by improving the measured attribute by modifying the performance platform, which in turn allows a given level of use to be more effective in producing the desired output.
- Performance is a measure of the results achieved. Performance efficiency is the ratio between effort expended and results achieved. The difference between current performance and the theoretical performance limit is the performance improvement zone.