Identification of Key Performance Indicators in Project-Based Organisations through the Lean Approach

Abstract

For the time being, companies and organisations are being forced to compete in utterly complex and globalised environments, facing massive natural, economic, and technological challenges on a daily basis. Addressing these challenges would be impossible without a proper approach that helps them identify, measure, understand, and control the performance of their organisations. Lean principles and techniques rise as a solution. This paper justifies and proposes the use of lean principles and techniques to identify key performance indicators (KPIs) in project-based organisations based on their organisational and operational needs. The research focuses mainly on the identification and categorisation of KPIs through a qualitative approach, based on systematic literature review (SLR) of performance indicators, project management, and project success. As a case study, an analysis of relevant information of an R&D and innovation project-based organisation, such as quality manuals, a benchmarking process, internal studies, and surveys regarding what success means for different kinds of stakeholders and for the organisation itself was conducted. As a result, this research is of a high value for project-based organisations, especially those that are not apprised of how to correctly formulate a series of KPIs, or whose path to it is still not clear.

Energy Self-Sufficiency Aiming for Sustainable Wastewater Systems: Are All Options Being Explored?

“…Nevertheless, this cannot be confirmed due to the lack of energy data for a number of the cases studied, particularly, for the smaller plants [20,47,52,69]. Another possible reason could be related to the availability of specialized management resources in larger plants, as usually happens in industrial organizations [67,[81][82][83]. This could also explain the fact that most of the plants have several renewable technologies installed.…”

“…All these KPIs might show a wide range of different values, depending on the effecting factors described in Section 1, such as the size of the plant or type of treatment [9,12,14], providing valuable information for improvement in the first line of action, energy efficiency. Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are a well-established method widely used nowadays in the management of all types of business activities and organizations [67]. Indicators can be established at micro-, meso-, or macro-level, depending on the system being measured.…”

“…Thus, either as the main energy recovery technology like in Engelberg (65%) [20] or only with a small contribution like in Clarkson (about 1%) [78], in any scenario, pondering on the possible implementation of hydropower could be of interest on the pathway towards self-sufficiency. In any case, these KPIs are valuable for performance monitoring and sustainability improvement, both individually and in aggregated evolution data [66][67][68]. Concerning the specific hydropower contribution to energy self-sufficiency, the limitation of available data was even stronger [20,80].…”

Quality management as the basis of business company operations for the purpose of customer satisfaction

“… Improvement processes [12]: these are processes of a generic nature that plan, organize, monitor and control the activities of the organization as a whole as well as the business results of the organization. Such processes are human resource management, planning, internal control, etc.…”

Key performance indicators (KPIs)

“…Management and organizational KPIs are especially important to measure the relationship among project members and their ability to collaborate and avoid or resolve conflicts. This kind of indicator is now present in the evaluation of many university-industry collaborative projects and other public sector projects [8], [30]. ProdPhd includes the following KPIs related to the team's organization, its ability to solve internal conflicts, and the relationship between the partners and the Expert Advisory Board.…”