Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are a term which is used a lot in the context of Management Information. I have mentioned them in an earlier post in the context of the “Balanced Scorecard”. I also listed the KPIs used by the new Lee Kong Chian reference library in Singapore.

KPIs are important for report design in that, in an ideal world, most standard reports in the library would have an implicit or explicit link to a KPI or KPIs.

Indeed it is possible to design a report that superimposes a KPI onto data. Here is an example (created using Talis Decisions) showing a KPI (Orange line) superimposed on actual Library data (Blue Bars). As a matter of style, it is probably appropriate to link  the KPI value to a prompt to remind all concerned that the KPI value may change even if the thing being measured does not (so for example, there might be a target number of loans every year, but the actual value will change from year to year)

Many organisations suggest target KPIs for libraries: I’ll review some in a future post.