Going overboard on KPI's?

This is absolutely true. An objective/KPI should be relevant to that process, realistic, measurable and supportive of quality goals in order to be included in QMS targets/objectives. The target/goal should be that which the people in that process can control, or at least heavily influence, based on that process's effectiveness.

It is important to not over complicate this.

 

KPIs can indeed be shared. Examples include:

For more than one production process, "First pass yield of xx%"
For Management Review, Change Management and Corrective Action, "xx% overdue actions"

 

In my experience, no it isn't. Just as control of records isn't.

 

Inputs transformed into outputs. As someone who has done it, I have to disagree with you, at least as control of documents is concerned.

But all that aside, I can offer that auditors are not making this up. We are being pressured to include support processes in the list of processes (what would we do without current, available, secure process information?) and I know of at least one CB that enforces the expectation to have some effectiveness measure for those processes. I have pushed back against that internally, and lost the argument. Since then I had a client with no KPIs for their support processes, like training. Severral personnel were overdue for regulated training. The HR people had repeatedly prompted them to do their required training, but when I got there the training was overdue for both the previous year (which had been written as a nonconformity for the 3rd party audit) but also now overdue for an additional year (now a repeat nonconfomity, for which a major is expected to be issued).

My point is, top management did not know because there was no performance metric, which would have been included in management review so as to shed light on the delay and get it resolved. Management was not pleased to be receiving this major NC. At that point I became a convert.

Goals/targets/KPIs are not supposed to be difficult, or painful, or arbitrary in nature. They are meant to reflect how the processes support the QMS and its goals. That's it.

 

I'd like to have a concrete example of "transformation" regarding document, records etc.

Training IS a transformation - from not competent to competent people.

 

Your premise is wrong. We don't measure people.

 

You would need to directly show the process owner is responsible for missing targets based on not performing to known requirements.

You are now talking about a human resource issue. If you are going to measure a person against process KPIs, those KPIs had better be:

• Realistic
• Achievable base on solidly implemented resources
• Clearly understood
• Fully supported by upper management
• Fully supported by other processes that supply needed inputs

In short, you would need to be able to show that person willfully circumvented existing process controls. Then, in order to clearly identify the issue as one of choice, you would need to isolate the variables. There may be reasons for not following the process that do not indicate fault - that is, willful disregard. I put a paper titled When Employees Don't Follow Procedures in the Elsmar Cove Reading Room (number 4 in the Stealth Quality Series). General Electric under Jack Welch's leadership was famous for regularly "culling" the bottom 10% of employees. I have always wondered if, in doing so, the above listed points had been properly executed before firing all those people.

Even if the person willfully circumvented established process controls (including established procedures), exploration for the sake of establishing human performance for evaluation should include the question "Is this person, in fact suggesting a potential improvement?" This is not only good for business, the standards all require us to actively support employee involvement, which can include suggesting process improvements. Is it possible that these people do not have a recognized, organized venue for inputting process improvement suggestions?

The quality gurus of old (Dr. Deming among them) believed that poor performance is almost always about process failure, not personal failure. While it is true that some people do not like to follow the rules, I subscribe to the theory that most are trying to do the right thing. Look to the system to help them succeed.

I hope this helps!