3.3: Performance Management Systems
Sarah Farahdel
Workshop Introduction
Organizations today understand the need to have an effective performance management system (PMS), as a necessity to be successful and drive excellent results. There is still, however, a struggle to be best-in-class due to unstructured measurement processes that are misaligned with key strategic objectives. This presentation will be highly beneficial for engineers to gain a better understanding of the importance of creating effective PMSs, learn effective ways to improve training and development within their job function and gather insight on potential advancements required in data visualization and automation. A case study will be presented, demonstrating the detailed steps taken to create an effective PMS for a Program Management Office at an aerospace company, which resulted in improved performance results, optimized communication strategies, and reduction of costs and resources required.
This talk will:
- Define Performance Management Systems (PMS’s), outlines their importance for engineers within organizations today, and present the evolution of existing frameworks
- Demonstrate effective methods of creating metrics tailored to the needs of a team for different levels of the organization
- Indicate the results of a real case study application, further describing the benefits and disadvantages of integrating sustainable concepts for long-term control
- Share potential opportunities for future research in the field of performance management as an integration towards sustainability in engineering leadership and management studies
Presenter: Sarah Farahdel
Sarah Farahdel is currently a Program Manager at Bombardier Inc. in the Business Aircraft Aviation division. She has significant experience in continuous improvement consulting, contract negotiations and project management for various industries such as aerospace, health care, retail and manufacturing. Prior to this, she has held multiple roles at Bombardier, both in Montreal and Toronto, within the departments of Supply Chain and Logistics, Procurement and the Program Management Office. She holds a B.Eng and MASc. in Industrial Engineering from Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec, focusing her research in performance management and applications of Lean Six Sigma to improve decision-making. Throughout her studies and her work, she has been actively involved in Concordia’s student associations and her surrounding community, such as representing as the President of the Women in Engineering (WIE) association at Concordia and the President and Co-founder of The Operations Research Challenge (TORCH) organization, Montreal Chapter.
Seminar
The content shown is taken from a seminar recording presented by Sarah Farahdel with an accompanying PowerPoint. The full Powerpoint presentation in the seminar can be found by clicking on the link below, which will take you to a google drive folder.
Key Takeaways
- Organizations need effective frameworks to make correct decisions that match their performance objectives. A Performace Management System (PMS) is a framework that comprises four pillars: Sustainable processes and Results, Organization engineering, leadership behavior, and change management.
- Performance Management systems are evaluation systems that use continuous processes of identifying and measuring the developing performance of individuals. They can be applied both academically and in industry.
- Engineers can learn project management skills, allowing them to analyze and improve upon changes, as well as aiding them in organizing their project deliverables. They can communicate more effectively with stakeholders and better measure performance.
- In order to create an effective PMS, it must be applied to all levels of the organization. It can be broken down into 3 levels: Strategic, Tactical, and Operational. Strategic set the business’ goals and evaluate performance. Tactical allocates resources to meet objectives while Operational executes tasks and tracks commitments relative to their real performance.
- To create an effective PMS, one must define roles and responsibilities, create unique metrics, perform performance analysis, assess ROI and feedback, and finally control and sustain the established PMS with a control plan. The most important steps are the first and last steps to ensure the system is sustained and roles and responsibilities are known to everyone.
