Measuring for reporting vs. measuring for action
Measuring for reporting is asking the question, "What number can I defend?"
Measuring for action is asking the question, "What number drives behavior change?"
Over the years, I've come to the realization that they are mutually exclusive.
Don't assume measuring for reporting will drive behavior change; to drive behavior change, we need the kind of measurement that you can't defend, that regulators and auditors can't accept. Where double counting is rife, and the measure is only directionally accurate.
Take energy, for instance. To measure energy from a reporting perspective, you have to defend the energy consumption of your application; the only way to prove its energy consumption is to look at billing data, which is so delayed and course-grained as to be useless to drive energy efficiency initiatives. If you want to drive behavior change, you need to give energy values that are real-time; those measures are not defensible, they double count, and they are imprecise, but they drive behavior change. We need both, but we have to focus on measurement for action.