I’ve had variations on the same conversation three times in the last month. Senior leadership in a company is frustrated because their website keeps going down, their email system isn’t stable, or they’re frustrated by the pace of new features rolled out to their systems and applications. In all three cases they asked me about how to reorganize to fix the issues.

I asked all three of them what the metrics were telling them, and not one of them were using metrics that actually gave them useful data on the problems frustrating them. If you don’t know what the source of the issues are, reorganizing isn’t going to solve the problems. You need to identify, track, and manage metrics that give you useful insight. The right metrics, tracked with discipline, and used to make decisions on priorities and resources are critical to getting the outcomes you want.

Select your metrics thoughtfully. Pull together your team and agree on the metrics needed to measure what matters. Select carefully; too many measurements can bury the useful data in a flood of measurements. More isn’t better.

Track them with discipline. Capture the information effectively and frequently; that does not mean someone fills out a spreadsheet at the end of the month with their best guess from memory.

Review them honestly. By design they are going to identify problems in your processes, people, skills, systems, and/or priorities. You and your team are going to have to have the courage to accept what the data tells you.

Act on the results.

This isn’t easy. It can lead to uncomfortable conversations and decisions. But it will allow you to either fix the root issues or allow you to make conscious decisions about how you’re prioritizing your efforts and allocating your resources. A reorganization might be one of the identified solutions but you’ll be making that decision with clear purpose.