March 2015 – The finance storyteller

Ancient business wisdom says “What gets measured gets done”. Business leaders and financial executives have used this heuristic to design and implement key performance indicators that link to the company’s strategy. A related rule of thumb is that it’s only fair to measure people on things they can influence.

But does and should the opposite also apply? “What does not get measured, does not get done”? Logically speaking, maybe that should be the case, and many employees seem to implicitly use this statement to justify not taking certain actions (“if it is not measured, then it doesn’t help me on my performance review, or get me a bigger bonus, and it isn’t worth doing”). However, this assumes that the key performance indicators have been correctly chosen by the company, are fair indicators of the company’s success, and that everything that is truly important can be (numerically) measured.

In my view, we should look to moral philosophy for guidance, rather than business literature. Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill held the view that “the moral worth of an action is determined by its outcome” (utilitarianism, consequentialism). Immanuel Kant disliked this utilitarian approach, as good consequences could arise by accident from an action that was motivated by a desire to cause harm to an innocent person, and bad consequences could arise from an action that was well-motivated. Instead, Kant proposes to focus on principles: “There are principles that are intrinsically valid; they are good in and of themselves; they must be obeyed in all, and by all, situations and circumstances”.

Based on Kant’s principle-based ethics, I would reject the “What does not get measured, does not get done” viewpoint. Some fundamental principles of doing the right things (leadership), doing things right (execution excellence) and doing right (integrity), cannot necessarily be fully measured by key performance indicators in a utilitarian way. There’s definitely a context to what we do in business….

Culture matters. A lot. Our cultural background shapes the way we view the world, what we find “normal” or “strange”. Cultural biases are very strong in human beings, though they can be overcome by awareness and appreciation of other cultures, through travel and exposure to alternative ways of viewing the world.

Culture even plays a very big role in the financial reporting of companies. And not just in the “technical”/numerical sections, where how we keep the score is influenced by the rules and principles we apply to the calculation (US GAAP used in the US, IFRS used in 120+ countries globally, or “local GAAP”). Each of these accounting frameworks for reporting to the stock market has its own definitions and calculations of metrics such as “profit”. These might be similar in many cases, but are not fully identical.

Culture is much more evident in the “branding” and contextual sections of the annual report, such as the title that is chosen for an annual report, or the messages from the senior leadership in the “letter to the shareholders”.

Both in my years as an employee, as well as in those as a trainer and external consultant, I have mostly worked for global companies with American roots. I like the optimism, forward-looking orientation, and passion to “dream big” that is embedded in American culture. It shines through in the annual report: much of what the CEO is sharing (in the letter to the shareholders) is about the initiatives the company is implementing, the market opportunities it is pursuing, and the great future that is ahead of us. Some time is spent on recent results, but looking back at last year is mostly done in the “Management’s Discussion and Analysis (MD&A)” section, which is much further down the annual report (the smaller font “technical” section that fewer readers get to).

If we then turn to the annual report of a British company, we will find a Chairman’s Review and a Chief Excecutive’s Review (reflecting the two-tier structure in the UK, versus the Chairman-CEO single point of power in the US) that largely deal with last year’s performance, with possibly a little reference to what this means for the future of the company. The tone of these is much more modest, at times even apologetic, versus their more optimistic or even aggressive US counterparts.

The most overly optimistic annual report title (versus the actual financial results) I have ever seen was in the midst of the financial crisis, in the Caterpillar 2009 annual report: the title “How we win” suggests that the company has done very well, while the financial overview shows a 37% drop in revenues versus the prior year, and a whopping 75% (!) drop in profitability versus prior year. Caterpillar is a global company with clear American roots. Worth going beyond the cover page and the impressive marketing/branding efforts on people and products, to get a more holistic view once you go through the key financials (revenue, operating margin, cash flow from operating activities).

It’s worthwhile to review a company’s annual report, as a shareholder, employee, customer, or supplier. But before you dive in, ask yourself what the context is of the (narrative or financial) messages you are looking at!