EFFICIENCY AND EFFECTIVENESS

Efficiency is how much waste results from your activities. Ideally, you want to minimize waste to achieve high efficiency.

Effectiveness is how well you are achieving your goals. Ideally, you want to maximize the attainment of your goals.

Typically, the business world emphasizes efficiency. “Cut here. Cut there. Reduce expenditures by another 10 percent!” cries management. Determining the effectiveness of an organization often remains an abstract concept until year-end when performance assessment occurs. Then the assessment arrives too late; after the fact, everyone realizes what was efficient but not effective and vice versa. Indeed, sometimes the two can conflict.

Ideally, you want equilibrium between efficiency and effectiveness in whatever you do. Too much emphasis on efficiency results in cheap and shoddy performance. Too much emphasis on effectiveness can lead to wasteful expenditures. Seek moderation in achieving both.

for Achieving Efficiency and Effectiveness

• Determine the overall goal of the endeavor.
• Identify the different ways to achieve the goals.
• Determine the desired levels of cost savings you want to achieve.
• Calculate the cost for implementing each alternative.
• Select the alternative that provides the desired level of cost savings.
• Determine the tasks to execute the selected alternatives.
• Put the tasks in a sequence.
• Take action by following the sequence of tasks.
• Monitor how well the tasks achieve the overall goal.
• Take corrective action, if necessary, by adding, deleting, changing, or resequencing the tasks.