Happy New Year ... and introducing TrueValueMetrics blogspot.

Dear Colleagues

Happy New Year to all.

Hopefully 2011 will see some important changes in the way in which economic and social metrics are handled.

There is something rather disconcerting about the fact that the New York Stock Market price index is suggesting that the economy is doing as well now as it was in the period before the near catastrophic collapse of Lehman Brothers and the implosion of the financial and housing sectors. The Stock Market closed at the end of 2010, higher then pre-Lehman. As one might say in the vernacular "Go figure!"

Of course a big part of the corporate sector has been able to survive and its stockholders prosper by putting a singular focus on profit performance, ignoring everything else. Employment is not in the corporate performance metrics anywhere, yet this is bigger in socio-economic performance impact than profit. If anyone needs convincing that better metrics are needed, I would argue that this aberration is a good argument.

It is easy to improve profit by moving economic activity from a high wage location to a low wage location ... and to lower a host of regulatory standards at the same time. Big corporations have no loyalty to location ... and maybe they should not ... but they should be measured in some way not only for profit performance but also social behavior.

Corporate owners and the stockmarkets are not the only place to point blame. Unions and workers who have engaged in work rule featherbedding should take some of the blame. Nothing is gained by making a corporate business uneconomic and unprofitable ... yet this has been done over and over again by unions and workers.

And of course managers in the corporate world need to share blame as well ... they are the decision makers, and they have made their choices. The choices made by too many high level managers have been self serving, and in due course there should be metrics that sort out those managers that really deserve their rewards and those that do not.

Some of this will become more apparent as time goes on ... some in 2011.

Most of the blogging that has been on Community Analytics CA will start to appear on a new blog True Value Metrics in 2011. This reflects the way the name change has progressed during 2011 and the need to move away from Community Analytics because of a conflict with another organization using the same name. Though we are in different fields, the potential for confusion is too high and since they were in place first, we must move on! The URL is: http://truevaluemetrics.blogspot.com

All the best for 2011.

Peter Burgess