The Perils of Metrics

Wells Fargo paid $185M in fines and 5,300 people paid with their jobs to bring you this perfect example of metrics dysfunction.

The question that does not seem to have been answered is whether or not the people who set up the system -- the people who put 5,300 line workers in the impossible situation of choosing between losing their jobs when they got caught eventually or losing their jobs right away for not meeting targets -- have themselves been fired.  Or do the higher level metrics show that the system was actually profitable, even net of the fines and costs of employee turnover?

"When you pay people to do something measurable (like open accounts) they do more of it — and not necessarily in a way that actually increases the underlying figure (profit) that you wanted to raise."

http://www.businessinsider.com/wells-fargos-scandal-is-a-cautionary-tale-about-incentive-pay-2016-9