A unit-based team gets its value primarily from the performance targets it sets for itself. When a UBT establishes a clear sense of its performance priorities and has the ability to measure and track improvement over time, team members share a common purpose. Team members then have opportunities to engage their peers in the work of taking the unit from good to great.

Early in the team's development, UBTs identify performance indicators that reflect business and job satisfaction, are meaningful to their unit and support national, regional and local goals. Time is taken to identify these targets and reach agreement on how best to meet them. In addition, team members learn how to obtain, read and use data to drive performance improvements in their unit. 

Data collection

When planning data collection, the team needs to ask itself:

• What will we measure?
• What are the definitions?
• Who will collect the data?
• How and when will the data be collected, and for how long and how often?
• Do we have a process for collecting and entering data?

The best people to create and test data collection are frontline staff.