Most CEOs live and die by quarterly revenue, market share, and efficiency metrics. But the very tools we use to measure progress often erode it. Traditional KPIs prioritize the easy to track over the things that truly drive resilience, creating a dangerous illusion of progress. Companies hit numbers, but lose their long-term advantage, misalign their teams, and overlook the dependencies that sustain growth.
Even a good-looking scorecard and short-term wins can hollow out your long-term advantage. The recent debate over Fed interest rates has shown how a single data point can move from fact to question that sends debatable signals about trust in sources, motivations for preferring one indicator over another, and how geopolitical factors can quickly reshape the situation.
The message is clear. Numbers that once felt stable are now signals of contention. There's nothing wrong with the saying, “What gets measured gets done.” But that's no longer enough. To know if progress is real, today's leaders need to look beyond historical KPIs to understand how future value is created, measured, and connected.
short term trap
Quarterly goals provide clarity of focus but narrow vision, optimizing for the next earnings release, evaluating the easy things at the expense of what matters most, and providing instant validation.
This is where the revolution in business models, particularly the rise of the subscription economy, provides an important reminder to skeptics. Revenues for subscription-based companies have increased by more than 435%, far outpacing the S&P 500, and the total subscription market is estimated at $557.8 billion in 2025 and is projected to reach $1.9 trillion by 2035, an incredible 250% increase. This is changing the game.
Subscription models are built for long-term thinking. Unlike one-time sales that reward immediate revenue, we prioritize lifetime value, churn, and retention. And the market is moving as follows.
● From transactions to relationships: Sales of one-off products end upon conversion. Subscriptions start there, and customer trust and continued satisfaction are the foundation of success.
● From numbers to value: Traditional KPIs tempt leaders to track activity. Make phone calls, launch campaigns, and close deals. Subscriptions reveal whether a customer actually stays or not. Churn is relentless. Companies need to address the root cause, not just the optics.
● From finite to permanent:Products have a sales cycle. Subscriptions generate data insights and a predictable, recurring revenue stream to guide and support your investments.
The lesson is clear. Value is moving from being something that simply drives the next quarter to something that lasts and creates a foundation for growth.
Internal efficiency and external influence
One of the hidden risks of KPI-driven management is mistaking internal activity for external impact. Dashboards may glow green and reports may look impressive, but the customer and employee experience tells a different story.
Busyness is often the culprit. Research shows that 43% of employees spend more than 10 hours a week doing work that is primarily for show, resulting in one full day being lost every two weeks. Energy is expended during exercise, but very little energy is used to move your business forward.
Codifying this busyness into KPIs doubles the cost. 10% revenue growth looks solid until customer acquisition costs double and become unprofitable. Without context, performance signals distort reality and lull leaders into a false sense of confidence. One global operator explained the dangers. One team was rewarded for selling adjacent services, while another was recognized for reducing order changes. Customers responded positively to the first effort, but the second one resulted in fees. Each team achieved their KPIs. Overall, the business suffered losses.
Such mismatches are more common than most leaders realize. It creates the illusion of progress while quietly eroding trust and value. Internal efficiency means little if it compromises external outcomes. The real test for CEOs is whether the organization's energy is aligned with what customers, employees, and markets are actually experiencing.
Redefining value from context
Value is never created in isolation. It grows through interdependence. customers, employees, suppliers, ecosystems, and even competitors. Ignoring the interdependencies that actually sustain growth can leave companies looking strong on paper but vulnerable in reality. Internal efficiency without external influence is not a value. It's erosion.
We see this in every industry. Companies that focus too much on their own metrics can inadvertently destabilize their partners and suppliers and limit their own growth. For example, retail transformation requires payment providers to enable new forms of transactions, communications networks to connect stores, and supply chains to be agile. Just one weak link can derail a well-intentioned effort. In contrast, the situation changes when leaders weigh the results in the context of their own networks. Market creation takes precedence over direct acquisition, platform enablement over one-off sales, and collaborative acceleration over siled efficiency.
The great value lies in recognizing the optionality within such dependencies. Leaders who understand how customers, employees, suppliers, and ecosystems are connected can pursue multiple paths rather than sticking to a single course. It's about knowing what tools exist, where interdependencies create strengths and vulnerabilities, and how much weight the business itself carries within the system. Recognizing these connections allows leaders to steer with flexibility, resilience, and intention.
Redefine value on your terms
If you only measure the “what,” you risk hollowing out your business from within. The solution is not to abandon measurement, but to redefine it.
Three shifts are essential.
• Reframe metrics from outputs to results. Don't just ask what was offered, ask why it is important. Think beyond closed deals and efficiency ratios to customer loyalty, employee trust, and ecosystem impact. These are more difficult to measure, but they are enduring.
• Collaborate across the enterprise. Eliminate measurement silos. KPIs that reward one team and penalize another create false wins. CEOs must ensure that internal efficiency complements external value.
• Lead with conviction, not just data.. Numbers should inform decisions, not replace them. Executives must develop the courage to speak out based on long-term integrity and understanding of the ecosystem, even if it goes against the outlook for the next quarter.
Redefining value is not about polishing up your dashboards. It's about choosing the future. Measurements fixed in the past keep leaders there. Redefining your values will pave the way. CEOs who master this don't just report movement, they set direction, expand possibilities, manage interdependencies, and materialize progress in ways that others can build on.
