Stat Check

This is an exciting time of the year for football fans. The college season has wrapped up, and the NFL playoffs are in full swing. Plus, our hometown Denver Broncos are still in the hunt for a Super Bowl ring.

Even at this exciting time of year, for some fans, the games just aren’t enough. They want to know all the stats, even down to obscure and downright bizarre stats, such as who threw the most touchdowns against a 3-4 defense in the fourth quarter when the temperature was below 32 degrees.

Even when the stats being tracked are beyond what most fans would find interesting or relevant, there is a common theme in the stats: they measure outcomes. What isn’t usually measured and shared is the background work it takes to achieve the outcomes. You won’t hear sports pundits reporting on how many squats the team did during training camp or how many completions a quarterback makes during training camp drills. Even for the geekiest stats geek, outcomes are what are really worth tracking. The process of getting to the outcomes is important, but they are not a real measure of success and/or failure. They aren’t deliverables.

So why am I going off on this tangent? Because I have been noticing lately that in the field of serving individuals with intellectual disabilities, we aren’t doing a great job of tracking outcomes. Instead, we seem to be focusing on everything else. I hear organizations reporting all the time on how many employees are being trained on Person Centered Thinking, or how many new computer programs are being used, or how departments are being re-organized. All of those are fine and important, but they aren’t outcomes or deliverables.

And unfortunately, when we do take the time to measure outcomes, the results are depressing. Has departmental re-organization led to more jobs for individuals with developmental disabilities? No. We should measure if Person Centered Thinking has led to more individuals getting services, or better services.

We’re spending a great deal of time and energy talking, planning, putting together agendas and giving presentations, but we’re not getting great outcomes as a result. I think that is most unfortunate. Look, I understand that preparation and training are important in our field. I am in support of a Person Centered Thinking for providing services. I want providers and regulatory agencies to have the latest software if that makes them more effective and efficient at their jobs, and I want departmental structures that make sense and help move service delivery forward.

But we have to stop pretending that those things are any more than a means to an end. If we only measure the means, we are ignoring our true obligations and obfuscating the real issues. We’re watering the plant but not getting any fruit. The people we serve need outcomes that increase their abilities to be fully participating members in their communities. And we need to measure those outcomes to see if we are succeeding or failing. Simply measuring the means is not the means to get anywhere.

Then again, what do I know?