As a matter of practice, prior to 1992 all businesses measured their success based on financial (outcome) metrics alone. Kaplan & Norton wrote an article for the Jan-Feb 1992 issue of the Harvard Business Review Magazine titled “The Balanced Scorecard – Measures that drive Performance.” This completely changed the metrics businesses focused on as well as utilized in order to measure, improve and manage their performance and the resulting outcomes. Now, just about every business uses some form of the Balanced Scorecard in the management of their business. There are numerous short coming in traditional safety management in various industries, but more specifically in construction project delivery processes procedures and practices. Virtually all safety metrics are historic and almost all interventions are directed at their workforce.  

Management is responsible as well as focused on efficient and effective operations. Specific information is required to manage and successfully accomplish this. The traditional financial measures used were historical, outcome metrics, which tell you how you have done in the past, but not much else.     To manage effectively, management needs information that tells them in real time how well the organizational and operational systems are performing in order to meet business challenges, customer needs and expectations, incorporating innovative improvements, enhancing profitability as well as sustain growth. These require process metrics. Management also needs information on how quickly things are improving when they do implement a change. This requires progress metrics. To manage effectively all three of these metrics are useful as well as required.