How to set KPIs your team won’t ignore

The 4-Step KPI hitting playbook

Heyy team, happy Tuesday from a very sunny Manchester,

I’m headed to Heathrow this afternoon to fly to my my furthest keynote yet, to speak in front of my biggest ever audience. Eek. When I handed in my notice as an Ops Director in 2023, I had a vision for what I wanted to build with Fresh Leadership World… But “flown to the other side of the world to deliver my signature keynote” wasn’t something I’d even dared to put on the vision board.

And yet. Here we are. I’ll reveal where I’m going once I land, and I’ll of course be bringing you the full debrief when I’m back. But for now, thank you. Genuinely. None of this can happen without you backing what I’m building.

But back to the issue at hand…

How to set KPIs your team won’t ignore

I did a training session towards the end of last year with a brilliant creative agency based in Shoreditch, and I keep coming back to this story because I see versions of it everywhere.

The business was growing quickly. New clients coming in, new people joining the team, exciting momentum building every month. And from the outside, it looked like things were going really well.

But internally, they were starting to feel the strain most growing teams eventually hit.

• Communication gaps.

• Confusion around priorities.

• The feeling that everyone is busy, but not always moving in the same direction.

So, naturally, they tried to solve it the way a lot of businesses do. More dashboards and metrics, more KPIs in a push to feel closer to the numbers. And everything became measurable.

But when I sat down with them properly, it became clear that most of those numbers weren’t actually driving behaviour. They existed in spreadsheets, got mentioned in meetings, maybe even looked good in reports… but nobody really felt connected to them at all.

And the reason this story resonated with me so much is because I’ve been that manager too.

I’ve built the giant colourful spreadsheets, tracking every possible metric.
I’ve convinced myself that if I could just measure more things, the team would suddenly click into alignment.

Yet instead, I remember sitting there week after week thinking:

“Are these KPIs wrong?”
“Why does this still feel so hard?”
“Why does it feel like I’m dragging everyone uphill?”

For a while, I blamed the usual suspects, motivation, priorities, workload etc. But deep down, I knew as their leader I had to take accountability for getting the team to actually care about hitting our KPIs.

So I took to finding out what. I started researching, asking them for feedback and making small changes. And very quickly, I discovered that the problem wasn’t my team. It was how I’d set the KPIs in the first place.

So let me walk you through the 4 shifts that turned our deadweight KPIs into real team-owned momentum.

And by the way, one of the reasons we built Custard was because we realised most managers need visibility into the human patterns affecting performance to stop the KPIs start slipping. Make sure you’re on the waitlist for all our launch-day, early-adopter offers.

The 4-Step KPI hitting playbook

Let’s do it

Step 1 - Don’t mix up goals and KPIs

Goals are the destination.
KPIs are the dashboard that tells you if you’re on track.

Dashboards don’t inspire or engage people.
Destinations do.

❌ KPI as a goal: “We need to send the newsletter every Friday.”

✅ Goal first, KPIs second: “We want a healthier sales pipeline so revenue is more predictable. Increasing qualified leads by 20% this quarter helps us get there. The newsletter is one way we’ll achieve that.”

When you lead with the bigger outcome and goal, you give your team clarity, and the freedom to decide how to get there.

Step 2 - 3 beats 10

You’ve probably seen a KPI doc like this:

• 9 KPIs

• All urgent

• All unconnected

• Chaos

But when everything is a priority, nothing is.

Instead, have 3-5 core KPIs for each individual, and 3-5 for the team. This gives people mental clarity and lets them zoom out to the bigger picture.

Step 3 - Stop dropping goals on people, co-create them

Disengagement toward a goal often comes from lack of involvement from the start.

If a KPI shows up out of nowhere, fully formed and unchangeable, people feel like it’s just another thing being done to them.

You want to flip that.

Before locking anything in, ask:

• “What do you think would make the biggest difference this quarter?”

• “What feels like a stretch, but possible?”

• “What support would you need to hit this?”

Action step:
Before finalising a goal or KPI, run a quick session (yes, even 15 mins in a team meeting) asking:
“Here’s the goal, what’s your take? What would be your top three ways to hit it?”

Step 4 - Check-ins should be a rhythm, never a rescue plan

Too many managers only ask about KPIs when something’s gone wrong.

So when they do check in, it creates panic, defensiveness, or the dreaded,
“Oh no… I forgot about that one.”

Instead, normalise having a checkin rhythm. Have one regular meeting where KPIs are reviewed, questions are asked, and progress is discussed.

I’m currently testing out doing it with my team weekly. Every Monday, 10am for 45 mins. They report on the data, I ask the questions.

In the past I’ve done it monthly and it’s worked well too, don’t put too much pressure on getting the perfect rhythm, just start with something.

Outside of that meeting, you don’t keep checking in. The checking up is where it becomes micromanagement. We must start to trust people to run their numbers.

Ask:

• “How are we tracking?”

• “What has gone well, that we should do more of?”

• “What hasn’t gone well, that we need to change”?”

Your 4-Step Playbook

1. Start with the outcome
    → “What do we want to be true if this goes well?”

2. Co-create, don’t dictate
    → “What do you think will move the needle?”

3. Three beats ten
    → “What are our top 3-5 focus areas this quarter?”

4. Review early and often
    → “What’s working, what’s stuck, what’s next?”

And honestly, this is only scratching the surface.

One of the biggest reasons we built Custard was because so many managers are drowning in data, but still struggling to understand what’s actually happening inside their team.

Inside Custard, managers get:

• Clear visibility into the patterns affecting performance, before they become bigger problems

• Weekly team insights that go beyond surface-level KPIs

• AI-powered leadership support to help managers actually take action, not just stare at dashboards

• A simple way to spot issues around communication, accountability, overwhelm and trust early

So instead of reacting when performance drops, managers can lead proactively with clarity and confidence.

We’re limiting the number of businesses we take in on launch day, so make sure you join the Custard waitlist.

But for now, cya, I’ve got a flight to catch. 🌏

H