As you can read in Bill Paarlberg’s in-depth interview with Jessica Jones, her path to measurement mavenhood was unusual, to say the least. (That’s her up above, presenting at the 2018 Summit on the Future of Communications Measurement.) It started with studying English Literature, progressed to joining Canada’s Department of Defence, (with all of its 95,000 military personnel and 24,000 civilian employees), and has now arrived at the creation of the Department’s first integrated communications dashboard. I predict she will travel on to even more exciting measurement destinations.
When she took on the task of creating the dashboard, she had no comparable work experience. So she took a course on data modeling. For that alone she deserves an award!
More importantly, she got everyone to agree on objectives and a strategy. For some programs, that was a first; they’d been operating for years without formal written objectives. But, echoing what I’ve said a million times, once she had consensus on the objectives and strategies, the metrics were relatively easy. She actually mapped out the first draft with a colleague on the back of a business card over dinner(!)
(Measurement history moment: I can empathize with Jessica. Many, many years ago, when I was running corporate communications for what was Lotus Development (now IBM), I picked up a napkin one night and mapped out a plan for all the new product rollouts in the upcoming six months. Only then did I realize I had no way to know which ones were more successful than others.)
Jessica did her prep work so well that when she presented her dashboard to management, it was quickly and easily adopted. She’s already produced the first quarterly report. So for her determination, diligence, ability to generate consensus, and overall enthusiasm for measurement, we name her our Maven of the Month. Congrats Jessica Jones! ∞
