Businesses can improve their processes, both operational and financial, in order to remain competitive in today's marketplace. To accomplish this, it is necessary to develop a method of specifically measuring improvement. Because, as the adage goes, "what cannot be measured cannot be managed." Businesses create metrics, which are measurable details of a process, in order to gather data about a process both before and after a change is implemented to address this problem. Analysis of these metrics provides information about how much the change improved the process, if it did at all, and how much of an improvement it made. Prior to getting started, it's critical to identify the metrics that are most appropriate for your process.