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Measurability bias drives the investment and development of HR technology to focus on only half the field.

Hiring, training, performance management, and core HR (payroll, admin) receive the lion's share of resources.

Leadership, motivation, organizational development, and culture are harder to measure so get less attention.

In its very design, industrial/organizational (I/O) psychology (a.k.a. "psychology of work") reveals something nuanced and supremely relevant about what drives behavior in organizations.

Industrial psychology treats the individual as the unit of measure, while organizational psychology measures the group. The former tends to be measured quantitatively, while the latter tends to be measured qualitatively.

So, what falls on the “I” side (selection, training, performance management, core human resources [HR]) is very different than what falls on the “O” side (leadership, motivation, organizational development, culture).

From a technological investment point of view, “I” has a lot going for it. For starters, only quantitative data flows cleanly into a system of record, so there’s a built-in motivation for organizational use. But that’s not even the half of it.

Measure Twice, Cut Once

Measurability bias describes the tendency of people to prioritize easily quantifiable metrics over qualitative factors that are difficult, if not impossible, to measure.

It’s not hard to understand why. Easily quantifiable metrics require a lot less thinking and ostensibly provide a lot more certainty. (Of course, “ostensibly” is necessary because they’re so often applied incorrectly.)

Human beings hate uncertainty at a........

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