Scorecards for Every Role: How to Build Metrics That Actually Drive Performance

Feb 10

This post is written by Adam Frederico.

Adam Frederico grew up in Utah surrounded by entrepreneurial family members, including his father, Russell Frederico, the founder of what is now Frederico Outdoor Living. Adam has a bachelors in business from BYU and an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business

I run a landscaping design-build company in Utah where we focus on creating lasting visions for the discerning clients with whom we work. Getting this work done though is more like threading a needle with a blind fold on. Managing crews, trucks, equipment, rain, snow, wind, materials, subcontractors, and ever-changing decisions from the homeowners. In that world, “work harder” isn’t a strategy. Clarity is. I’ll be honest, in my five years of running the company, there hasn’t been clarity. But in 2026 we are tweaking things to gain even more clarity in our organization.

That’s why we run scorecards for every role. It’s an evolving process as we learn and iterate!

A scorecard does one thing really well: it defines what “winning” looks like in a way that’s measurable, visible, and coachable. When you do it right, your team doesn’t need you hovering. They can self-correct.

Here’s the approach we use at Frederico Outdoor Living, with real examples from our internal scorecard.

Start with one North Star

For us, the primary metric is Revenue Per Hour. And this largely falls on our production team to plan and execute per week and per crew. It’s our best leading indicator.

Why? Because it forces operational excellence without getting lost in opinions. It blends productivity, planning, execution, leadership, and waste. If revenue per hour is healthy, a lot of things are going right.

The other key metrics are materials spend and of course gross margin. We track:

Internal gross margin vs subcontracted gross margin
Blended gross margin
Job-specific materials variance (budget vs actual)

Revenue per hour keeps us moving. Material variance keep expenses down.

Step 1: Define the job

I try to go through an exercise to answer the question, “if I get to the end of my week, how do I know if it’s successful?” I hate going into a weekend and feeling like my week was just a blur. As the head of my company, I have two areas that I track – did we sign any new jobs and what was our recent net margin report.

“I am successful at the end of the week if XYZ happened”

Not a job description. A purpose statement tied to outcomes.

Examples:

Estimating is successful when they deliver accurate proposals on time so sales can close work confidently.
Procurement is successful when they get the right materials at the right cost at the right time.
A project manager is successful when clients have been updated, revenue variance is less than 5% for the week, and warranty as a percent of revenue is under 1%.

If you can’t define the outcome, you’ll end up measuring activity instead of impact.

Step 2: Give every role a metric

This is where most businesses mess up. They create a “dashboard” with 14 KPIs per person and call it accountability.

I’ve done this before and… it’s a train wreck. My leadership scorecard used to have 15 metrics on it and no one knew what the focus was.

People can hold about two or three things in their head and execute at a high level.

So we do:

Primary metric = the scoreboard (win/lose)
Secondary metrics = quality + consistency (how we win without breaking things)

Step 3: Make the metric measurable without debate

A real scorecard includes:

Metric name
Exact calculation
Cadence (weekly/monthly/quarterly)
Owner (who reports it)
Targets + trigger points
Optional: bonus and write-up trigger

If someone can argue about the number, you don’t have a metric—you have a meeting topic.

Step 4: Build the field scoreboard

Here’s one of the most practical things we do in production:

We calculate total projected hours for the project.
We divide by crew size (and translate into days).
We communicate the expectation clearly to the field team:
“This scope is X hours. With a crew of Y, that’s Z days. Here’s the plan.”

Now we’re not managing “who’s a good crew lead” or “who is slow” or “who got delt a bad hand” —we’re managing math, pace, and execution. Clearly articulated weekly.

And when the job starts slipping, we can diagnose:

scope creep
missed planning
material delays
inefficient sequencing
rework
leadership breakdown

Real examples from our scorecard (what we track by role)

Below are examples pulled directly from our internal scorecard tab. Notice the pattern: simple, clear, and tied to outcomes.

Estimating

Primary: Proposals completed and sent to sales on time as per internal deadlines (weekly)

Secondary: Fewer than 5 missed items (monthly)
Accountability trigger: missed deadlines or major missed scope = write up

Procurement

Primary: Job-specific materials variance (budget vs actual)
Bonus concept: share in savings when materials come in under budget (with rules)
Accountability trigger: preventable returns or repeated overages = write up

Site Super / Project Leadership

Primary: Revenue per hour on their projects (weekly target of $175/hr)
Secondary: Warranty spend under 1% per quarter
Secondary: Change order revenue performance (monthly) with gross margin bonus
Accountability trigger: extended dips below an acceptable floor (3 weeks of under $175/hr)

Director of Production

Primary: Gross margin average for the projects (monthly)

Crew Lead

Primary: Revenue per hour on their project (weekly)
Secondary: End-of-day reporting compliance - five out of five days
Secondary: Safety/equipment accountability (no preventable incidents)

Fleet

Primary: Machine utilization > a target percentage of 50% (weekly)
Accountability trigger: sustained utilization below a minimum floor of 30%

Accounting

Primary: Books soft closed within 7 business days (monthly)
Secondary: Invoicing completed weekly (yes/no) with billing breakdowns

Sales

Primary: Signed proposals per month (monthly)
Accountability trigger: gross margin must be at or above floor (ex: don’t fill the month with small jobs or unprofitable jobs that break the model)

Design

Primary: Billable design hours per designer (weekly) - above 25
Secondary: Design/build conversion rate into production (varies) - 80%

Step 5: Tie scorecards to a meeting rhythm

Metrics don’t work if they live in a spreadsheet no one looks at. We put the metrics into the department L-10’s so it’s tracked and visible.

We run:

Weekly: production + role scorecards (fast review, solve issues)
Monthly: financial scorecard (margin, labor, materials, cash)
Quarterly: recalibrate targets + refine metrics

A scorecard is a coaching tool, not a gotcha tool. But it only coaches if you review it consistently.

Step 6: Use incentives carefully, adhering to Core Values

Scorecards should reinforce culture. For us, that means:

Own the Job (take responsibility for outcomes)
Win Together (no silo wins)
Surprise & Delight (quality and experience still matter)
Integrity in All Aspects (no gaming numbers)

Starting from scratch?

If you’re starting from scratch, here’s the fastest way:

Pick a company North Star (profit, cash conversion, revenue per hour, etc.).
Choose 5–7 “key functions” scorecard items (sales, ops, finance, etc.).
For each role, write:

- “This role is successful at end of week if XYZ happens…”
- One primary metric
- A secondary metric, if applicable
Define calculation + cadence.
Review weekly and refine monthly for 90 days.

The first version won’t be perfect. That’s fine. A living scorecard beats a perfect spreadsheet nobody uses.

Final thought

Scorecards are tough. When in doubt, simplify.

When people know the target, how it’s measured, and how often it’s reviewed, they can run their lane with confidence.

Our theme this year is “Operational Excellence” – and I hope to report back at the end of the year to explain if our scorecards were truly a leading indicator of our success in 2026!

Adam Frederico