Internal operations teams have evolved, but the way we measure their productivity? Not so much. We’re still talking about things like "tickets closed" or "average resolution time" as if those numbers tell the full story. Spoiler: they don’t.
If you’re on an internal ops team (think IT, PeopleOps, HR, FinanceOps), you know the job isn’t just about clearing a queue. It’s about streamlining internal operations, enabling other teams to move fast, and making sure the organization runs like a well-oiled machine. And that requires a smarter way to measure success.
So let’s dive into why traditional metrics fall short, what you should be measuring instead, and how platforms like Siit can help your team track, automate, and optimize the stuff that really matters.
Why Traditional Productivity Metrics Are Outdated
We get it. It’s tempting to look at high-volume metrics—"We closed 500 service requests from employees this month!"—and call it a win. But if most of those were basic password resets, or if resolution times were quick but the solutions weren’t actually helpful, are we really measuring productivity?
Here's where traditional metrics trip us up:
- They prioritize quantity over quality. Closing a ticket fast doesn’t mean the issue was resolved well.
- They ignore context. A complex tool access issue shouldn’t be compared to a name change form.
- They create incentives to work faster—not smarter. Teams start rushing through requests to hit arbitrary numbers.
It’s time to shift our focus to metrics that reflect actual value, operational impact, and employee satisfaction.
What Internal Ops Teams Should Actually Be Measuring
Let’s talk about the metrics that matter—the ones that tell you how well your team is actually supporting the business.
1. Time to Resolution (With Context!)
Speed is still important—but it needs to be contextualized. Instead of aiming for the lowest time-to-close across the board, track resolution time by request type, urgency, and department.
Siit’s Request Attributes and Business Hours tracking help you analyze how long each type of service request from employees takes and whether you're staying within SLA targets. It's resolution time—but smarter.
2. First Contact Resolution Rate
If a request is resolved during the first interaction without bouncing between teams or waiting on more info, that’s a win. This metric shows how effective your frontline support is—and how well your internal documentation supports it.
With Siit’s Comments, Request Followers, and 360° Employee Profiles, IT admins and ops folks have all the context they need to resolve requests right out of the gate.
3. Employee Satisfaction
Quantity doesn’t mean quality. That’s why it’s critical to ask employees how helpful your team was—not just whether their issue got resolved.
Siit lets you send Satisfaction Surveys after requests are closed, giving you insight into how your team is perceived and where you can improve.
4. Self-Service Deflection Rate
If employees can help themselves, they don’t need to create a request. That’s good. In fact, that’s the goal.
Siit’s Self-Service Portal and AI Article Suggestion work together to surface answers before the employee even opens a request. The higher your deflection rate, the more scalable your internal support becomes.
5. Automation Coverage (a.k.a. Workflow Efficiency)
You should know how much of your workflow is still manual. Every repeatable process—like onboarding, access provisioning, or expense approval—should be automated.
With Siit’s AI-Powered Workflows, Power Actions, and Rapid Approvals, you can track automation adoption and identify what’s still eating up your team's time.
Bring Context Into the Equation with Better Tools
Metrics are only as good as the data behind them—and if your tools don’t talk to each other, you’re stuck manually pulling reports and guessing at performance.
It’s one thing to track a few metrics in isolation, but when your service desk runs on fragmented systems—email over here, approvals in a spreadsheet, employee data in an HR tool, and request logs buried in Slack—it becomes nearly impossible to get a full picture of what’s actually happening. You’re spending more time hunting for context than solving problems.
That’s why Siit’s integrations are a game-changer. It connects with the platforms your team already relies on every day, including:
This helps pull all the operational data you need into one place. No more jumping between tools to understand a request, track approvals, or chase down performance metrics.
Let’s say a service request comes in through Slack, relates to onboarding, and needs approval from HR. With Siit:
- The request is automatically triaged and routed to the right person.
- It’s enriched with context pulled from BambooHR, so you know the employee’s role, department, and status.
- Approvals can be triggered instantly using Rapid Approvals, no email threads required.
- The entire process is logged, measured, and visible in real-time dashboards.
Now multiply that by every other workflow your team manages—tool access, hardware provisioning, offboarding, security escalations—and suddenly you’ve got a single system of truth for internal operations.
This kind of visibility isn’t just helpful—it’s essential. It lets you answer questions like:
- Where are service requests getting stuck?
- Which teams or workflows are generating the most volume?
- What processes can we automate next?
With Siit, you’re not just collecting data—you’re connecting it, interpreting it, and using it to optimize how your team works, supports, and scales.
Build a Reporting Culture (Without the Spreadsheet Circus)
Manually exporting data and stitching together metrics in spreadsheets is not the move.
Siit’s Analytics & Reporting dashboards give ops teams real-time visibility into what matters most, including:
- Top request categories and bottlenecks
- SLA compliance by team or department
- Request backlog trends
- Automation impact (before vs. after)
- Employee satisfaction by request type or owner
No more guessing. No more last-minute reporting fire drills.
Focus on What Actually Moves the Needle
It’s time to leave vanity metrics behind. Counting how many tickets your team closes doesn’t show how well you’re supporting your organization. Instead, focus on:
- Resolution quality and consistency
- Self-service deflection and automation impact
- Employee satisfaction and feedback
- Real performance, not just busywork
Siit helps you get there with automation, real-time reporting, smart integrations, and a service-first approach to ITSM.
Sign up for a free trial and start tracking the metrics that actually matter.
Ditch outdated IT metrics. Learn which KPIs actually reflect performance, employee satisfaction, and workflow efficiency—and how Siit helps you track them all.
