… “Reporting is fishing in every part of its definition. Firstly, since reporting is addressed to people to whom you are subordinate, those who write it inevitably have a conflict of interest. Rather than passing on information honestly, they have good reason to put themselves forward, or at any rate to hide their own shortcomings.
Secondly, periodicity doesn’t necessarily mean better information management. To carry out a task, employees transmit or request the data needed to complete it before the reporting date.
Thirdly, standardization ensures that reporting is not adapted to the task in hand, unless the task itself is standardized. When employees have to produce analyses or give training courses, reporting tends to measure not the work done, but simply the time spent, the number of pages produced or the number of participants.”…
