Goodhart's law: the metric as a target
The last trap is about the metrics themselves. As soon as a metric is made a target, people start gaming it, and it stops reflecting what it was introduced for.
A call center decided to push the "calls per hour" metric. Move the pressure on the metric. At first both the metric and the real value (the quality of the conversation with the customer) grow together โ all is well.
What it means
When setting goals (OKRs, KPIs), experienced teams always ask: "how can this goal be gamed to the detriment of the business?" โ and add a counter-metric that will catch it.
This is a direct bridge to the second part of the site: in every metric hierarchy the bottom level is guardrails. They exist precisely because of Goodhart's law.
Where it shows up
Schools that drill for the test instead of knowledge; hospitals turning away severe patients to improve mortality statistics; social networks burning out their audience for momentary engagement.
Everywhere the same: one indicator got optimized โ and the system it was supposed to measure broke.