Government to study quality of life indicators, wary of KPIs that ‘drive the wrong behaviour’: Chan Chun Sing

He suggested four dimensions of social progress for consideration: material adequacy, access to essential services, social connectedness to Singapore and subjective well-being.

Another NMP, Dr Haresh Singaraju, asked who would build the quality-of-life measure, when it would be presented to parliament and whether it would be published, even if it does not count toward the national bonus.

Mr Chan said the government wants to broaden the indicator, but there has to be data that can be collected and organised into a stable series before targets can be set.

It is not easy to set such indicators because they may be qualitative rather than quantitative, and some factors should be measured over multiple years, rather than a single year, he said.

“We certainly do not want to set the wrong KPI (key performance indicators) to encourage or drive the wrong behaviour,” he added.

Mr Chan said some important things in life cannot be measured, and Singapore must be careful not to only value the things that can be measured.

He said the Public Service Division will look into this and come up with a proposal on what is feasible and possible.

Mr Chan, who is also defence minister, responded to a question on whether the government would consider including indicators that reflect Singapore’s capacity to thrive in the medium- and long-term, beyond the immediate social and economic performance.

“The job of the Cabinet, the job of the leadership team, is not just about meeting the KPIs on a yearly basis, and the here and now,” he said.